What is a hardware-based RAID?
A RAID is considered hardware-based when it is implemented in hardware, either on the motherboard directly or a separate RAID card. Windows views the entire RAID as a single disk. The individual component disks are controlled by the RAID controller and not directly accessible to Windows. RAID (redundant array of independent disks) levels 0, 1, 3, and 5 are the levels typically implemented in hardware-based solutions. Hardware-based RAID uses an intelligent drive controller and a redundant array of disk drives to protect against data loss in the event of media failure and to improve the performance of read/write operations. A disk array is an effective disk-storage solution for computers running database software. Hardware-based RAID levels 1 through 5 automate redundancy and fault tolerance at the hardware level. All levels (0 through 5) incur no overhead on the system processor. Individual data files are typically spread across more than one disk. It is possible to implement a hardwar