Redundant Arrays Of Independent Disks (RAID)

RAID, an acronym for Redundant Array of Independent Disks (Changed from its original term Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks), is a technology that provides increased storage functions and reliability through redundency. This is achieved by combining multiple disk drive components into a logical unit, where data is distributed across the drives in one of several ways called "RAID levels".Marketers representing industry RAID manufacturers later attempted to reinvent the term to describe a redundant array of independent disks as a means of dissociating a low-cost expectation from RAID technology.

RAID is now used as an umbrella term  for computer data storage schemes that can divide and replicate data and increase input and output performance. When multiple physical disks are set up to use RAID technology, they are said to be in a RAID array. This array distributes data across multiple disks, but the array is addressed by the operating system as one single disk. RAID can be set up to serve several different purposes. among multiple disk drives. The schemes or architectures are named by the word RAID followed by a number (e.g., RAID 0, RAID 1). The various designs of RAID systems involve two key goals: increase