ATTENTION COMPUTER GENIUSES: Need Help Setting Up RAID-1 in Windows Vista

[HectorM52]

Okay guys, I've done a lot of searching on Google and I need some DEFINITIVE HELP.

I've got a Dell Inspiron 531 desktop. AMD Athlon 64 dual core processor. Supposedly this mobo has capability to do RAID built in.

There are 4 extra SATA ports on the MOBO. I have two extra hard drives from some computers I picked up for free. Both identical 40gb HD's. SATA units.

What I want to do is ADD these two HD's in addition to my existing C: drive and use them as a secondary backup. Meaning I don't want to touch the existing hard drive. Just set up a mirrored backup as additional drives (let's say X and Y drives).


I could go on all day about what I think I know, but if I'm wrong then I'm just wasting my time...

But here's the jist of what I think I know...

Turn off computer
Plug in two new HD's
Turn on computer
Enter CMOS (or is it BIOS) by pressing the DEL key
Set up new hard drives (is there any trick to this?)
Then reboot again
Once windows is running, do this:

1. Go to Computer Management > Disk Management
2. Right click on your main disk (not partition) and choose Convert to dynamic disk...
3. Right click on your main system partition and choose Add Mirror

Or am I crazy? Did I miss any steps?

THANKS!!

Adam