SSD and Hard Drive Setup (Spec Thoughts?) for 2K+ PC

Stuarts · 9 Jun 2009 at 14:04

You had chance to test it with a decent number of drives yet?

Unfortunately not. This is a full system rebuild, and all the parts won't even be here until next wednesday maybe.

Definitely a wake up call to backup data. I have been phaffing about for a week with this, and it will be at least another week before I can even start the build, let alone do anything else.

Ended up deciding to get 5 x 1TB Spinpoints for the Raid 5 Array. I have a sneaky feeling that 5 will be noticeably faster then 4, and for the sake of £60 it seemed to make sense.

Will update this if I ever manage to have a PC that works again (thank god for laptops!)

miniyazz · 9 Jun 2009 at 19:15

It'll work with at least 4 drives (that's all I've tried) - although I'm having to send back one of mine soon, it's started clicking so I took it out, and it's behaving very oddly. Hopefully another won't die before I get my replacement, but not the end of the world if it does, just a little annoying!
Pity the PERC doesn't support RAID6 actually, it'd be nice to have the option.

Stuarts · 9 Jun 2009 at 20:51

The Perc 6 does.

Its on ebay at the mo for bout $199.

What I have done is buy a spare drive at the same time as the others.

Its £60 sitting in my draw I guess. But at least then I figure if a drive does go down I could just pop it in within 10 minutes, and its good to go again. And then just order another backup one then, without stressing.

Used to be a server admin in a past life, and I did actually see 2 drives fail within 24 hours of each other (unlikely as I thought that was at the time). Hence me doing this.

For the sake of £60 I would sooner not be sweating over some online companies delivery times :-)

Microwave · 9 Jun 2009 at 20:55

Why are you getting 2 128GB SSDs and having one for the OS and one for programs. The OS doesn't take up 128GB!

Why don't you raid them and put the OS AND programs on the array.

miniyazz · 9 Jun 2009 at 21:37

Stuarts said:
The Perc 6 does.

Its on ebay at the mo for bout $199.

What I have done is buy a spare drive at the same time as the others.

Its £60 sitting in my draw I guess. But at least then I figure if a drive does go down I could just pop it in within 10 minutes, and its good to go again. And then just order another backup one then, without stressing.

Used to be a server admin in a past life, and I did actually see 2 drives fail within 24 hours of each other (unlikely as I thought that was at the time). Hence me doing this.

For the sake of £60 I would sooner not be sweating over some online companies delivery times

This is true, to some extent. There's still the unrecoverable read error problem. And just so you know, you don't need to put it in your drawer - you can plug it in as well and tell the PERC to treat it as a hot-spare. If a drive fails, it'll automatically rebuild on your hotspare drive. But since RAID5 isn't a backup anyway, it's redundancy/convenience, so since I have the important stuff backed up off it anyway that's why I'm not fussed with it temporarily running with RAID0 reliability!
Besides, I needed another HDD really anyway so ordered another on top of the RMA, it'll be here tomorrow.

Microwave said:
Why are you getting 2 128GB SSDs and having one for the OS and one for programs. The OS doesn't take up 128GB!

Why don't you raid them and put the OS AND programs on the array.

RAID means you can't use TRIM as of yet, and read/write speeds greater than around regular HDD speeds are of no benefit unless moving large files.
Although I agree, 256GB seems like overkill; I'd fit everything onto 128GB with space to spare.

Stuarts · 9 Jun 2009 at 22:30

Why are you getting 2 128GB SSDs and having one for the OS and one for programs. The OS doesn't take up 128GB!

Why don't you raid them and put the OS AND programs on the array.

I ended up getting a Corsair P256 ie 256gb.

A tad pricey. Cost £498. But I figure that at least I can cease having the nagging feeling in my mind that I should be looking at how much space I am using up.

With 256gb (or 240 or whatever it is when formatted) I can install to my hearts content, and not have to give the matter any thought.

I opted not to get 2 128Gb and raid them.

Upon reading about this I remain to be convinced that in anything except benchmarks you would notice much of a difference between that and the 256 version (as well as the trim thing, which probably will be sorted out for raided drives sooner or later, but possibly not for a while after the Windows 7 launch)

In any case, in every review I have read of the Corsairs, they look to be about 3x as fast for normal stuff, and infinitely faster at seeking out stuff on the disk, then a 'normal' hard drive. And seeing as I will be coming from an enormous, single 750gb Barracuda with no raid. I suspect I will be pleased enough.

If not I can always add another one in a years time when the prices have halved.

The reason for the '1 for operating system' - '1 for programs' thought was to keep the thing speedy. But I realise now that a better operating system (Windows 7), a faster computer, and a much faster ssd hard drive will probably be enough to keep it quick. Time will tell I guess.

In truth I don't expect to be touching the drives for a while.

And just so you know, you don't need to put it in your drawer - you can plug it in as well and tell the PERC to treat it as a hot-spare. If a drive fails, it'll automatically rebuild on your hotspare drive.

That is interesting to know. Thanks.

Might keep it out anyway. Reason being that I also am setting up a Windows Home Server with the same drives, for backup. So I have it in case either a drive fails in the raid array, or on the backup server.