RAID Array Issue

[lennyll]

I am having an issue with a Dell XPS 710 that I thought was configured with a RAID 0 array using two 150 GB hard drives. Please understand that I am working with a limited amount of technical knowledge when it comes to hardware issues.

My first indication of trouble began when my C drive began to reach full capacity. I began moving data to D drive, but finally reached a point where my boot drive was full. At that point I cloned all my C drive files to a 300 GB hard drive thinking I could simply exchange the drives. I soon discovered that my new C drive indicated a total capacity of 150 GB. While reading the Owner's Manual (which left me more confused than when I began) I thought the two hard drives had to have the same capacity, so I cloned and installed a second 300 GB hard drive. The second hard drive (D) correctly shows 300 GB but my boot drive still indicates a capacity of 150 GB.

I tried turning off RAID but upon restart I got a message saying it couldn't access C drive.

Question: Can someone walk me through the process of removing the RAID array completely so I can use both hard drives to full capacity?

Thanks -

[Bryan]

In the original setup was D: showing as 150 GB?

[lennyll]

Yes it was.

[Bryan]

Was the original added 300 GB drive a internal drive or external one? Also what steps did you take to turn off the raid array?

I thought the two hard drives had to have the same capacity

Nope, a raid array made out of two different size drives is possible with the array only using the smallest drives capacity for both. ( So a raid 0 with a 150 GB and a 300 GB would result in an array close to 300 GB)

Further, there is overhead for running raid so you won't get exactly 300 GB for 2 x 150 GB drives and it appears as a single drive.

Have to be careful when you see c: and d: designations as those could be partitions and not the underlying array. If you go under administrative tools from control panel you can use disk management to see the underlying drives. ( Which start from disk 0 and goes up from there.)

[lennyll]

I understand about the 'overhead'. I see that in Disk Management. I see:

Disk 0:
47 MB (Healthy OEM Partition)
(C 145.96 GB NTFS Healthy (System, Boot, Active, Primary Partition)
3.00 GB Healthy (Primary Partition)
130.47 GB Unallocated

Disk 1:
New Volume (D)
297.47 GB NTFS
Healthy (Page File, Primary Partition)

Is it possible to combine Disk 0's 145.96 and 130.47 partitions into a single partition, or is there a better way to free up the 130.47 Unallocated partition?

[Bryan]

Should be able to right-click disk 0 and select extend.

[lennyll]

Extend Volume is grayed out. The only choices available are 'Shrink Volume' and 'Change Drive Letter'.

[Bryan]

Didn't see the 3GB partition, extend only works with contiguous free space the 3 GB partition is in the way.

[richardd43]

In addition to the drives, Dell offers configurations with two of the drives in either RAID 0 for performance or RAID 1 for data security

You might have the Raid 1 setup?

[lennyll]

Bryan, I was curious about the 3 GB partition. I can delete it without consequence - right?

[CMB]

Typically a 3gb partition on dell is a hidden partition for restoring the original os
You might want to google around about removing it...do you still need it ?

http://en.community.dell.com/support.../17778339.aspx
http://en.community.dell.com/support.../18947682.aspx

[lennyll]

I know of no reason why I would need it. The disk we are discussing is disk 1. My OS is on disk 0. In any case, I would have no requirement to restore the original OS. That was XP and I am now running Windows 7.

[lennyll]

OOPS, I mis-spoke. The 3 GB partition is on drive 0 (my OS drive). Still, I am no longer using Windows XP. I upgraded to Vista, then later to Windows 7.

[Bryan]

As long as your OS install is a custom one rather then the OEM install from Dell then its reasonably safe to delete.

[lennyll]

Bryan, thanks for our help. I deleted the 3GB partition and was then able to extend the volume - No more problems.