RAID 0 or not? Need suggestions.

[groberts101]

So my decision is stuck on whether I should use RAID 0 for the SSDs on the LSI controller or on the onboard Intel ICH10R?

15 minutes or less and all restored. I do regular backups

Like I already said in my earlier response.. I've done both and prefer the faster response times and superior caching performance of the Intel chip even at the expense of large file transfer speeds. But 550MB/s is nothing to sneeze at for a snappy OS volume. I just use cards for their intended purpose which is typically mass storage and faster large data transfers.

And not to be a smartass or overly critical here.. but if you have your image restores down like that?.. why not just try a few different configurations?

We can all give input and tell you what to do until we're blue in the face here.. but ultimately you'll need to be the judge of what best suits YOUR particular usage patterns. Of course the typicvally used file sizes and amount of data transfered PER worksession AND over the long term will be the deciding factor on the time you gain from raiding various volumes. If the gains were minimal as some point out?.. I wouldn't have invested thousands in cards/drives to do it. No placebo affect for those that need the speed, to be sure.

So, the more data you tend to transfer with increased frequency?.. the greater the importance of raided storage volumes. Having an OS drive that can R/W data at 550MB/s means nothing if you are bottlenecked to single HDD speeds since that OS volume will only read/write data as fast as the drive it's coming from or going to. Even on systems with lowly sata2 SSD speed bottlenecks.. any single HDD based storage volume is going to become the next biggest bottleneck. Unless you have them raided to better compliment the SSD's speed capability.

It's pretty pricy if you need to add drives to do it(raid to raid).. but it sounds like you already have the available hardware needed to achieve "raid to raid" type speeds. Personally speaking.. I'll never go back to single drive speeds and use additional R0's to back up my primary R0's(OS and storage volumes). Obviously get's very expensive to use that method of redundancy.. but the benefits are there if your time is worth more than the hardware needed to do it.

Never EVER seen a power user that's grown accustomed with raid to raid transfer speeds go back to single drive OS/storage volumes on a sata2 system. Sata3 systems with SSD to SSD OS/storage configurations maybe.. but they are obviously going to be space limited unless they use raided HDD storage volumes to better compliment the sata3 SSD's speed capability.

PS.. the easiest test to do for witnessing firsthand what faster raid to raid transfers will do for your usage model is to set up a ramdisk and transfer typically used data between a raided SSD volume and that non-bottlenecked ramdisk volume. File transfers much below 1GB will go so fast that you rarely get to see the Windows transfer speed dialogue box popup. And files under 500MB will transfer almost in the blink of an eye without the transfer speed popup. Most people who do the test are blown away by the results and start building raids shortly thereafter.

 

[An_Overdose]

You can do a raid 0 partition using Windows software raid while still having the benefits of TRIM. Although it might not be as fast as your LSI controller.

 

[Bad Dude]

You can do a raid 0 partition using Windows software raid while still having the benefits of TRIM. Although it might not be as fast as your LSI controller.

I am not sure the X58 chipset could run RAID0 and have TRIM at the moment.

 

[JAG87]

If he's already purchased the hardware, the increased cost is zero. You do get a return on the flexibility of the space. I've now got 138GB of games installed on my system. If I had setup my previous 120GB SSDs as independent drives, I would have had to split up the games installations to separate locations.

The increased cost is not zero just because the money has come out of the account. For example, the second SSD could be used in another application that requires a storage medium instead of purchasing another.

If you need the space then you should buy ONE larger SSD, not combine many of them in RAID 0. And as much as you like to think your games benefit from striped SSDs, well here's a newsflash for you, they don't. You're shaving off just a few seconds of loading time, because you are still bottle necked by your CPUs ability to de-compress game data into RAM and VRAM.

So yea, those are some expensive game installs on a $/GB basis.

 

[Zxian]

The increased cost is not zero just because the money has come out of the account. For example, the second SSD could be used in another application that requires a storage medium instead of purchasing another.

The money has been spent. He has the hardware. Assuming he's not going to sell it or return it, it's a sunk cost. You're comparing that to a prospective cost which is not the same thing.

If you need the space then you should buy ONE larger SSD, not combine many of them in RAID 0. And as much as you like to think your games benefit from striped SSDs, well here's a newsflash for you, they don't. You're shaving off just a few seconds of loading time, because you are still bottle necked by your CPUs ability to de-compress game data into RAM and VRAM.

So yea, those are some expensive game installs on a $/GB basis.

I never implied that I was gaining performance on my setup. You seem to have misread what I said. I mentioned flexibility. Independent drives limited me (and will limit the OP) to 120GB of space on a single volume - RAID0 would allow him a total of 240GB to use as he sees fit. I also said "very good performance" - not "the best performance", although I'd argue that there's little performance downside to RAID0 aside from an extra couple of seconds on boot. Yes, you're doubling your chances at the hardware failure lottery. My previous comment about having to reinstall any software installed on the secondary drive still holds true.

On the topic of cost, when I purchased my 120GB Intel 520's the price/GB on the 120GB drives was lower than that of the 240 GB drives. By running in RAID0, I ended up with the same total amount of space and a lower overall cost. I was running out of room with 240GB of total space on my system drive(s), so I upgraded to the Samsung 830's. The same cost/GB scenario was true for those drives as well ($180 for 256GB - have you seen a $360 512GB Samsung 830? I haven't).


Your comment about a "newsflash" doesn't help bring out the facts. It implies that I'm somehow stupid (which I'm not, thank you). There's no reason to be rude in this thread. I'm well aware of the fact that real-world application scenarios don't get the same boost in performance as we see in benchmarks as well as the potential downsides to RAID0.

