OMG RAID 0 !!!

Solouko

Solouko

Solouko

Associate
Joined
12 Aug 2005
Posts
595
Location
North wales near Rhyl
New build, only have space for 4 SATA drives on the nF4 Lanparty ultra D and so i have 4 SATAII drives...

can i use one drive on it's own and have the other 3 in a RAID 0 configuration? (will read the nVidia RAID manual later)

if so, should i have one 80GB HDD for my documents and the other 3 in a RAID 0 configuration with windows and program files on it?

should i have one UBER drive with all 4 in RAID 0
(and possibly partition the uber drive into 3 for windows, program files and my documents)

ooor... should i have 2 drives RAID 0 with windows, 2 drives RAID 0 with program files and not have any my documents on the computer at all?

i'm going for optimal performance here.... i've not got watercooling just so i can be slowed down by a slow SATAII transfer rate!


anyway, thanks in advance :3 hope you guys can help (not that i'm expecting anyone to look in this part of the fourms EVER :p )
 
Bandwidth wise buying 4x smaller drives and maxing out the NVraid in a raid 0

!!!WITH ONLY STUFF YOU WOULDNT EVEN BLINK ABOUT MISSING!!!!

actually gets you approaching some fairly serious sustained transfer speeds. (like 200MB/sec+ on outter edge transfers) - handy for level loading in games and general stuff like unzipping downloads.

Another drive - preferably mirrored with anything thats seriously important also backed up to DVD would give you the best all-round setup.

Not exactly cheap or hassle free tho :)
 
You can buy a PCI-express x1 SATA-II RAID card now for peanuts (sub £15) with 2 more ports... so you can always add two more drives later if needed. :).

It's based on the Silicon Image 3132 RAID controller. I have one myself and it is very good. In fact, it is slightly faster than nVRAID from my tests but unfortunately only does RAID0 and RAID1 and has a limit of 2 drives.
 
With 4 drives I'd go for RAID 10 or 0+1, though I don't think standard controllers will do 10.

I wouldn't do RAID 0 as you don't gain much compared to what you could lose.
 
look guys... ST*U about mirrors and ghosting and RAID 1+0 or RAID 5, it's the best RAID 0 configuration for 4 drives, i'm aiming for speed, i'm not going to use this comp for anything important, just games to i need bandwidth.

and i dont need a RAID card cause i have a lanparty nF4 board with the RAID controler built in.

Mercutio has the right idea, 200+ MB/Sec transfer speeds, that's what i'm aiming for, i dont need it to last forever, hell a full drive format is like an oil change on a car, it's something you do on a regular basis to keep it clean and running smoothly, ok putting the right oil in it and not redlining it untill it's warmed up with keep her ticking over a little longer but you have to change it sooner or later!

i'm planing so far (wont hapen untill at least sunday) to Raid 3 drives together into a RAID 0 array and partition it in 2 (one for windows and one for program files) and i'm going to leave a seperate drive untainted by the RAID for My Documents folder, this is because there is a size limit (or was) on both the XP My documents and Program files folders which i always seem to ba able to fill quite nicely. (yes it's upwars of 10GB in each)

i dont need a fast transfer rate for the My Documents just local storage (i may at a alter date invest in network storage) but i do want and need fast transfers for the Windows and program files partitions, cuase this will result in faster booting and loading of both games and programs.

this is my thinking, if i'm wrong about anything please correct me but i really dont care for useing RAID for it's original purpose as to make my system more relyable, just faster :3
 
Solouko said:
look guys... ST*U about mirrors and ghosting and RAID 1+0 or RAID 5, it's the best RAID 0 configuration for 4 drives, i'm aiming for speed, i'm not going to use this comp for anything important, just games to i need bandwidth.

and i dont need a RAID card cause i have a lanparty nF4 board with the RAID controler built in.

Mercutio has the right idea, 200+ MB/Sec transfer speeds, that's what i'm aiming for, i dont need it to last forever, hell a full drive format is like an oil change on a car, it's something you do on a regular basis to keep it clean and running smoothly, ok putting the right oil in it and not redlining it untill it's warmed up with keep her ticking over a little longer but you have to change it sooner or later!

i'm planing so far (wont hapen untill at least sunday) to Raid 3 drives together into a RAID 0 array and partition it in 2 (one for windows and one for program files) and i'm going to leave a seperate drive untainted by the RAID for My Documents folder, this is because there is a size limit (or was) on both the XP My documents and Program files folders which i always seem to ba able to fill quite nicely. (yes it's upwars of 10GB in each)

i dont need a fast transfer rate for the My Documents just local storage (i may at a alter date invest in network storage) but i do want and need fast transfers for the Windows and program files partitions, cuase this will result in faster booting and loading of both games and programs.

