RAID or SSD!?

chrismcca

chrismcca

chrismcca

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currently running system on one 500Gb maxator 7200 rpm with 32Mb cache
benchmarking in sandra gives read speed 79Mb/s and points out block size not optimal/too small. can find a setting in my mobo to change this (asus M2N4) but thats a seperate problem that any help on is welcome.

so wanting to boost performance for loading games etc so wondering if spend approx £50 on another of these HDD and use mobo to RAID 0 or RAID 1 as kind of affraid to lose anything as holds my data too OR do i go to SSD to run operating system?

IF SSD what is better MLC or SLC to run an operating system etc cos i seem to be getting mixed messages from other sources.
 
Great link on SSD architecture! at least i now know if goin SSD will be SLC i look for. though duno if warants the money if i could achieve similar read speeds if raid will double my current read speed? will seek time play a factor too?

any info on changing block size for current HDD?
 
tbh I wouldn't go near either SSD technology at the moment, certainly not with disk time syncs, system updates, swap files or any sort of indexing enabled. I'd wait for the OS technology to catch up or the flash technology to improve. But, this is just me, myself and I.

2 mechanical drives in standard raid0: expect about 50% increase in read speed and you shouldn't be disappointed.
 
worried about RAID 0 cos current hard drive holds all documents too including work and my large music collection so does RAID 0 not carry a greater risk of losing this material compared to RAID 1?
 
thought it gave a read boost cos reading form 2 at same time?just no write boost as writing exact same to both. if not then wat is the advantage or use for raid 1? surely must increase read speed just safer!
 
RAID 1 is purely mirroring one drive onto another - only real advantage would be that your data is safer than being stored on just 1 drive.

RAID 0 Makes use of both the drives, splitting files and writing part to one and part to the other, so read/write speeds are individually faster.
 
well here's a wee definition of RAID1

'Mirrored set without parity' or 'Mirroring'. Provides fault tolerance from disk errors and failure of all but one of the drives. Increased read performance occurs when using a multi-threaded operating system that supports split seeks, very small performance reduction when writing. Array continues to operate so long as at least one drive is functioning.

so eyah it is a copy / mirror and safer but still increases the read speed.

eg. 2x500Gb HDD in Raid0 operating system sees 1 x 1Tb HDD and reads and writes fast as split. in RAID1 operating system sees only 1 x 500Gb HDD reads twice as fast as can read pieces from both as data identical but writes same speed as has to write to both all data.

for more read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redundant_array_of_independent_disks

nice wee pics should clear up a lot here when read down that page
 
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RAID_0.svg


RAID_1.svg
 
Why don't you go with 2x 10k rpm HDs in Raid 0 (e.g. 2x 150GB raptors) and one larger 7200 rpm (Not in Raid) for all your data files, music,pictures, video etc.. You can then partion the larger HD, for backup/ disk image.
I also backup to an external drive, just coz I'm paranoid.

NOTE: THe best thing about SSDs right now is they are quiet!! Which Raptors are most certainly not.
 
money money money is the issue lol. why so paranoid, how bad or likely is the prospect of data loss? 500G suits me fine hence raid1 would protect me? cos one can fail etc besides im only using one hard drive at min, should it fail id be screwed lol so how likely are HDD fails or errors?
 
myb im wrong and doesnt give increased read speed form soem stuff i just read :S guess only way is to try and bench mark so some learned ppl tell me for defs lol
 
im on vista ultimate 64x duno if it is multithreaded or watever it needs to be or can be set to do multiple seeks hence taking advantage of RAID1 beyond back up
 
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