okay... so, let's just say that hypothetically I choose to be a little less than intelligent and try to use the motherboard built-in software RAID. Would that work?
Also, I'm a little skeptical of Linux's software RAID being better (ie. faster) than my motherboards. Is there any statistics I can look at in regard to this? Once more, thanks for your considerable patience in dealing with me - someday I might evolve into a semi-respectable linux sub-guru...