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I am currently running a Dell Precision T5400 (Intel Xeon E5420 @ 2.5GHz / 4GB RAM).

I am looking to add disk mirroring. I presume I will require a RAID card and two new fast SATA hard drives.

I will install Windows 7 Pro (32 bit) after hardware config.

Can anyone offer a little more detailed guidance?

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There's not much to say. Just add the card and have its windows 7 drivers on a floppy or a flash drive when you start windows installation. During the installation, there will be a spot where you need to select drives. If the RAID doesn't show up, load the drivers using appropriate option.

As for the RAID setup itself, you should just plug in the disks and the RAID card will have its own splash screen after main BIOS screen. On the screen, open RAID card settings and make a RAID 1 volume with your disks. Two disks will show up as one disk to operating systems.

Don't forget to set the RAID volume as bootable in your main bios!

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  • The more obvious answer is that when you buy a RAID card, it'll come with some form of instructions to follow...
    – Bart Silverstrim
    Commented Mar 3, 2011 at 12:53
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    @Andrejako: What vendor did you buy a card from that had no support or manual/instructions for their RAID card?
    – Bart Silverstrim
    Commented Mar 3, 2011 at 13:06
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    @andrejako: maybe you shouldn't trust your data to this card...
    – Bart Silverstrim
    Commented Mar 3, 2011 at 13:37
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    @Bart Silverstrim It worked fine for 5 years and I decommissioned that computer after that. Still, it's always a good idea to purchase products w3hich do come from manufacturers with good reputation if at all possible.
    – AndrejaKo
    Commented Mar 3, 2011 at 13:40
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    Also, setup the Raid BEFORE You install windows. Once you create a raid Array, it should initialize or Scrub the disks, wiping everything on them. (and wait for that to finish, or things will be slow for a while)
    – Brian
    Commented Mar 3, 2011 at 15:06

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