Re: Software RAID on Windows using Embedded Linux?

[Molle Bestefich <molle.bestefich@gmail.com>]

Ewan Grantham wrote:
> I know, this is borderline, but figure this is the group of folks who
> will know. I do a lot of audio and video stuff for myself and my
> family. I also have a rather unusual networking setup. Long story
> short, when I try to run Linux as my primary OS, I usually end up
> reinstalling Windows after a couple weeks because there are still
> holes in what I can do. That isn't the fault of Linux as much as folks
> who write device drivers or have video codecs that require DirectShow.
> 
> However, the big thing I really miss from Linux that keeps me trying
> to find a way to convert is the support for Software RAID 5.
> 
> It occured to me yesterday that perhaps the trick would be to use QEMU
> to run Knoppix or Damn Small Linux under Windows, and then setup a
> RAID 5 array under one of those. Not to mention then having access to
> Linux for some other fun stuff.
> 
> I'm not sure if that's even possible, and if it is, how much trouble I
> would have moving files around to and from the RAID array if it's
> setup that way. So I'm wondering if anyone on the list has ever tried
> this?

Not too much trouble, you should be able to just setup Samba in the
Knoppix/DSL and access your files through QEMU's network emulation.

It will be damn slow, however :-).

Perhaps buy a NAS device like Linksys NSLU2?
It's cheap and has low power consumption - but you'll need to hack it
to add disks (via USB).

http://peter.korsgaard.com/articles/debian-nslu2.php
 or
http://www.tomsnetworking.com/Sections-article85-page3.php

explains how to get into the Linux guts of the box.