So I just got a new machine which I will be using to play games, run VM's, and develop on and I am moving these usages from a machine I did all that plus run server processes, media storage, and some other network functionality(which I may move some of these things to a third system)

My issue right now is that I have 2 RAID 1 arrays on my old system that are [616GB Free of 1.36TB](Soft RAID 1) and [158GB Free out of 1.81TB](Soft RAID 1), with a [3GB of 83.8GB SSD] boot system and a [60GB Free of 698GB] single drive all on a Win7 system.

I have all of this data, but because I kept getting drives a couple at a time I wasn't able to start in a RAID 5 array which seems optimal for my Media Storage needs(both raid arrays are media and file storage). I have a lot of data, and I REALLY REALLY don't want to attempt to collect a lot of this media, or files, that took me years to collect. I'm not sure if it would even be possible to get some of this stuff again.

What I want to do is move from Win7 on my old machine to Ubuntu Server, and have it boot off the SSD and run a RAID 5 array with the 2 2TB drives and the 2 1.5TB drives. Then move the 750GB drive over to my new system to act as an application drive(It already has a 240GB SSD its booting off of). My new system will be running Win7(don't like dealing with all the compatibility hassles with new games)

I don't have any experience with RAID 5, or any advanced knowledge of RAID management so I'm not sure the best way to get to this new setup without losing all of my data. I might be able to house clean about 20% off each drive, I just have no idea about RAID migration, or making raids that aren't completely blank to start, or much experience in ubuntu.

I'm also not sure on having ubuntu server on my SSD, will this be an issue? I randomly read somewhere that EXT3 writes a lot, should I use something else? Am I going to have to drop a couple hundred on more drives for backup?

I would appreciate any suggestions on how to do this, or what about it I really shouldn't be attempting.