this is my thinking, if i'm wrong about anything please correct me but i really dont care for useing RAID for it's original purpose as to make my system more relyable, just faster :3
Click to expand...

sounds like a plan. good luck!

daven
 
ok, i've chickened out, i got the RAID 0 drive working with 3 80GB drives and thought... that's too huge for just windows, so i've got all 4 drives running on RAID 0+1 but i'm thinking about RAID 5.... my motherboard dowsnt support RAID 5 but i can run RAID 5 through software, i'm just worried that it'll slow my processor down too much. because if it's hardware controled i dont mind and is seems a heck of a lot quicker than IDE which is what i'm used to and a 160GB drive is more practical and i'll have some hope of making use of it.

pluss thanks to a slight um... smeg-up on my behalf i'm stuck with a spare 80GB drive of the same type ^_^' heh.. so that make come in usefull some day

anyway, what do you guys think of raid 5?
and what raid configuration do i have to use to enable soft RAID 5?
 
i dont understand why everyone goes on about raid 0 drive failiure, ive had a raid 0 array working perfectly since 2003 on one rig and ive had my quad drive working flawlessly since day 1 and i got it about feb''ish. :)
 
lay-z-boy said:
i dont understand why everyone goes on about raid 0 drive failiure, ive had a raid 0 array working perfectly since 2003 on one rig and ive had my quad drive working flawlessly since day 1 and i got it about feb''ish. :)
Click to expand...

lucky you, i'm having nothing but problems with my raid array >.o i've been sitting here for 2 days now with a message saying "rebuilding array" and once it gets to 100% it starts all over again, this is getting stupid! i need help.
 
I've got 2 x 4 x 300gb raid arrays (that's 2 raid arrays with 4 drives) both in raid 0.
One of them I've had no end of problems with, a drive fails about every 6 months, that said, I've never had any problems getting data off it when a drive does fail, I think I've lost about 4 files with 3 HDD failures...
 
lay-z-boy said:
i dont understand why everyone goes on about raid 0 drive failiure, ive had a raid 0 array working perfectly since 2003 on one rig and ive had my quad drive working flawlessly since day 1 and i got it about feb''ish. :)
Click to expand...

yeah and i had a 320gb raid 0 that went bang and i lost the lot. You only see things from one side of the fence untill youve been on both!
 
james.miller said:
yeah and i had a 320gb raid 0 that went bang and i lost the lot. You only see things from one side of the fence untill youve been on both!
Click to expand...
And let's be honest, that 4 drive RAID 0 is just asking for trouble.
 
smids said:
And let's be honest, that 4 drive RAID 0 is just asking for trouble.
Click to expand...

You could throw my computer off a cliff for all i care, all my data that i care about is backed up 3 times over. :)

yeah and i had a 320gb raid 0 that went bang and i lost the lot. You only see things from one side of the fence untill youve been on both!
Click to expand...

Agreed, but i say once more 'backups, if you dont its your fault when the hardware fails'

But 4 drives in small strip size raid 0 is very, very fast with lots of space and is cheaper than a raptor 150gb.
Athough i would agree, a rappy 150 or 2 would be better if i was looking for 300gigs of very fast storage, it was soo much more expensive than the way i chose.
 
lay-z-boy said:
Agreed, but i say once more 'backups, if you dont its your fault when the hardware fails'
Click to expand...

thats besides the point. losing the data made me realise that really, its just not worth the hassle. like i said - you wont really appreciate it untill you loose a signel drive and the lot goes down.
 
james.miller said:
thats besides the point. losing the data made me realise that really, its just not worth the hassle. like i said - you wont really appreciate it untill you loose a signel drive and the lot goes down.
Click to expand...

Its anything but besides the point, you should always, raid or single drive have a backup of your data.
 
I have been using RAID0 arrays for about 3 years with no problems - so far.

However, I don't keep any vital data on it, and I have a backup.

Currently, I am using 2 x WD 250Gb (16Mb cache) drives in RAID0, plus a 200Gb Seagate SATA and a 320GB WD IDE. They seem to be co-existing happily at the moment. :)

I used to have 2 x 74Gb Raptors in RAID0, but decided that any speed increase was outweighed by the space-cost (for me). So I went down to a single Raptor and 300Gb Maxtor, then to the current 2 x 250Gb WD drives.
 
lay-z-boy said:
Its anything but besides the point, you should always, raid or single drive have a backup of your data.
Click to expand...

its besides the point, stop arguing about that:rolleyes: were talking about raid arrays and the potential to loose everything on the array if a drive goes down and wether the benifits outweigh the risks. Not what you should do in preperation for that event - which im not concerned with. two different subjects. you understand that, right? nobody's said you shouldnt back up important data.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom