SA641 and RAID 5 Question

[Daniel Velez]

We are planning to buy a ML350 G4 with 3 36GB HD's and a SA 641, configured in RAID 5. It's going to be used for a small DB in Windows 2003 Server and MS SQL 2000. Long time ago I remember it was strongly recommended don't install Windows in a RAID 5. It's that true today with the hardware mentioned above? BTW, we are thinking to buy another Proliant with the same configuration for a SBS2003 installation. How safe is to install everything in RAID 5? I have try to google that info, but can't find any document explaining this. Any suggestion will be appreciated. BTW, the configuration will be the C: volume for the OS and D: volume for the data. Thanks in advance...

[JohnWRuffo]

Daniel:

Most of the "warnings" on loading Windows and the DB on one RAID volume is based on performance. If you are not really driving for a high performance server or do not mind some disk contention, then you can build it that way.

Alternatively, you can add 2 more disks and make a mirror volume for the O/S and Swap and then reserve the RAID 5 for your DB space. That way you remove some of the disk contention between the O/S (swap) and the database files.

The 641 is capable of building this configuration and the ML350 has room for 6 disks.

Array A = 2 x 36GB (RAID 1)
Array B = 3 x 36GB (RAID 5)

You even have room for a hot spare if you wanted...

G'luck! -john