none of the big names make hardware raid chip. they all use LSI/Adaptec products(some just rebrand some make own firmware) and all have good linux support.
debian has best hardware raid support. RHEL will drop old raid card drivers, but debian will not. fake raid is a problem under linux, but not hardware raid.
I totally agree winpe restore CD, but not because hardware raid. hardware raid support under linux is better than natvive windows without 3rd party driver.