How do I get Win10 to not only run from USB but also include my RAID drivers?

Associate
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13 Apr 2017
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Hi all,
I have been having issues getting a win10 pro machine to see its RAID drive when a windows update broke stuff.
I plan now to temporarily run a fresh Win10 OS from a pendrive to access the raid and back it up.
I can get win10 to run on USB using the Win_To_USB app but....
With win10 running from the pen drive it cannot see the raid drive. I assume that is because you normally install the raid drivers during windows installation but i used Win_To_USB.
How can I get Win10 to run from USB with the raid drivers?
My very final option if I cannot find a solution will be to put the windows installer onto a pen drive and then tell it to install to a second pen drive, therfore going through the full windows install process and allowing myself to include the raid drivers.
The raid members group is still intact across four HDD's and can been seen in the Bios but i cannot boot to the original Win OS if i leave bios set to raid, only if i set Bios to IDE & therefore win10 then does not see the RAID. The original win10 OS is hosted on a seperate SSD.
Any thoughts are much appreciated?
PS. i back up monthly but i need the code I have written from the last few days.
 
Soldato
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Not familiar with the Win to USB app.

I would try WinPE with the RAID drivers to recover data or a Linux distro which runs from USB.
 
Soldato
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Add your RAID drivers to the USB stick that has the W10 install on. Do you mean Windows to Go (ie, are you trying to run windows 10 from a USB, or just install Win10 from a USB to the RAID disks).

Sidenote, if your RAID disks aren't showing up in W10, they must be bat crap crazy old.
 
Associate
OP
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13 Apr 2017
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Sorry for the delayed response. Covid disruption to working pattern etc. Will post back asap.
Thank you for your replies. Don't give up on this post.
PS the drive members are in RAID 5. Win 10 runs off an SSD and is not a raid member. The data drives are the raid 5 group and they are hdds. I can run the Win10 SSD in IDE mode (bios) but no access to Raid or I have found I can run a fresh copy of Win 10 from a USB (windows to go) in Raid mode (bios) and then access the raid, (had to initialise the raid with drive manager to see it).
When bios set to raid and reads from the original SSD with win10 it borks out with an error, 'INACCESSABLE_BOOT_DEVICE'
The last time I upgraded my hardware I went for COREi7 and have surprisingly not found them lacking in power but you are probably right that was donkeys ago and time flies, so they probably are bat crap crazy old, a little bit like me I guess. RAID drivers are prol 8 years old.
I have been able to back up the RAID5 drive through the Windows To Go but would still like to try and get the original SSD Win10 back up and running without a complete reinstall. Any further ideas?
 
Soldato
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28 Sep 2008
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Right, what you need to do is find the RAID drivers for your controller. If you can't find win10 ones, Server 2012R2 will work and possibly 2008R2. With the BIOS set to RAID, it will expect the SSD to form part of the LUN. Instead, in the RAID controller, you should set a primary raid array with the one disk (SSD) for Win10 and the second RAID array for your RAID5 LUN.

Boot from USB (not Windows To Go) ensure the USB has the bootable WIN10 files and also copy the controller drivers to the USB stick.
When you get to the page listing the drives, if blank, choose have disk, and select the drivers for the controller. At this point, back in the installation wizard, you should see both RAID sets. Install the USB and then when Windows boots, all the drives will be available and shown
 
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