a rookie question

[4pbears]

i am about to build my first system using a gigabyte z68 board and have a question. i will also be using 2 ssds in a raid 0 configuration. my guestion is this; after completly assembling the unit, and turn it on for the first time, is this when i would go into the bios to set up and configure the ssds for raid0? also, will the motherboard walk me through each step? i know, these are probably dumb questions, but i need the answers lol


                                                                                                                                     thanks.


                                                                                                                                      dave.

[Aussie Allan]

  No! and.... to a point..... and Yes


  Read, Read, read....is the best advice, but if you have to know.........No! after the first initial boot, you will go into Bios and hit Optimized defaults/save/and exit.........reboot/ Delete key for BIOS again to do the system configuration, 64 or 32 bit, Raid, AHCI , IDE this controller, that controller, then you will save this final config and reboot, this is when you hit the Ctrl+I  if your using the Intel Raid controller (ICH10R) and follow the prompts to configure your first raid set.......Read,read,read...........there's about another 70 paragraphs...and if applicable, don't forget pre install driver if applicable.....and 2.....If you use/load the OS under IDE or ACHI this is what you'll be stuck with unless your quite advanced.

     Hope this helps

 Aussie Allan

 

[WarYur]

AA I thought to use the SSD's that you had to have the AHCI mode selected in the BIOS.  At least that is my understanding of the OCZ 100GB LE's that I intend on using for a raid 0 array. I also have an LSI controller card as well for two sets of RAID 0 that has four connections to it Is that SSD specific or were you allowing for the read, read, read to learn all the things one needs to know and understand to use the SSD in the first place.  You are so right though, there is a ton of reading to do before just using those and actually just about anything that you do that is specific to building a computer.

I know I have been reading a bunch now that I have decided to install separate water cooling products rather than just using an all in one type of solution.  Come to find out though I still should have been doing a bunch of reading becasue there were a lot of fundamentals that I didn't know up to as late as yesterday.  Can you teach an old dog new tricks?  YES!       But the old dog better have his reading glasses on to be sure...

Sure wish that I had waited for that Z68 board but at the time I bought my P67-UD7-B3 I wasn't aware that there would be a Z68 coming.  I like my board though becasue of the 2 PCIE x 16 slots but I read where with  the P67 chipset you can only o/c the CPU and with the Z68 you can o/c both the CPU and GPU.   Is that correct?

[Aussie Allan]

  I'm pretty new to SSD my self, but my understanding is........ realisticly  they are still a data drive .......generally need ACHI instead of IDE and if your not using a add-on card the RAID option in BIOS must be selected.....otherwise Ctrl+I does not become Available in the boot phase

 You are correct in that IDE will not give you all the advanced functionality that come with SSDs including trim support

 Again as far as I'm aware ... All add-on GPUs are clockable to some degree

 Aussie Allan

[Dark Mantis]

Just to clarify a couple of points there.

An SSD will run quite happily in either IDE or AHCI mode and if everything else is supportive will transfer the TRIM commands, however your nice shiny new SSD will take a fair performance hit by running in IDE mode.

The Z68 motherboards do support overclocking of both the CPU and GPU.

[Aussie Allan]

 DM.... well you learn something every day !  I thought IDE did not support trim as well as raid......only Garbage collection.

   Looks like I'm still a rooky on "P" plates

 Aussie Allan

[Dark Mantis]

Yes there was a lot of conflicting information on the net when the SSDs started to become more popular.