Raid 0 on iMac?

[raid_on_imac]

Hi..

I have a extra 250 gig drive sitting around, and I thought of maybe setting it up as a RAID 0 on my iMac? Is it worth it?

My Setup:

- 20" iMac core2duo 2Ghz, 4GB Ram, 320 GB HD (apple original).

Questions I have:

- 2nd drive (Hitachi Deskstar 7200RPM) would be attached via Firewire 800 (best option I could think of), would this work?

- is it possible to run a RAID like this, with only 2 drives? i.e. not having a separate drive for the system files?

- since my internal 320GB is larger, should I partition of part of it and keep the system files on the extra part?

- I'd be using a software RAID setup, will this still increase my performance over a single drive?

I'm basically considering it because I have the extra drive, so it won't cost me anything. I'm hoping that it would increase performance on games and such.. ( that and I have some extra time on my hands :> )

Also, I'm aware of the cons of RAID 0, I back up any important files that I need to..

Thanks

Brad

 

[ElDiabloConCaca]

I wouldn't suggest it.

It's silly to run a RAID with two drives of differing size, since you'll "lose" anything beyond the maximum capacity of the smallest drive in most RAID configs (JBOD is different)... since you have a 320 and a 250, you'll "lose" the extra 70GB that the 320 has over the 250.

Also, it's silly to run a RAID with disks that are connected via differing interfaces -- if you want a RAID, run ALL FireWire 800, ALL internal SATA, or neither. The different interfaces can cause data corruption in some RAID setups -- you really need to have drives of the same size on the same interface.

A software RAID on a desktop home machine probably wouldn't do anything much different than what you're used to now -- any perceived speed increases would probably be just that: perceived. Games would not benefit in the slightest -- they're more dependent on your processor and video card.

The short answer is that it'll be more trouble than it's worth in your situation, and it won't speed anything up at all. I would recommend simply using the extra 250GB drive as a place to hold stuff (ie, an extra hard drive connected to the computer for storage).