AAARGGGGHHHHHHH!

:0 OUCH!!! I bet that did hurt...I'd hate that to happen to me because I couldn't remember all of the good cigar sites with the great prices :p
 
Drives are so cheap you should get one just for backup that way all you'd have to do is reload the OS.
 
Does the baby still spin? There is software out there that can pull data off a drive that has been formatted even. For links, favorites, etc it probably isn't worth the 1 grand for clean room extraction but 50 to 100 bucks for one of these software packages might be worth looking into.

While you are buying new drives you may want to consider using a RAID 1 (mirroring) or 5 (spanning with parity) array for the drive that houses your important personal data.

-Matt
 
I'm using 2 SATA (Serial ATA) 250GB drives setup with Raid 1. That way, worst case, if one drive goes out on my PC, I'm still completely up and running with the mirrored drive. It costs a little more but since I have business financial files and some client info on my PC (and I don't backup as often as I should), I feel this is worth the cost of an extra drive - plus it's fun to play around with technology I've never worked with before.
Dave ;)
 
Thanks for the tips. Didn't know about the software; got a name?

I've been thinking about the SATA drives and a RAID setup. The MB is an ASUS
and it came with 2 SATA cables and has two sockets for that type of drive.

Is a separate controller needed for a RAID array, or does the fact that the MB has those 2 connectors mean it's ready to go?
 
Word of caution: those SATA HD's require a good amount of computer knowledge to configure. One of my buddies (whose in the bsiness) went that route and it gave him a fit. He ended scrubbing it!

Just something to think about and good luck! :D
 
psyktek said:
Thanks for the tips. Didn't know about the software; got a name?

I've been thinking about the SATA drives and a RAID setup. The MB is an ASUS
and it came with 2 SATA cables and has two sockets for that type of drive.

Is a separate controller needed for a RAID array, or does the fact that the MB has those 2 connectors mean it's ready to go?
Click to expand...
The built in controller on the motherboard must have RAID already in it. Just having 2 connectors isn't enough. Somewhere on your MB documentation it will say if it has raid ability. Although you may not notice it too much, RAID 1 will slow down the system more that a RAID 5 but it is much cheaper.

You can get a seperate RAID contoller for as little as $13 here. You'll need 2 matching disks too unless you get a much fancier RAID controller that handles JBOD (just a bunch of drives or disks).
 
psyktek said:
Thanks for the tips. Didn't know about the software; got a name?

I've been thinking about the SATA drives and a RAID setup. The MB is an ASUS
and it came with 2 SATA cables and has two sockets for that type of drive.

Is a separate controller needed for a RAID array, or does the fact that the MB has those 2 connectors mean it's ready to go?
Click to expand...
Is the motherboard an ASUS A7N8X Deluxe by any chance?
Yes you can do a HARDWARE RAID 1 array on that board.

If you are running Windows 2000 or XP you can do a Software RAID 1 on most motherboards however this utilizes the CPU time and slows your system down.

Personally I would use the onboard SATA controller to power a nice Western Digital Raptor 10k RPM drive for your operating system and applications. These come in 35 and 70 gig varieties. If you are really a power hungry PC nut (a Viggen of a PC) use 2 of these in a RAID 0 (spanning) array for your operating system and applications. I don't advise using these drives for data storage because they are still expensive and low capacity compared to ATA drives.

For data redundancy to protect Data (things that store in the "documents and settings" path of Windows XP like music, pictures, favorites, spreadsheets, documents, P2P downloads, etc) a RAID 1 array of less expensive, large ATA 100/133 drives is better IMO. I think using an inexpensive ($25-$30) Highpoint or Promise PCI RAID card and 2x120 GB or 2x200 GB drives would be good to look into and less expensive than significantly smaller Serial drives. Keep in mind when doing RAID 0 you use 2 drives but only get to store 1 drive's size in data.

If you want better performance than ATA 133 for your data drives, I would look into a more expensive RAID card that does RAID 5 (spanning with parity) in lieu of Serial ATA. You could do 3x120 GB drives (for 240 GB storage) in a RAID 5 array and get improved speed and the needed redundancy.

I am a geek
:lookup:
Matt

PS I will try to find the package I used to pull data off my father-in-law's drive last year and let you know the name of the application.
 
Thanks for the advice (and the warnings :0 ). I'll let you all know what I decide to do.
I've seen the criticism of the SATA drives in the literature (smaller, more expensive, etc.) so coupled with Lee's info, I think I'll likely go with another Maxtor 40GB drive and some backup software.


Sometimes I hate computers!!! :angry:
 
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