[800] in comp.os.os2.announce archive
HARDWARE: RAID 1 IDE mirroring for OS/2 and Warp
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (arco@arcoide.com)
Mon Mar 11 12:48:37 1996
To: os2ann.DISCUSS@bloom-picayune.MIT.EDU
Date: 9 Mar 1996 20:02:44 GMT
From: arco@arcoide.com
Reply-To: arco@arcoide.com
Reply-To: arco@arcoide.com
Submitted by: arco@arcoide.com
Source: ARCO Computer Products, Inc.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
ARCO LOW COST IDE ADAPTER PLACES OS/2 MIRRORING ON EVERY DESKTOP
Hollywood, Fl.ARCO Computer Products, Inc. today introduces the AC-Mirror, an
IDE adapter designed to provide hardware disk mirroring for OS/2. This cost
effective adapter will bring RAID 1 fault tolerance to every desktop by over
coming the existing hurdles of mirroring cards, overkill and overprice.
PRODUCT SPECIFICATIONS
The AC-Mirror is a standard ISA IDE disk adapter supporting up to 4 IDE
drives. The board sets up to show a standard drive while in the background,
the ARCO adapter is writing duplicate information to the mirror drive(s). As
the AC-Mirror is hardware based, no software drivers are necessary. This
reduces the memory overhead and potential conflict when drivers from multiple
vendors are installed. ARCO provides a simple installation program allowing
users to select the primary and mirror drive, select the drive from which all
reads are performed or switch the drive being read from at intervals ranging
from 1 to 15,000.
DISASTER AND RECOVERY
An alarm resides on the adapter to notify users when a drive is compromised by
a failure, a bad cable or if a cable is not attached properly. A boot time
message will appear until the drive is replaced and/or re-mirrored.
The easy to use ARCO ACP software which is shipped with the AC-Mirror allows
for re-mirroring data at the touch of a button.
IDE HANDLES HIGH PRICE AND STANDARD CAPACITY
RAID 1 mirroring has been available through software methods for many years.
Users have been educated as to why data should be protected, some the hard way
through disk crashes. Until now, this technique has been implemented typically
in a high end or server environments via the SCSI interface. SCSI has the
nature of being more expensive than IDE, as well as the typical drive weighing
in at 1 gigabyte or more, far greater than the average desktop drive. When
calculating the price of 2 drives and 1 controller, this can up the price to
thousands of dollars. The AC-Mirror is a hardware based IDE adapter with a
retail price of $195, though it sell for less on the street. The typical disk
drive can be found for $200 or less. Users will be able to mirror a gigabyte
of data for under $500.
IS IT A BACKUP?
The AC-Mirror protects users from data loss due to disk drive failures. This
is critical to small off and home office companies which run an entire
business from a personal computer. Many times, these companies are too busy
running the day to day operation to consistently implement an effective backup
strategy. Their businesses could suffer dramatically should their data suffer
a calamity. The AC-Mirror performs real time backup. Given the percentage of
users which backup consistently (a very low number), or need to be on-line
continuously, the AC-Mirror is ideal for data protection.
CORPORATE INFORMATION
ARCO Computer Products, Inc. was founded in 1987 and is a manufacturer of high
performance IDE, EIDE and ATAPI adapters for the VL, PCI, Micro Channel and
ISA bus architectures. ARCO is located at 2750 North 29th Ave., Hollywood,
Fl. 33020
Contact: Mike Hertz arco@arcoide.com
(305) 925-2688 - voice (305) 925-2889 - fax
800-458-1666
http://www.arcoide.com/adapters
=====================================================================
-- email os2_ann_req@bix.com to submit articles to comp.os.os2.announce
-- email lfirrantello@bix.com for comments to the moderator.
-- Please use "Reply-To:" or "Source:" addresses for email comments
regarding this article.
