Partitioning of hard drive and / or RAID setup ???

[Fish Chris]

Okay, I probably know just enough to be dangerous here {or just to sound stupid } but anyway....

Since, for the time being anyway, I have way more than enough hard drive space, we split it in half with a partition. So my PC sees that as drive 'C' and drive 'D'.

So now, every once in a while I can back up my drive 'C' to drive 'D' correct ? {just stop me wherever I'm screwing this up} So, should I get some kind of virus, or worm, or crap on drive 'C', I can simply dump that empty, then move everything from drive 'D', over to drive 'C', and be right back in business correct ?

Of course if my hard drive were ever to just crash and burn, I'd lose both 'C' and 'D' drives, as they are really only one drive unit anyway.

Now, with a RAID setup and a whole other seperate Hard Drive, I can have a duplicate copy of everything I do on my first hard drive (drive 'C') but of course if I ever get any kind of viruses or such on one hard drive, I will also get them on the other. Good thing here though, is should either hard drive ever crash and burn, I can simply replace it, and move everything over to the new replacement HD, from the other HD.

So (if I'm correct so far) can a guy have > both < partitions in his HD to protect from viruses and crap that might screw it up "and" another whole other seperate HD, to protect from a possible crash and burn ?

Good idea ? It totally won't work ? Or somewhere in between ?

Please learn me somthin' here

Thank you,

Fish

[1992Chevy K1500]

I'm no expert at partitions/RAID, but it sounds like it might work.

[raytard]

the thing is, if you have 2 partitions on the same drive, its THE SAME DRIVE, so if the drive goes, everything goes. essentially you just separated everything into 2 big folders, and a virus can affect either one, or both. If its a virus that say, erases your MBR, the hdd is pretty shot regarrdless of how its partitioned. If its a virus that wipes the hdd, it wipes the hdd regardless of partitions or boot priority (or everyone would mount everything on a f; drive and keep a dummy c: drive that wouldnt matter if it was corrupted.

the point of a raid setup is to protect against physical hdd failure, the point of a backup is that it is a physically separate record, so if soomething was to infiltrate and destroy data, you have a separate uncorrupted independant drive that would allow you to restore your files

if you want a backup i suggest looking at western digital external drives. I had a 500gig that usb'd to my ccomputer. I backed up all the files and had a shitton more room, and it was just over 100 bux.

[Ipod]

hmm RAID sounds complicated (im not sure what it is).. lol.. i have my internal HD partition.. D drive for programs and what not then C for daily use.. then also got another external HD to back everything up..

Edited September 15, 2009 by Ipod

[1992Chevy K1500]

hmm RAID sounds complicated (im not sure what it is).. lol.. i have my internal HD partition.. D drive for programs and what not then C for daily use.. then also got another external HD to back everything up..

Just a physical drive that updates itself everytime you change a file. It's not that complicated (I'm not running it). The computer sees both drives, but only reports them as one. As far as the users concerned, it's just one drive (unless one crashes, then the other can boot the system and you don't loose anything).

[Fish Chris]

Just a physical drive that updates itself everytime you change a file. It's not that complicated (I'm not running it). The computer sees both drives, but only reports them as one. As far as the users concerned, it's just one drive (unless one crashes, then the other can boot the system and you don't loose anything).

Right, and that part I'm pretty clear on. But what then, is the reasoning behind partitions, if a virus can infiltrate a hard drive beyond one partition (say drive C) to another (say drive D) ???

BTW, I actually do have a 300gb Seagate external hard drive...... but I'm, just so lazy about getting around to using the darn thing (only used it twice in the couple years I've owned it). Whereas, if I had a RAID setup, every single key stroke would be instantly backed up, at all times, with no work on my part.

I have considered just leaving it hooked to a USB port on the back of my new PC.... then, what would be really cool (I think) would be if I could set up something to do a back up "automatically" on a sheduled basis.... say once a week. Is that possible ? How about, for a total PC dummy, such as myself ???

Peace,

Fish

[1992Chevy K1500]

XP and Vista both have an auto backup program. It's not hard to use, but doesn't come with the initial software (I downloaded it free from the Microsoft website). I don't know if one's included or not.

RAID protects you data against HDD failure (they fail after so many hours). If one crashes, the system will boot with the bad one still in place and should (I repeat, should) warn you if one fails.

[1992Chevy K1500]

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-v...res/backup.aspx

Here's one for Vista's auto backup (it's not as good as the one I downloaded, but it does work).

EDIT: Here's the one I use (or used to use, til my HDD gave out).

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/downloads...c5-98d0592d8c52

Edited September 15, 2009 by 1992Chevy K1500

[Fish Chris]

Hey 92', right on. So then, I could use that program, along with my external hard drive ?

Thank you,

Fish

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-v...res/backup.aspx

Here's one for Vista's auto backup (it's not as good as the one I downloaded, but it does work).

EDIT: Here's the one I use (or used to use, til my HDD gave out).

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/downloads...c5-98d0592d8c52

[1992Chevy K1500]

Yeah. That's what I did. Worked well for me. I set mine to backup every week. But I believe it will go down to 1 day.