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I have a new HTPC with two HD bays. I want to use a RAID 1 (mirrored) configuration on two identical 1TB drives to store all my media but I'm not sure where my OS should reside? I'm planning on using Windows 7...

  1. If I create 2 partitions i.e. C: 80GB for Windows, all remaining for D: data will this work with RAID 1?
  2. I don't currently have the second drive. If I buy this after setting up the first, can the drive be mirrored successfully?

As a third option should I use an old 100GB drive for the OS then use the 2 data drives purely for media and buy an external chassis to hold them in?

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Your plan makes no sense because RAID is not backup and there will be no performance improvement. Put one of the drives in an external enclosure and use some synchronization or backup software.

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What? RAID 1 specifically protects you against a single drive failure. Also, RAID 1 can increase your disk read speed by splitting the reads between the two disks. – Fake Name Feb 27 '10 at 9:09
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I haven't tried this in Windows 7, but both 1 and 2 should be quite easy to do if you set up the RAID 1 in Disk Management. I wouldn't use the old 100GB unless you need the extra 100GB for media.

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