Asus P4V800D-X - Manual (Page 66)

ASUS P4V800D-X Motherboard 3-5
If you use either Windows ® XP or Windows ® 2000 operating system (OS), copy
first the RAID driver from the support CD to a floppy disk before creating RAID
configurations. Refer to section “5.5 Creating a RAID driver disk” for details.
3.3 VIA RAID configurations
The motherboard includes a high performance IDE RAID controller integrated in
the VIA VT8237R+ southbridge chipset. It supports RAID 0, RAID 1 and JBOD with
two independent Serial ATA channels.
RAID 0 (called Data 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 but at a sustained data transfer rate, double that of a single disk
alone, thus improving data access and storage. Use of two new identical hard disk
drives is required for this setup.
RAID 1 (called Data mirroring) copies and maintains an identical image of data
from one drive to a second drive. If one drive fails, the disk array management
software directs all applications to the surviving drive as it contains a complete
copy of the data in the other drive. This RAID configuration provides data protection
and increases fault tolerance to the entire system. Use two new drives or use an
existing drive and a new drive for this setup. The new drive must be of the same
size or larger than the existing drive.
JBOD (Spanning) stands for Just a Bunch of Disks and refers to hard disk drives
that are not yet configured as a RAID set. This configuration stores the same data
redundantly on multiple disks that appear as a single disk on the operating system.
Spanning does not deliver any advantage over using separate disks independently
and does not provide fault tolerance or other RAID performance benefits.
3.3.1 Installing hard disks
The motherboard supports Ultra DMA 133/100/66/33 and Serial ATA hard disk
drives. For optimal performance, install identical drives of the same model and
capacity when creating a disk array.
Installing Serial ATA (SATA) hard disks
To install the SATA hard disks for a RAID configuration:
1. Install the SATA hard disks into the drive bays.
2. Connect the SATA signal cables.
3. Connect a SATA power cable to the power connector on each drive.