MSI X2-109 v1 User Manual
Page 21
 
RAID Overview
1-5
Version 2.0
Copyright © 2006 by LSI Logic Corporation. All rights reserved.
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A RAID 1 array consists of two physical drives.
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A RAID 5 array consists of three to eight drives.
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A RAID 10 array consists of four, six, or eight drives.
Note:
Some hardware configurations do not support eight disk 
drives. So depending on the hardware, the actual maximum 
number of drives for RAID 0, RAID 5 and RAID 10 arrays 
can be fewer than eight.
Important:
LSI recommends that you not use both SAS and SATA 
drives in the same array. Using different drive interfaces in 
this way could cause decreased performance and 
decreased Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF).
You can use either of these three strategies when creating RAID arrays 
and logical drives:
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Maximize Fault Tolerance: You can maximize fault tolerance to 
protect against loss of data by creating a RAID 1 array with mirroring. 
All data is written to the primary disk in the array and is also written 
(mirrored) to a second disk.
•
Maximize Logical Drive Performance: You can maximize logical 
drive performance by creating a RAID 0 array with striping. Data is 
broken into segments and can be simultaneously written to or read 
from several different stripes on several different disks in the array.
RAID 10 arrays combine both striping and mirroring to provide high 
data transfer rates and data redundancy.
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Maximizing Storage Capacity: You can maximize storage capacity 
when selecting a RAID level. Striping alone (RAID 0) requires less 
storage space than mirrored data (RAID 1) or distributed parity 
(RAID 5). RAID 5, which provides redundancy for one drive failure 
without duplicating the contents of entire disk drives, requires less 
space then RAID 1.