A server I manage: (2) 18 gig scsi3 drives + win 2k =(

What IDE raid options in your opinion would match or surpass this performance. Considering the cost of upgrading to a pair of 80 gig drives, I think I can pitch the idea of a Linux server successfully.

There isn't much support in Linux for hardware IDE raid. There are a few "software" IDE raid controllers in the IDE driver list, but the hardware IDE raid controllers are in the SCSI section of the kernel configuration.

Your best bet performance-wise (other than a SCSI raid array or fibre channel SAN) would be to look for a SATA raid controller. The controllers are a little pricey right now, but the drives are cheap and they're the future of IDE. There are even fewer of these supported in Linux right now, though, and I'd avoid any Promise ones using the "pdc-ultra" driver until the driver has been merged into the kernel. (It was recently released by Promise, and in my experience with my own promise card, it has a few showstopper bugs on high-end systems.) I'm not sure if pdc-ultra is just for the normal cards or if it is also used on raid cards, though.

Hi,
Check out 3Ware's products for hardware raid.

I have been looking at it myself, and have read some success stories about an "easy setup".

SATA @150Mbps should be good enough. SCSI is very expensive.
But you already know that.