Create JBOD or RAID 0 on a Windows Drive

Is it possible to create a JBOD or RAID 0 using an empty drive, and a drive that contains windows? I don't have a very computer literate family, and teaching them to put their stuff on the D: rather than C: is too much of a concept for them to remember/practice. I end up receiving phone calls every month about them not having enough space to open up email attachments, etc. I would like to not have to spend any money on it (Windows Software RAID), but still be able to increase their disk space without repeatedly teaching them something they will never use. If the answer is budget intensive, it's a no-go... Labor intensive I can handle (I have plenty of time).

EDIT:

Additional research into the topic gave me a very brief explanation of what a "Simple" volume is on a dynamic disk... It states that "A simple volume is made up of free space on a single dynamic disk... ...You can extend a simple volume by adding free space from the same disk or another disk"

So far this seems to be close to what I am looking for. Does anyone know if it would add all disks involved into the same volume (same drive letter)? I'd just like to know if it's what I'm looking for before I go and attempt it on their computer.

Sivvy

Posted 2009-09-24T18:52:42.667

Reputation: 358

@Sivvy, it might be better to mount the drive as a folder: http://www.mydigitallife.info/2008/02/19/how-to-mount-and-access-new-partition-volume-or-drive-as-folder-path-in-windows/

– hyperslug – 2009-09-24T19:58:42.300

Thanks for the suggestion. I looked at it and may use it if I can't figure out anything else. – Sivvy – 2009-09-24T20:12:30.430

Answers

You can mount the 2nd drive in a folder on the first one. You don't really want RAID-0 because if one drive dies, all your data is gone. You don't want JBOD because...well JBOD is garbage. Windows can't boot from a dynamic disk anyway, so you can't use the built in Windows utility for it.

To mount a drive in a folder instead of as a drive letter you can

Right click on My Computer and select Manage.
Then click Disk Management
Select the volume you wish to mount inside of another and click Change Drive Letter and Paths
From there you choose Mount in the following empty NTFS folder

This will hide the second drive letter and it will look like a normal folder on C: or wherever else you choose to mount it.

MDMarra

Posted 2009-09-24T18:52:42.667

Reputation: 19 580

Thanks, but I need an option that essentially defaults downloads, etc. to empty space... Needs to be something that they don't have to know anything about. The entire problem is, if they download something, and it asks where they want to save it to, they just click. They can't seem to learn to change locations. Same goes for moving files. As for Windows not booting from a Dynamic Disk, I found a pic of one that works fine: http://www.screenshotdumpster.com/img/E2nu917072/New_Bitmap_Image.jpg It states "Type: Dynamic", and shows "Dynamic" on the left.

– Sivvy – 2009-09-24T20:04:26.110

Thanks for the answer anyway. If I can't find any other way to do it, you at least gave me another option to turn to. – Sivvy – 2009-09-24T20:13:18.480

@MarkM, is it possible to add a disk to an existing Windows JBOD/span? – hyperslug – 2009-10-14T22:04:08.707

Yes. That is supported by dynamic disks. – MDMarra – 2009-10-15T00:32:21.393

By just relocating the accounts Downloads folder by right clicking on the Downloads folder and selecting properties and then the tab Location you can simply point it to any folder on any drive attached to the machine. You do not need to merge the file systems of the secondary data drive... you can relocate Documents, Music and Video user specific folders too. Windows does allow some others to be altered to but I'll leave that as an exercise for you to discover yourself :)

I do it in Win10 to shift files and file writes off of small system SSD and onto larger secondary more write tollerant hard drive.

user995213

Posted 2009-09-24T18:52:42.667

Reputation: 1