Can I disassemble RAID level 1 safely
 

Hi,

I got a raid level 1 setup on my computer and I want reuse one of the drive. Can I disassemble the raid array and keep the data on the drives?

Thanks

Yes, most RAID1 configurations allow you to remove one drive from the array. What RAID system are you using? Are you using hardware RAID or are you using mdadm?

Hi,

I'm using the raid function from the NForce5 chispset on my board
(ASUS M2N SLI-DELUXE)

I want to be able to reuse the drives outside the raid with the data currently on them.

Be sure that this motherboard is TRUE RAID. Most motherboards today are sold with RAID Support but not TRUE RAID. They are only compatible with Windows drivers. What these motherboards do is facilitate the copying of data from one drive to the other using a Windows driver. I may be wrong about your mobo but I've notice this is now a hidden bogus marketing strategy in the mobo industry. You may not have an array going at all. The fact that most TRUE RAID(0,1,5) SATA cards; such as the ones from Adaptec, LSI; cost two to three times than most top motherboards, should be enough evidence.

Anyway you may want to find out if your RAID trully is mirroring your drives. Try disconnecting the power from the first drive and see what happens.

I suggest backing up the data and then remove it even though RAID-1 (mirroring) creates copies of the master drive. Hard drives that are formatted on one system may or may not be able to be used on other systems. I suggest using Norton Ghost, Ghost for Linux, or dar to mirror the drives that are on separate computers.

ramram29, there is no such thing as True RAID. RAID is RAID. The difference is software versus hardware. Software RAID is the cheapest, but cost a performance penalty of the main processor of the computer. Hardware RAID has the same setup as software RAID but it is handled independently from the main processor. Both software RAID and hardware RAID has equal pros and cons.

According to 3Ware, one of the top RAID card manufacturers, it can be called TRUE RAID. Unless you are a higher authority than the technical writters at 3Ware then I don't think your declaration above is valid. Review the following document for clarification.

http://www.3ware.com/products/pdf/HWvsSW_111804.pdf

Also, like I said, the SATA "RAID Features" that they are selling in most motherboards today is not TRUE RAID; neither is it SOFTWARE RAID. The only thing these motherboards do is reduce the I/O and CPU cycles a little-bit or almost down to nothing but only by using a Windows driver. Hence, this also goes by the name of FAKE RAID.

ramram29, 3ware is good hardware RAID company, but you do not know that it is all sales pitch. Again there are no True RAID. Only gullible people think there is True RAID. Hardware RAID controllers have the same components as software RAID. Both have a processor, memory, XOR (for RAID-5 and RAID-6), storage controller, and software to do RAID transactions. Hardware RAID controllers do use the main proecssor, but not as much as software RAID.

The cheap SATA RAID controllers have software RAID stored in their BIOS. This software gets copied into main memory, so compatible operating systems run this software instead of the usual code. Again this is software RAID. Fake RAID is another term for software RAID which is actually a laymen term.