Seeking advice about RAID

[Bart Silverstrim]

I'm working on assembling a new workstation for running Ubuntu.

I am going to get a system running RAID 1.  The system I've spec'd  
out is currently configured with a 3ware RAID card on advice from the  
vendor (rather than using the motherboard's built-in RAID... 
(Motherboard is an Asus P5N32-SLI SE Deluxe, 3ware card is a 3Ware  
9650SE-2LP 2-port PCI-E SATA2 controller).

I've used a 3Ware product before, and liked the ease with which I can  
access a graphical status of the card from the web page (3dm2?), plus  
3ware support should be for the most part plug and play with current  
kernels and creating/managing the arrays, if all else fails, should  
be simple from the bootup screen's hotkey-setup on the controller;  
Linux wouldn't need to worry about managing the RAID disks because it  
would virtually invisible to the system.

But I've also read that software RAID 1 under Linux should work well  
now too; the problem for me is monitoring/checking status in a quick  
and easy way (and doing setup, rebuilding, etc.).

Questions:
For software RAID, are there good tools to use for configuring/ 
monitoring/interacting with the volumes now?  Graphical ones?
Is the 3Ware worth the extra money to install, given that it's true  
hardware RAID and has 3dm and a CLI tool for configuration?  It  
sounded like 3ware was well supported under Linux and generally  
reputable, and rebuilding/using the controller is a relatively no- 
hassle deal.

Anyone have advice or input?