[ubuntu-uk] Software verses Hardware raid (was RE: Anyone ever tried kolab on feisty)

[Daniel Lamb]

Good arguments for it, I knew it was a very good system but never looked at
it in to great detail as we 
have always used cards as we use linux and windows servers and like to keep
the hardware quite alike.

I like the perc cards, prefer to set it all up before installs as I do not
want to accidentally lose data, 
or does the linux software raid protect against you selecting the wrong
drivers and overwriting them?

Regards,
Daniel

-----Original Message-----
From: ubuntu-uk-bounces at lists.ubuntu.com
[mailto:ubuntu-uk-bounces at lists.ubuntu.com] On Behalf Of Alan Pope
Sent: 27 September 2007 11:50
To: British Ubuntu Talk
Subject: Re: [ubuntu-uk] Anyone ever tried kolab on feisty


Linux software RAID does RAID 5 too. This screencast shows it :)

http://screencasts.ubuntu.com/MoS2007/10_Installing_Ubuntu_Part_2

Linux software RAID has some advantages over hardware RAID. Most notably if
you are using hardware RAID and the controller or host goes phut, you can't
access the data on the disks easily until you get a replacement
controller/motherboard/host. You also need to be careful about firmware
revisions on the controller, a replacement may have a newer (or indeed
older) version and thus may not be able to read the data at all.

With Linux software RAID you can pull the disks out (in a disaster/emergency
situation for example) and chuck them in any other machine that has a
compatible interface, and read the contents.

You also have quite a lot more control over the array using the md
(Multi-Disk) tools under Linux than you do under most BIOS-operated hardware
RAID solutions.

Cheers,
Al.