Adaptec Raid 5 Controller question

[InlineFour]

Text

i'm looking to buy a raid 5 controller for a server setup, and i found the adaptec 2610SA 64MB SATA 6 ports for $130 shipped. is this card a good deal considering the price? how do adaptec compare with other brand such as promise and 3ware?

 

[Jeff7]

Geez, ya still looking for a RAID 5 card?
Good ones ain't cheap.

At least RAID 5 controllers don't depreciate like CPUs or videocards do. My Radeon 9700 originally cost me $245. Was what, 2 years later that they were below $90? Crazy.

Sorry if this wasn't much of a useful post concerning your original question. I don't know a thing about Adaptec's offerings.
Just from the picture, that thing looks like it's got a decent processor soldered on there.

 

[InlineFour]

bump

 

[Vegito]

Adaptec is in the middle.. promise are usually software, 3ware are better... lsi (scsi) are the best.. they do make some sata controllers..

 

[SnoMunke]

Absolutely nothing to say.

 

[InlineFour]

bump

 

[InlineFour]

Originally posted by: InlineFour
bump

 

[tw1164]

what setting is the server going to be in? Is it for your home?

 

[InlineFour]

Originally posted by: tw1164
what setting is the server going to be in? Is it for your home?

yep, it will be in a home environment.

 

[ribbon13]

well what is the RAID5 for?
If it's for streaming video over gigabit, the donkey sh!t performance that card provides won't matter anyway, with at least any 4-5 recent hard drives you'll be able to saturate the gigabit link anyway. Likewise for other fileserver situtations. But if you're putting that in your personal PC, in a PCI slot of all things, it's going to be a dissappointment.

 

[InlineFour]

it will be for a file/web/email, basically an all in one. i don't want to lose my files from hdds failing. that's why im choosing a raid 5 configuration.

 

[ribbon13]

well then you won't need high-performance anyway.

That HBA will be limited to ~120MB/s on a 32bit/33MHz PCI bus.

 

[InlineFour]

Originally posted by: ribbon13
well then you won't need high-performance anyway.

That HBA will be limited to ~120MB/s on a 32bit/33MHz PCI bus.

so this will be a good card considering my requirements?

 

[ribbon13]

yeah, given your usage, it's a steal.

 

[BIGGDOG]

I just bought a 3WARE ESCALADE 8506-8 SATA RAID - Retail for 495.00 and have it currently running RAID 10 with 8 WD RE 250 gig drives.
Sweet setup for my back up system.
Hardware raid is not cheap

 

[tw1164]

Have you thought about a software RAID solution?

 

[RaiderJ]

I have a 64MB Intel 4-port SATA RAID controller. I'm definitely a fan of hardware RAID. Will probably upgrade to an 8-port card down the road.

 

[InlineFour]

Originally posted by: RaiderJ
I have a 64MB Intel 4-port SATA RAID controller. I'm definitely a fan of hardware RAID. Will probably upgrade to an 8-port card down the road.

how's that working out for you? do you configure the raid in the raid bios?

 

[Jeff7]

I'll say this - I don't think you'll want a software RAID card. Granted, I have never used a software RAID card - closest thing I know of is PIO mode for hard drives, which relies on the CPU during hard drive accesses. Slow as hell. The fastest part of the computer is stuck waiting for one of the slowest parts.
Save up the money and splurge on one of the Promise cards with XOR assist processing. I don't think you'll be sorry. The damn things can sustain close to 100MB/sec read speeds. I'll try to get some read tests when I have slightly less going on - WMP, Winamp, Virtualdub, Eudora, and Firefox are all running right now, and Virtualdub especially will screw around with the results, as it's reading and writing from and to the array.

 

[SnoMunke]

Originally posted by: Jeff7
I'll say this - I don't think you'll want a software RAID card. Granted, I have never used a software RAID card - closest thing I know of is PIO mode for hard drives, which relies on the CPU during hard drive accesses. Slow as hell. The fastest part of the computer is stuck waiting for one of the slowest parts.
Save up the money and splurge on one of the Promise cards with XOR assist processing. I don't think you'll be sorry. The damn things can sustain close to 100MB/sec read speeds. I'll try to get some read tests when I have slightly less going on - WMP, Winamp, Virtualdub, Eudora, and Firefox are all running right now, and Virtualdub especially will screw around with the results, as it's reading and writing from and to the array.

With today's CPUs, there is little difference between software and hardware RAID controllers for the home/home office use...and software RAID is controller independent (this is a good thing!).

As for hardware RAID controllers, Promise sucks @ss! Either LSI, Areca, or Adaptec is the way to go.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: SnoMunke

Originally posted by: Jeff7
I'll say this - I don't think you'll want a software RAID card. Granted, I have never used a software RAID card - closest thing I know of is PIO mode for hard drives, which relies on the CPU during hard drive accesses. Slow as hell. The fastest part of the computer is stuck waiting for one of the slowest parts.
Save up the money and splurge on one of the Promise cards with XOR assist processing. I don't think you'll be sorry. The damn things can sustain close to 100MB/sec read speeds. I'll try to get some read tests when I have slightly less going on - WMP, Winamp, Virtualdub, Eudora, and Firefox are all running right now, and Virtualdub especially will screw around with the results, as it's reading and writing from and to the array.

With today's CPUs, there is little difference between software and hardware RAID controllers for the home/home office use...and software RAID is controller independent (this is a good thing!).

Software-based RAID through the OS is controller-independent. Software-based RAID through a controller is generally NOT. You can't generally take an array from, say, a Promise-based controller and stick it on one from LSI or 3Ware.

 

[Arcanedeath]

For your usage that controler is a steal

 

[InlineFour]

so i just received the controller yesterday. unfortunately one of the ports don't work. it does not detect a hdd. all the other ports work though. any idea what's going on? is the port dead?

 

[SnoMunke]

Originally posted by: Matthias99

Originally posted by: SnoMunke

Originally posted by: Jeff7
I'll say this - I don't think you'll want a software RAID card. Granted, I have never used a software RAID card - closest thing I know of is PIO mode for hard drives, which relies on the CPU during hard drive accesses. Slow as hell. The fastest part of the computer is stuck waiting for one of the slowest parts.
Save up the money and splurge on one of the Promise cards with XOR assist processing. I don't think you'll be sorry. The damn things can sustain close to 100MB/sec read speeds. I'll try to get some read tests when I have slightly less going on - WMP, Winamp, Virtualdub, Eudora, and Firefox are all running right now, and Virtualdub especially will screw around with the results, as it's reading and writing from and to the array.

With today's CPUs, there is little difference between software and hardware RAID controllers for the home/home office use...and software RAID is controller independent (this is a good thing!).

Software-based RAID through the OS is controller-independent. Software-based RAID through a controller is generally NOT. You can't generally take an array from, say, a Promise-based controller and stick it on one from LSI or 3Ware.

Thanks for detailing what I was saying...

 

[mamisano]

I have the SAME card in my home server. Server is an A64 3400+, 2GB Ram, 80GB Hitachi (onboard SATA) OS, and 3x Hitachi T7K250s in Raid 5 for a total of just under 500GB of storage.

The card runs fine, reads are no problem, but writes are noticably slower. I just wish I had an A64 based board with a PCI-X slot to put it in.

For the intended use, I am very pleased with the overall performance of the setup. Don't forget to check on the Dell site for BIOS and Driver updates. I usually check out the Precision 670 Workstation Windows XP section about every 3-4 months. Adaptec DOES NOT have this card on their site, the 6-port seems to be OEM only.