RAID0 Performance increases?

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xen_

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Hi, I have 2*200GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 SATA and 1 250GB of the same but IDE.

I'm thinking of raid configuring the 2 200GB drives in RAID 0, I'm just wondering what real performance increases (if any) there are? I have googled it but they seem to get mixed reviews, some saying it doesn't really make much of a difference for home use and some saying there is noticeable benefit from it.

I know of the reliability problems of RAID0 and if one drive fails all data on both will be lost, but the 250GB drive is more for storing and backing up important stuff and I would just use the RAID drive for windows, paging file, and other installs like games. So if the data does get lost, it's a pain to replace things but no big deal as it's not important stuff.

Also I would just like to know if the drives I have a good for RAID0 on a Gigabyte DS3.

Cheers :) ,
 
There is a noticeable benefit in operating system and general loading times. Once stuff has loaded into RAM, it becomes less of a concern. If you're doing things like video editing or moving large files around constantly, then you may get the most out of a RAID-0 set-up. Otherwise, it is simply for elitists (like myself).

If you absolutely must make use of your RAID chip, I would suggest you get two high-capacity drives and make a RAID-1 mirrored array. Any disk fault with a RAID-0 array would put data at risk.
 
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Go for raid 0 mate I have for years had 1 failure, sod the reliability long as you back up your main stuff, if you want realiablitity buy a mac nuff said :) just do it
 
raid is much faster when loading games or when installing windows, literally 2x the speed when installing windows, but for normal stuff there is little difference.
 
Thanks for the feedback everyone :).

I have just reinstalled windows on RAID0, I will tell you if it's any better after testing it out later or tomorrow.
 
I have noticed a difference actually :), installers seem to go faster, and certain load times are improved. They are minor improvements though, no real significant changes. If you have 3 hard drives or more like me I would recommend putting 2 of them in RAID0 and use the 3rd one to back things up. But I wouldn't recommend it if you only have the 2 drives encase one breaks, it's just probably not worth it as performance increases are noticeable but nothing special.
 
I noticed load times are a lot better (havent tried DOOM 3 yet though ;))

Booting time into Windows doesnt seem to have improved much, if it all but not too worried about that.
 
Dutch Guy said:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2974&p=5
Game loading difference is only 3% betwwen single drive and RAID 0

I have a RAID 0 setup and the time I notice it most is when moving files around on the drives/partitions.
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Along with moving/copying files, you will also notice an improvement when unzipping large files....but these are the only improvements in performance that you get with RAID0 (in my experience). :)
 
jbloggs said:
Along with moving/copying files, you will also notice an improvement when unzipping large files....but these are the only improvements in performance that you get with RAID0 (in my experience). :)
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Yes, unzipping also seems a bit faster.

Overall I am a little disappointed with the speed increase and I will propably go with a single large drive next time.

One big disadvantage to RAID 0 is the reliability, another issue is that if you enable RAID on the mobo the array will be unreadable if you get a new mobo with a different chipset.
 
Dutch Guy said:
Yes, unzipping also seems a bit faster.

Overall I am a little disappointed with the speed increase and I will propably go with a single large drive next time.

One big disadvantage to RAID 0 is the reliability, another issue is that if you enable RAID on the mobo the array will be unreadable if you get a new mobo with a different chipset.
Click to expand...

Still building & waiting for parts myself so have been keeping an eye on this thread as I have 2 spinpoints wiating to be used.

I realise issues around reliability but everyone should be backing up anyway. The most common set up I have heard mentioned is 2 drives in RAID0 although some people have a 3rd for bulk media.

Anyway the question is, how can you improve the perfomance yet again on RAID0 would a 3rd drive in RAID0 give a boost to bandwidth yet again?
 
Dutch Guy said:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2974&p=5
Game loading difference is only 3% betwwen single drive and RAID 0

I have a RAID 0 setup and the time I notice it most is when moving files around on the drives/partitions.
Click to expand...

Yeah I read that article before trying it, but I also read one that did some tests and sort of said that anandtech article wasn't completely true, thats why I said I saw some mixed reviews on the topic :).

ChemicalKicks said:
Still building & waiting for parts myself so have been
Anyway the question is, how can you improve the perfomance yet again on RAID0 would a 3rd drive in RAID0 give a boost to bandwidth yet again?
Click to expand...

Hmm I guess it would, but I wouldn't recommend it, I think it would be a waste of the hard drive, the difference from going from 1 HDD to 2 in RAID0 isn't huge, so I doubt having a 3rd in RAID0 would be worth it, you probably wouldn't notice any difference unless you were running a large file server or something.

Dutch Guy said:
Overall I am a little disappointed with the speed increase and I will propably go with a single large drive next time.
Click to expand...

Good point, getting a single large drive is probably better and cheaper, I don't think it is a good idea to buy 2 drives specifically for RAID. I didn't buy my drives just for RAID, I've had them for a while and just decided to try it. If you already have the drives it's a OK thing to do for the extra performance, but I wouldn't choose to do it as part of a new build.
 
Dutch Guy said:
One big disadvantage to RAID 0 is the reliability, another issue is that if you enable RAID on the mobo the array will be unreadable if you get a new mobo with a different chipset.
Click to expand...
True, but IMO you would be mad to change to another motherboard with different chipset without doing a new clean OS install anyway. The important thing is to regularly backup everything you value - and that applies equally whether you have a single disk or multiple disks in RAID.
 
Buffalo2102 said:
True, but IMO you would be mad to change to another motherboard with different chipset without doing a new clean OS install anyway. The important thing is to regularly backup everything you value - and that applies equally whether you have a single disk or multiple disks in RAID.
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It is not just the reinstall issue, you will have to format everything, not just the Windows partition.

My Windows partition is only 10GB and the rest of the partitions are 455GB total, normally all I have to do is format the Windows partiton and I can leave the other partitions intact, with a RAID 0 array I would have to format everything :(
 
Agreed, but was my point is that as long as you backup (which everybody should) RAID or single drive makes very little difference, hassle wise. In your case, you would have to re-create the partition structure you have on your RAID0, reinstall windows and apps, then restore a backup of your important stuff (which you should have). Given that replacing a motherboard is a pretty major operation and hardly a regular occurence, it's not a great deal of extra hassle.

I am the same as the OP and have RAID0 for my system and a separate drive for documents, media etc. The separate drive is regularly backed to an external drive. This makes things very simple.

Most things are simple if you prepare for them.
 
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