For a while now I have wondered what the "Convert to Dynamic Disk" option does.

Hi Arin,
I used to have a dynamic disk. They're pretty cool. Basically it allows you to stripe one or more partitions across 2 or more drives. The problem and I personally consider it a major one is you can't create RAID array on a bootable drive. Which I think is ridiculous since NT 4 could do that. Also WinXP may have overcome this limitation, but I somehow doubt it. Another problem with the RAID 0 or RAID 1 parition that's created is that most backup software doesn't support them. Yet another issue is that you can't create FAT based raid partitions instead you are forced to use NTFS which means that after all that work your RAID Array will be about the speed a normal FAt32 parition on a single drive which isn't a very big deal is it? Also the CPU usage will naturally be much higher when working with two drives.
Cheers,
Christian

Hi Gang,
Can someone comment if they know of a single backup title that supports dynamic disks. Please be sure to list what version of the product is required. Also are there any additional complications like you have to partition the drives manually first or something. I realize that almost any backup title can support these RAID paritions doing a sector by sector backup, but I'm talking about native support.
Thanks,
Christian Blackburn

I have to clarify something here. NT 4 does not support booting from software raid 0(striping), and neither does 2000 or XP. Booting from a software mirror is always supported, but only windows servers support software mirroring, not workstations or pro. So it is not ridiculous, and no functionality with respect to this has been lost.


It really annoys me that 200 pro and XP pro do not support disk mirroring, and only the servers do. With the cheapp prices of hard drives, it would be a great way to keep them workstations running.

Hi Duhmez,
I think you can mirror partitions in Win2K pro. Windows XP may be a different story, but I don't own that. I know I've seen the option I've just never used it.
-Christian

The option is there, but permanently greyed out. No mirroring except on windows servers