On Wed, Apr 25, 2007 at 01:22:17AM -0400, Peter Sjoberg wrote: > I'm currently running linux sw raid but considering go hardware for my > next system. Hardware RAID *can* be good for speed (RAID-0), and is particularly good for things that involve parity bits like RAID-5. For just about anything else, software RAID is much more recommended by just about anyone I talk to. Even though RAID modes like RAID-1, RAID-5, etc. all theoretically increase redundancy, when done in hardware, they introduce an additional single point of failure -- the RAID card itself. For whatever reason, hardware RAID cards tend to be much more prone to failure than any other part of the computer system in question, *including the hard drives themselves*. And when the controller goes, generally your whole array does, too. Software RAID-1 across multiple disk controllers is the best way to go if you really want redundancy, either on raw disks or on top of hardware or software RAID-0 arrays (RAID-10) -- and even then, RAID does *not* eliminate the need for regular backups.
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