Intel Application Accelerator RAID Edition, User Manual

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RAID Background
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User's Manual 11
2 RAID Background
RAID (Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks) was originally conceived at the University of
California at Berkeley in 1987 by David A. Patterson, Garth Gibson, and Randy H. Katz. The
focus of their research was to improve storage subsystem performance and reliability. As a result
of their findings, they proposed five levels of RAID (RAID 0 – RAID 5) to provide a balance of
performance and data protection. Each RAID level is designed for speed, data protection, or a
combination of both. Patterson, Gibson, and Katz published their findings in a document titled “A
Case for Redundant Arrays of Inexpensive Disks (RAID).” This
document is archived at the
University of California, Berkeley:
http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/TechRepPages/CSD-87-391
RAID was designed to improve the way computers manage and access mass storage of data by
providing an independent and redundant system of disks. Instead of writing to one Single Large
Expensive Disk (SLED), RAID writes to multiple independent disks.