Abit Socket 462 System Board User's Guide download pdf (Page 104)

Chapter 5: Software support

5.4 Using the Promise5.4 Using the Promise

5.4 Using the Promise

Chip for RAID 0 or 1Chip for RAID 0 or 1

Chip for RAID 0 or 1

The Promise

chip, PDC20276, onboard the A7V333, offers a high

performance Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID) configuration

that supports only UltraDMA-133/100/66/33, EIDE or FastATA-2 hard disks.

After connecting two hard disks to the motherboard, activating either RAID 0

or 1 function is easily configured through the MBFastTrak133™ “Lite” firmware

BIOS during boot up. In addition, the support CD permits installation of

system drivers according to the Operating System (OS) on your computer.

Read through this section in its entirety before setting up a new RAID system.

RAID 0 is also known as “data striping.” Striping optimizes two identical

hard disk drives to read and write data in parallel, interleaved stacks. Two

hard disks perform the same work as a single drive, and at a sustained data

transfer rate double that of a single disk alone. The main advantage of a

RAID 0 array is to improve the Speed Performance of data access and

storage. With FAT32 and NTFS partitioning, the array will be addressed as

one large volume.

RAID 1 is also known as “data mirroring.” Mirroring optimizes two identical

hard disk drives to copy all data from one hard disk drive to the other and

vice versa. As new data is written, it is duplicated onto both disks using a

parallel write process. The main advantage of RAID 1 is that it greatly

increases Fault Tolerance of the entire system, especially if each hard disk is

connected separately to both ATA-133 IDE channels available on the A7V333.

Should one hard disk suffer mechanical trouble, all system data will be

preserved on the other drive.

IMPORTANT! Before setting up your new RAID array, verify the status

of your hard disks. It is possible to use a pre-existing hard disk for RAID

0 only if the data is backed up before configuring the array as all hard

disk data will be lost during the set up. RAID 0 requires at least two hard

disks for optimal results. It is possible to use a pre-existing hard disk for

RAID 1 to duplicate the source data; also, RAID 1 can set up two or more

new disks. The Promise

chip, the FastTrak™ “Lite” BIOS and the

FastBuild™ Utility on the A7V333 permit only two disks to be configured

in RAID 0 or RAID 1 pairs and combinations; a third, “hot” spare hard

disk may be used to support a RAID 1 array; (see the end of this section

for more detail). For optimal performance, install only identical hard disks

of the same model and storage capacity. Use only UltraDMA-100/66

compatible IDE cables and connectors. The Promise

chip also supports

UltraDMA-133 specifications of up to 133 MB/sec per disk, with or without

multiple disk arrays up to four hard disks.

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Abit Socket 462 System Board User's Guide Page 104

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