Originally Posted by billbartuska;13000745
Well it is part of the motherboard (the chipset actually, that's where the hardware is).
It's kind of like on board sound. If you use it you have to install the motherboard's sound driver, but if you don't use on board sound, you don't have to install the driver.
As for how to set up an array, it depends on what kind of array you want.
Basically with a RAID 0 array (where 1/2 the data goes to each drive, for faster speed) you have to set up the array during the OS install.
For a mirrored array (where all the data goes to each drive, for data security) you can set that up after an OS install. It's just easier to do it during the install.
The drives have to be identical (well, pretty close at least) because data is being whiten to two drive at the same time. If the drives have different read/write speeds, the RAID software/hardware can get slowed down, at best, and confused at worst (bit heaven for you data!).
Read your MOBO manual and some articles about RAID, types, and how to install, before you try. It will save you days, hours, weeks of anguish.