Raid-0 or USB 2.0 Hard Drive?

I have an external 200GB USB 2.0 drive and I LOVE it .

I use it to back up my computer, and I keep stuff I dont need readily available on it.
Whats great is that I can share this hard drive with others, have an external back up in case something goes wrong, and if I ever need my laptop serviced by Alienware, I wont be bummed about getting my HD wiped cause of my external hard drive back ups.

Also I have my, um, 'backup' movies on the external so it doesnt take up large chunks of platter space on my main hard drive and degrade performance.

The external USB 2.0 hard drive is plenty fast!! I loaded the 464Mb Far Cry demo file ONTO the external HD in 20 SECONDS, and loaded it back onto my internal HD again in 20 SECONDS.

Its fast enough in which you can install games onto the external hard drive and it should load up all fine.

Also, to make an IMAGE 'snapshot' of my internal hard drive, I use PowerQuest Drive Image 7.0 (but there are other back up programs like this too) to back up my system. This back-up file can be saved onto the external through the program.

Its a good idea to IMAGE your hard drive once you get your new computer and after making all the nesessary updates, the reason for this is because you can restore this backup if your system goes all wrong and is a great alternative to a full reformat.

Well, hope this helps (and if you enjoyed RdLdr1's little quip, then I'd appreciate some 'Good Reputation' points on the left hand side!)

RdLdr1, I have downloaded the demo version of Drive Image from Powerquest. I have my hard drive backed up on 2 DVD's. I can't figure out for the life of me how to restore them because they are not bootable. Why would they give a demo of something that you can't fully try? If I buy it can I boot from the CD? Also would the software let you boot and restore the image from your external hard drive if you had a complete wipe out??

Thankfully, I havnt had a reason to restore from an image backup. What I have is the full version 7.0. The two options on the main application that would be needed would be 'Restore a Drive' and 'Copy One Drive to Another.'
I don't think you can 'boot up' from the images on the DVD, but this is what it says in the help file:

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"If you are able to access the operating system on a troubled machine, you can use the Restore Drive wizard to restore an entire backup image of a data drive—all with zero downtime. This method of recovery, known as a hot restore, is useful if you have experienced the complete loss of a data drive.

From the basic view, click Restore a Drive.
Click Next.
Select the backup location you are restoring from, then specify the path to the backup image file.
If the backup image is password-protected, select the check box and enter the password.
Click Next.
Select the destination where you want to restore the backup image file.
If there is not enough free space to restore a backup image file, you can press <Shift> to select multiple, contiguous destinations that exist on the same hard drive.

The destination must be as large as the original drive.

Click Next.
Select or deselect the restore options you want.
The actual options available are dependent on the restore location you selected in the previous step.
Click Next.
Click Finish to restore the image.
If the wizard cannot lock the drive (definition of drive lock) to perform the restoration under Windows, it will prompt you to insert the PowerQuest CD, so you can manually boot into the PowerQuest Recovery Environment (PQRE) and complete the restoration. When the restore is finished, the machine is rebooted automatically.

You may wish to dismount the backup image after restoring it. See Dismounting a V2i Drive"
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Note: i havnt used the demo version of Drive Image so I'm not sure what the limitations are.