It's important to understand how a RAID 0 and RAID 1 work to understand the difference between them.
A RAID 0 contains a minimum of two hard drives and the data stored on the hard drives is split evenly between the two drives. This means one file can be stored on both drives, in pieces which allows for faster access to the data. This is known as Striping.
A RAID 1 again contains a minimum of two hard drives, with the data stored on one hard drive and a copy of that data is stored on another hard drive. This is known as Mirroring. The advantage is if one hard drive fails the data is still accessible on the working hard drive.
RAID 0 and RAID 1 are a popular way to store important data in a network, especially in a NAS device such as a QNAP, BUFFALO or IOMEGA.
Unfortunately, there are times when a RAID fails and causes the data to be lost. The main causes of a RAID failure vary, from the RAID controller failing to one hard drive failing or a hot swap of one drive.
For RAID 0, if one hard drive fails it causes all data to be lost because it is striped. So, to recover the data both hard drives are needed, so the data from both hard drives can be pieced together rather like a jigsaw.
When one hard drive in a RAID 1 fails, the other hard drive should carry on working, however the failed hard drive can affect the working one, and if the RAID Controller fails then both drives will be inaccessible. A RAID 1 failure does mean that every drive offers a chance of recovery increasing the likelihood of a successful recovery.
At R3 we perform RAID recoveries on a daily basis. It's important for our clients to know that if it is business critical data that has been lost, the cost of the data recovery should be covered by business insurance. It's also very important to understand if the lost data has any impact on the Data Protection Act and the new GDPR as non-compliance will incur significant fines and penalties. As part of our RAID data recovery service we provide help and guidance to ensure compliance for any data breach allowing out clients to fulfil normal day to day operations without distraction.