1. That is the only way to make them available to Windows as separate disks, as the PERC 6 does not support non-RAID/JBOD. 2. The PERC 6 supports a maximum disk size of 2TB. The hardware is limited to 3Gbps. You can use 6Gbps disks, but they will run as 3Gbps disks. 3. You need to connect a cable(s) from the backplane to the new controller, instead of the PERC 6. The backplane may not support 6Gbps speed either, so if you plug 6Gbps disks into a 6Gbps controller and they link up at 3Gbps, that's why. 4. Yes. 5. Yes. How many can fail depends on how you have it set up and how much data is there. 
Question for the forum: I got a Dell R710 server.  It has a PERC 6/i RAID card in it.  There are 5x 2 TB drives on the PERC 6/i configured as RAID-5 right now with 6th disk as a 480 GB SSD.   I currently has WINDOWS 2012 R2 installed.   Windows 2012 sees the 5x 2 TB as a 7.27 TB hard drive and the 480 GB SSD as a second hard drive. I heard Windows 2012 R2 storage solution is better.  I want to convert the 5x 2 TB to just hard drives so Windows 2012 R2 can manage it.  I have the following questions:  1.  Do I need to go into PERC 6/i controller and delete the RAID 5 and create a virtual disk for each 2 TB drive as a RAID-0 drive so Windows can see each as separate hard drive? 2.  Each of the 2 TB is a SATA II drive.  PERC 6/i can only support up to 2 TB at 3 Gbps.  Is this the best way to do this?  Can I upgrade the drives to SATA III or 6 Gbps?  Will this server support that at all?  I 3.  If I install a SATA III controller into the PCIe slot, how do I hook up SATA III drives to the card.  All the drives are plugged into the server on the front right now. 4.  If a drive fails, will Dell R710 still flash orange light on the front to show which drive failed?  Can people still hot swap the drive? 5.  Will Windows 2012 R2 be able to tell which drive failed?  With 5x 2 TB for storage and 480 GB set up as SSD for tiered storage, what's the best way to set it up for performance?  Simple Volume or mirrored?  How many drive(s) can fail before Windows can't recover from the failure?  Please advise on the best way to convert over to WINDOWS 2012 R2 software raid.  Thanks for the help in advance!
Dell R710 server upgrade to Windows 2012 R2