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With all of the posts about RAID, I should mention something about a
\common misconception. Many people seem to think that RAID is a backup
of some sort. You ask them about backup and they say "we have RAID".
For those who are reading this and aren't clear, let me say it very clearly:
RAID IS NOT BACKUP.
RAID will not help you when you accidentally delete a file or mess up a
setting or a database. RAID will not help you when you get hacked.
RAID will not help when you get a virus. RAID will not help when your
important files, like your password file and Windows registry are wiped
out because the drive is full. RAID, on your server, will not help when
your host disappears Alphared style. RAID will not help when your
power supply shorts, blowing your drives. RAID is simply and only a
way to reduce the chance of the physical failure of the drive itself,
when used in combination with proper monitoring systems. RAID
without proper monitoring is almost worthless because you don't know
when one of the drives fails. RAID doesn't even help THAT much
with making the hardware more reliable. A RAID rebuild is one of the
toughest jobs a drive will ever be asked to to do so it's common for
the "good" drive to fail in the middle of a rebuild. In fact, with some
RAID configurations there's a better than 50% chance that the rebuild
will fail. So all RAID does is make it a little less likely that you'll be
taken out by the drive hardware itself failing. It does not protect
you against most of the causes of data loss - RAID is not backup.
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