Software RAID 5 in Windows 7

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Johannes Krauser II
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Software RAID 5 in Windows 7

Post by Johannes Krauser II »

Hello,

I am writing here in hope that this gets too the attention of the people behind ReactOS, as they might figure out this:

RAID 5 is not an option in win7, it's reserved for win server 2008. I desperatelly want to use this feature, and chipset/pcie card RAID is not an option. WinXP also didn't had RAID 5 option, but they found a way and hacked it. So xp,8 and 10 can do RAID 5, but not 7. It seems that the staff behind sysinternals knew a way (you know who I am talking about), but the article is long gone (I wonder why...), as I read here:

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/win ... 781a183ffd

Does anyone know how to do this?
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EmuandCo
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Re: Software RAID 5 in Windows 7

Post by EmuandCo »

As I use RAID very often at work I can only say that a software RAID is not worth the name RAID. The one and only solution for a RAID is a RAID controller. Not the reply you wanted, but the only way for a useful RAID is a hardware RAID.
ReactOS is still in alpha stage, meaning it is not feature-complete and is recommended only for evaluation and testing purposes.

If my post/reply offends or insults you, be sure that you know what sarcasm is...
Johannes Krauser II
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Re: Software RAID 5 in Windows 7

Post by Johannes Krauser II »

Hardware RAID assumes that you have free pcie lanes (I don't) and a hardware-build array is not portable. Plus the ludicrus cost (as you said, if you want hardware RAID it must be REAL HARDWARE RAID ($$$$) and not some cheap card). Software RAID is, lets just say, plug and play. It can be transferred in another pc just like that. If your RAID card fails, you are bound to find the same card or cards that are compatible in order to recover.
middings
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Re: Software RAID 5 in Windows 7

Post by middings »

Software RAID 5 appears to be available in Microsoft Windows Server 2003 according to this Microsoft support article, How To Establish a Striped Volume with Parity (RAID-5) in Windows Server 2003.
erkinalp
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Re: Software RAID 5 in Windows 7

Post by erkinalp »

EmuandCo wrote:a software RAID is not worth the name RAID.
Which part of the Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks cannot be represented in software? Redundant, inexpensive, array? How does it make into a Redundant Array of Imperformant Disks?
-uses Ubuntu+GNOME 3 GNU/Linux
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saulius2
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Re: Software RAID 5 in Windows 7

Post by saulius2 »

middings wrote: Fri May 22, 2020 2:15 pm Software RAID 5 appears to be available in Microsoft Windows Server 2003 according to this Microsoft support article, How To Establish a Striped Volume with Parity (RAID-5) in Windows Server 2003.
Seems like the original content was deleted. It's still possible to get it:
https://web.archive.org/web/20190909013 ... ows-server
(if you are quick enough to cancel the last loading phase where the content also becomes hidden by an error view)

Since Windows 8 the OS has the technology and GUI called Storage Spaces:
https://wasteofserver.com/storage-space ... es-solved/

It would be very nice to get at least the GUI part implemented.

On the other hand, RAID 5 has an equivalent mechanism called RAID-Z:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-stand ... els#RAID-Z

... it is implemented in OpenZFS which already is being ported to Windows. Eg:
https://openzfsonwindows.org/
https://twitter.com/openzfsonwindow/sta ... 0721477632
feldrim
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Re: Software RAID 5 in Windows 7

Post by feldrim »

The GUI on Windows 8 is the user interface for the backend. Therefore, it's meaningless if it's not implemented in lower level.

Though I agree with EmuandCo that software RAID is not reliable, it depends on the user needs. You can use it in your home lab but it's not advised to use for business purposes, etc. So, it's your funeral to use software RAID whenever and wherever you want.

OpenZFS looks promising but it's a recent project, still unstable and tested on Windows 11 insider builds. It probably uses a newer driver framework and newer syscalls not implemented in ReactOS yet. Therefore, it's not usable as is. Though, it would be great if it was possible.
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