HP Elite 8300 RAID

RAID 0 is very risky if one drive fails then you lose everything. If you want 1TB then order a 1TB drive and clone the 500GB drive or just use it for DATA.

If you enable RAID in the bios (which will use the fake raid controller $15 chip) and once you configure it you have to reinstall everything.

You can through windows convert to dynamic disks and make it raid 0 with 0 downtime.

I cannot stress enough of how risky using RAID 0 is as drives will fail, this is a given the only question is when will they fail

Meant RAID 1.  I want to Mirror the drives.  Bottom-line, will original drive copy over to new drive without reinstalling OS?

only with windows raid (avoid fake raid at all costs)

Raid 0 is not a mirror
It's a stiping so you'll get 2x bigger volume size but no else.
 Since RAID 0 provides no fault tolerance or redundancy, the failure of one drive will cause the entire array to fail; as a result of having data striped across all disks, the failure will result in total data loss.

It is much better to create Raid 1 ahd still have 500GB drive but mirrored.

You going to need backup and restore data since creating drive is actually changing clasters configuration ad the way that controller see drive.

No warry. You can use free software called AOMEI backuper and create your disk image then create raid and boot from AOMEI boot CD and restore data to new volume.

http://www.aomeitech.com/

Here you can find manual how to setup RAID in your HP bios

http://h10032.www1.hp.com/ctg/Manual/c03519601

Please not the edit: options DON'T show up.

Neither Tom nor David has provided a solution.
My major problem is that the menu options shown in the manual of Rapid Storage Console DON'T show up on my computer.
To clarify other parts of my question, does the Bios RAID option have to be set before using the RST Console or leave it at AHCI; run RST & then change BIOS setting to RAID.

I think it might have something to do with the versions of the BIOS & RST.  My previous 8300 has a Storage Controller>Intel(R) Desktop/Workstation/Server Express Chipset SATA RAID Controller in Device Manager & a earlier version of RST.  The 8300 I'm trying to setup has IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers>Intel (R) 7 Series/C216 Chipset Family SATA AHCI Controller & not the Storage Controller.  My older 8300 does not have IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers section in Device Manager.  It has stumped an HP Tech and an Intel Tech that I have contacted via their respective Support Websites.  Though I have seen some chatter on the Internet about Intel's RST RAID/Software having some issues with their newer versions.

Both my 8300's have the same BIOS versions & Chipsets.  What I plan to do is update the BIOS on the newer(just purchased used) 8300 then see if that helps it with the newer RST Software.

Any Further Comments are Appreciated!

I plan to

This was answer to your question. Maybe your question was not clear.
Yes if you want see RAID option in Windows Controller must be set as RAID in BIOS first.
Then after this you can install Rapid Storage Manager in Windows and you going to be able manage Raid function from Windows.

Thanks Tom,
The main (I Think) problem is that when I set to RAID in the BIOS, the computer won't boot (As I've been told, it should).  I get a non-system disk message.

In addition, the RST Software does not have any options for managing and/or creating an array.  I've been online w/HP & Intel Techs (plus others) and everyone is baffled.  I did catch some comments online about the Intel RST having the same problem (not showing options under Status or Manage) but, no solutions.

Any Thoughts?

P.S. I didn't think Points could be and/or should be awarded if a solution was provided that solved the problem.

Server won't boot after enabling RAID.  This is to be expected, you set the raid options in bios and ALSO in the Raid configurator bios options. You can then restore from backup.

It's quite normal.
If you have before standard IDE or or AHCI configuration then cluster size and disk management is different in Raid, so boot configuration will be lost.
You need to make full disaster recovery backup, then configure Raid and restore OS.
Remember to start OS in safe mode for the first time to avoid blue screen for controller driver compatibility.

@Woody Woodside
Can you please close this question and let us know if your problem has gone ?