USB RAID

[4pyros]

Has any one tried to made a raid array out of usb thumb drives under windows 7 standard edition?

 

[ronsimpson]

Sounds slow.

 

[4pyros]

Yes I have read they might be slow. But the newer ones are much faster and if you strip them they are even faster.

 

[KeepItSimpleStupid]

USB3 SSD's are a bit faster yet.

 

[jpanhalt]

Presumably, you are talking about the Intel controller? Despite that ambiguity, I suspect an internal SSD drive in RAID 1 will beat a USB2. I have no real experience with USB3 and can't see from a practical standpoint why you would want Raid 0 for an SSD. But then, I read real slowly.

John

 

[heydonms]

What exactly are you trying to achieve? There are plenty of people who have tried it and the results tend to be "yes it works, but it is only practical for very specific situations".

Given that a single SSD can pretty much saturate a USB3 link, all you are doing by striping is increasing your overhead and failure rate.

 

[4pyros]

Presumably, you are talking about the Intel controller?

No it would have to be a software controller.

 

[4pyros]

What exactly are you trying to achieve?

Just trying to find something to do with a bunch of cheep drives. It would be neat if you could put a bunch in a hub and have them work like one drive.

 

[heydonms]

Well, you can, and if you already have the drives and hub then I guess it is just a question of whether it interests you enough to do it. It is pretty impractical so curiosity and your amusement are really the main reasons to do it. If you are going to go buy the drives then you are almost certainly better off just getting a single large thumb drive or SSD rather than messing around with smaller ones and RAID.

 

[4pyros]

Well, you can, and if you already have the drives and hub then I guess it is just a question of whether it interests you enough to do it. It is pretty impractical so curiosity and your amusement are really the main reasons to do it. If you are going to go buy the drives then you are almost certainly better off just getting a single large thumb drive or SSD rather than messing around with smaller ones and RAID.

Yes it may be fun to try, but I can not find any windows based software to run a USB RAID.

 

[heydonms]

I can't help but think you haven't actually done much research on this. The first page of google results for "windows raid usb" turns up several tutorials and write ups.

https://itexpertvoice.com/home/usb-flash-drive-raiders-of-windows-7/
https://windows.microsoft.com/en-hk/windows-8/storage-spaces-pools

 

[4pyros]

Oh yes I did, I spent a few hours looking into this. Most of what I saw was for linux.
The 1st link only works with Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate witch I dont have.
The 2nd link would be nice if I had win 8 witch I dont.

 

[heydonms]

Fair enough.

In that case I think you will struggle to find software, creating arrays simply isn't the sort of thing the average home user does. Most people who are into tinkering with PCs run Pro and the market for a third party package to add RAID capabilities to Home is going to be too small for anyone to bother with. Either upgrade to Pro, or grab a copy of linux and do it under that. It's not like it is actually going to be useful in the end anyway so does it really matter if you have to boot into linux to use it?

 

[4pyros]

Fair enough.

In that case I think you will struggle to find software, creating arrays simply isn't the sort of thing the average home user does. Most people who are into tinkering with PCs run Pro and the market for a third party package to add RAID capabilities to Home is going to be too small for anyone to bother with. Either upgrade to Pro, or grab a copy of linux and do it under that. It's not like it is actually going to be useful in the end anyway so does it really matter if you have to boot into linux to use it?

Well ya if I have to load and learn Linux just to play with a USB RAID then its not worth the effort.

 

[heydonms]

I would argue it wasn't worth doing anyway, the effort involved is what makes it worthwhile, because you enjoy tinkering and value the experience gained. Depending on where your goals are you could use it as an excuse to also gain experience with Windows upgrades, Windows server, or linux. Linux of course being the cheapest option.

If there was little to no effort required then you wouldn't gain anything from the process, the final product certainly isn't of any value.

 

[4pyros]

I would argue it wasn't worth doing anyway, the effort involved is what makes it worthwhile, because you enjoy tinkering and value the experience gained. Depending on where your goals are you could use it as an excuse to also gain experience with Windows upgrades, Windows server, or linux. Linux of course being the cheapest option.

If there was little to no effort required then you wouldn't gain anything from the process, the final product certainly isn't of any value.

Agreed I just dont have the time to learn a new OS right now.