Raid 0 Disk Activity is this normal ?

[sarah_louise]

I am restoring someones PC which has a Raid 0 Array on two 256GB disks. I do understand the principle of data sharing between the two disks. What I dont know is if it is normal for the hard disk activity light on the front of the PC to be quitely flashing away almost non stop even though no requests (mouse clicks or keyboard activity ) are being made. Can anyone enlighten me ?

[ACtheTROLL]

not really

My expectation would be the same as you ... which is probably why I've never taken any notice of what is actually happening.

the question is who what where ... if windows is a new install and there is a shed load of stuff there it could be indexing going on in the background (I'm making this up)

my raid 5 nas lights simply indicate live disks ..

a quick google shows some boards / sata combinations don't use the indicator light at all

at the moment I don't have any PCs with raid at either home or work.

does the raid help help?

[fo3nix]

Depends.

Some service could be doing something in the background.

Are you running Windows at this point?

Is the RAID software-based or hardware-based? Perhaps an integrity check is being made?

[fo3nix]

AC's answer wasn't there when I wrote mine. I strongly suspect AC knows far more than me.

[ACtheTROLL]

on the contrary fo3 ... I know bu@@er all about this

As I say ... I've set it up a fair few flavours - fixed 'em and stuff ... but never really looked further than explorer ;0
My ex no1 machine kept popping sata cables and breaking the array ... so I took it back to single discs
and based on that current no1 just uses single discs

NAS and "propper" servers are different again ...
I'm sitting in front of my NAS box here and each of the drive lights do flicker very fast constantly (and copying a CD onto it doesn't seem to alter the flicker).
no one here can shed any real knowledge (we all guess about the same - but none of us know)

like you we suspect service activity .... someone suggested possibly that a PC raid array could well be constantly "blipping" to check the integrity of the pair (of old I know that as soon as you kick the case and the array disintegrates you get an error... so checking must be pretty constant)

instinct says the light should go out .... the more we argue the less confident we are though.

someone must know ....

[ChuckFickens]

Nope I don't know for sure... same as AC most I have come across in servers only have a light to say the drive is alive not an actual activity light.

I do have a DAS box sitting across the room from me though, that is currently setup as raid (5 though not 0) and it has lights on the front for each disk that are green for alive and flash red for access and that is flashing all lights red for activity constantly. but as it's a different raid that may, or may not be of any relevance at all.

My main view on this is... does it work, if it does ignore the drive light on the front of the case (stick a bit of insulation tape over it if it annoys you)

[sarah_louise]

Thanks for the answers.
It is still doing it and it has been restored back to the as shipped condition 2007.
Mo programs, just Windows and AVG8 for safety. All taskbar items off except AVG.
The two disks are Western Digital SATA.
No all is working OK so as you suggest try and ignore it.