Hi folks! Need urgent help please!
I'm looking to replace my regular windows 7 boot HDD with a faster SSD and upgrading to windows 10. I also have three other drives striped in a raid0 configuration that hold a great deal of important data.
So will replacing my current windows 7 HDD and upgrading to windows 10 using a SSD compromise my raid0 drives and all files therein? I have no hardware/software expertise so don't want to do something I will regret later. Please help!
Assuming that the boot/system drive is not on the RAID, then it should not be a problem. That said, you may want to disconnect the RAID before you do the update, "just in case". Unlike Linux systems, you NEVER know exactly what Windows will do in these situations.
Wait, wait, don't tell me. Did you just reveal that you don't have a backup of those drives? It appears that is the first order of business.
True, first order of business is always to make backups. So that needs to happen. Today. Thanks for the concern rproffitt :)
Sometimes a raid array has so much data that backups are not feasible, which is why I suggested disconnecting the RAID before the update. RAID0 however, is basically a mirrored disc, so backups only need one drive that is as big as one of the RAID devices. My RAID arrays are all RAID5, which is why I was thinking what I did. Backing up 8+TB of space is not always feasible. :-)
Rubberman, your recommendation of disconnecting the raid0 drives during upgrading and installing a new system boot drive and operating system is an excellent idea. I shall definitely do that. Just to be clear, my raid0 drives aren't mirrored; they're striped (no mirroring, parity, and hence no redundancy).
Just to double-check: After fitting in the new SSD boot drive and installing the windows 10 operating system and reconnecting the raid0 drives, all the raid data will come back to as it was, correct?
So the stripe (raid0) configuration data is stored within the physical raid0 drives and not in the boot drive or anywhere else?
Yes. Your data should be ok after updating the OS. Make sure you disconnect the drives when the system is shut down, before the upgrade. After the upgrade, shut the system down again, attact the array, and then power it back up. The OS should see the array and install the appropriate "new hardware" drivers.
An external 1 or 2TB hard drive should back up your data just in case something weird starts to happen.
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