NhatPhongTran wrote:

> Raids indeed seem to be a very delicate task. I'll take your advice in
> consideration and abandon the raid container and backup manually
> instead. What Raid controller can you recommend which can rebuild from
> ROM without needing an OS running? One with which you got good
> experience. I'm looking for a Raid controller around $ 300-400.

madhusker's advice is one option.

"md" software raid is a very good option if you want to use a raid level in
linux and you don't even need a real hw raid card to manage it. It is
reported to be very stable (I personally have not tested) and has a smooth
setup under openSUSE. The pros of this solution is easy of manegeability
and non hardware dependant. The cons is just a bit of work to do when the
array goes down :-)

Another option is going with real hardware raid card. I use on my servers
Adaptec 2020sa (zero channel raid card) but not sure if I can recommend
this manufacturer, I'm not so happy with the adapter itself :-/. Areca,
3ware, ICP, ITE and LSI branded card used to be a good options, although
they are a bit expensive.

Remember that hardware raid cards also need to be fully supported by the
manufacturers driver in order you can fully manage inside openSUSE the
rebuild, creation and monitoring of the raid level status. Look for any
card that works 100% with the version of openSUSE you have installed and
that will support future version of openSUSE (just note that openSUSE is
not SLES).

You have some raid cards listed in openSUSE wiki:

http://en.opensuse.org/HCL/RAID_Controllers

Another very good pages, plenty of useful info:

http://linux-ata.org/faq-sata-raid.html
http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Hardware/sata.html

THT... and sorry for the delay :-)

Greetings,

--
Camaleón