[COLUG] SATA RAID controllers for Linux

[Joshua Kramer]

> Let me rephrase, I can effectively buy twice as much hardware now, as a
> single server + hardware raid solution, I also find throwing as much ram
> as possible at servers tends to alleviate a lot of DB IO wait issues
> when you properly tune the database.

What about the other esoteric features of HW raid, like hot swap and auto 
rebuild?  If I have 6 SATA drives in hot-pluggable carriers, and one of 
the drives goes south under a Linux Software Raid configuration, is the 
kernel 'smart' enough to allow me to just yank the drive, and start 
rebuilding it when I plug in a new one?  Or do I have to take the server 
down for this rebuild to take place?

Cheers,
-J