This is a mix between hardware RAID and software RAID. Hardware-assisted RAID uses a special controller chip (like hardware RAID), but this chip can not do many operations. It is only active when the system is started; as soon as the operating system is fully loaded, this configuration is like software RAID. Some motherboards have RAID functions for the disks attached; most often, these RAID functions are done as "hardware-assisted RAID". This means that special software is needed to be able to use these RAID functions and to be able to recover from a failed disk.