 

[groberts101]

R0 failures are waaayy overblown. I and many others I know have been using them for years without issue. My 6 drive V2 array is rock solid for well more than 2 years now and even the fastest single drives don't hold a candle to it when heavily multitasking during large data transfers.

Also IMHO,.. if your data is that important?.. you should be backing it up regardless of the built in redundancy of the chosen raid type. That's why I use R0's to back up my R0's with large single spinners and blurays as last defense against data loss. Expensive type of redundancy for sure.. but it's fast as hell.

 

[Bad Dude]

Well, now that my 240GB SSD order has been cancelled. I would think I am going with the onboard Intel RAID0. Even though the speed might be that much but I always felt it's much more responsive with RAID0.

 

[Bad Dude]

OK guys. Happy Holidays. Hope you all had a good Christmas or if you don't celebrate it, at least got a good day off. I had to work but no complaint.

Any how, I would like to ask the final questions:
1) With RAID 0, which would give me the higher transfer rate? Intel 10ICHR or the LSI card?
2) Which option would you take with the Corsair Force 3 SSDs? The Intel 10ICHR or the LSI card? A few seconds on the boot time does not bother me but fast performance is what I am aiming at.
3) Just to add to my arsenal, I just got a new 240GB OCZ Agility 4, which drive would be faster, the OCZ Agility 4 or the Corsair Force 3?

Thanks.
Happy New Year.

 

[groberts101]

1. ICH will blow the LSI card away for an OS volume since it has lower latency and more/better cache leverage. LSI will obviously have better throughput than the 3G based X58 if it's a 6G based model.

2. ICH for boot/data.. LSI for data only.

3. Depends on typical file usage more than anything. Both use Asynch nand and the Marvell based Agy4 will be faster than the Sandforce based Force 3 with less easily compressed data(such as vids/pics/music). But even if it does see more easily compressed data such as an OS volume would deal with on regular basis.. the Marvell controller has slightly better latency overall and would be my choice if it were to be used in single drive config's.

Happy Holidays to you too.

 

[Bad Dude]

1. ICH will blow the LSI card away for an OS volume since it has lower latency and more/better cache leverage. LSI will obviously have better throughput than the 3G based X58 if it's a 6G based model.

2. ICH for boot/data.. LSI for data only.

3. Depends on typical file usage more than anything. Both use Asynch nand and the Marvell based Agy4 will be faster than the Sandforce based Force 3 with less easily compressed data(such as vids/pics/music). But even if it does see more easily compressed data such as an OS volume would deal with on regular basis.. the Marvell controller has slightly better latency overall and would be my choice if it were to be used in single drive config's.

Happy Holidays to you too.

Thanks so much. I am running into a little dilemma right now. The Intel 10ICHR and the LSI controller don't play nice together. I can only have one or the other but not both. If the LSI is on with drives attached then the Intel won't go show and vice versa.

So Robert, would think that I single drive boot on the OCZ Agility 4, the Corsair Force 3 on singles, and my WD Black 1TBs on the LSI for data? So would you have other suggestions?

Thanks.

 

[groberts101]

Thanks so much. I am running into a little dilemma right now. The Intel 10ICHR and the LSI controller don't play nice together. I can only have one or the other but not both. If the LSI is on with drives attached then the Intel won't go show and vice versa.

So Robert, would think that I single drive boot on the OCZ Agility 4, the Corsair Force 3 on singles, and my WD Black 1TBs on the LSI for data? So would you have other suggestions?

Thanks.

sounds like you have a limited OROM and there isn't enough space for the card to run at the same time. It will only get worse when you try to run raids on the ICH.

First thing I would do would be to disable everything that you possibly can(only those features/chips not used of course) in the bios. Set the ICH to AHCI(if you aren't going use raid), eSATA ports, sound, 3rd party chips set to ide mode with no drives attached, etc.

Then if that's not enough.. check for a newer or preferably even a mod'd bios at the mfgr's forums(or even station drivers). In the case of my Gigabyte boards bios.. they moved from a 1MB bios to a 2MB version/larger shadow memory allocation to run more chips/PCIe based devices simultaniously. I can still get myself into trouble if I try to raid every 3rd party chip and run both my raid cards at once.. and I am silly like that.. but it did help immensely and nowadays I only need to choose between the JMicron raid and Marvell raid to get it all working at the same time.

As for the need to run the black on that LSI card?.. hardly worth the extra boot time and effort to only get slightly faster cache burst speeds. If the Force 3 is going to be data only(Agy 4 as boot)?.. I'd be worrying about that one getting max speeds through the LSI card more than the HDD.

 

[Bad Dude]

So Robert,
Would you suggest that I get rid of the LSI and run the Force 3 in RAID 0 with the Intel ICHR?
Here's what I need to be connected but not always on as I do hot swaps and only turn them on as I need the data.
-OCZ 256GB Agility 4.
-2X Corsair Force 3 120GB.
-1 DVD burner, in case I need to read some dvds later. I could run this of the Jmicron or Marvell onboard. Along with the rear eSATA.
-Front eSATA from case connector.
-4 swaps hard drives.
I have a few of the PCIe X1 cards which give me 2 more SATA2 ports. The Asus P6T gives me 7 ports including the Marvell. So that's overall 9 ports.
Is there a PCIeX1 card that would give me 4 ports? Other than the SSDs, I don't think any other drives will transfer that much through put even the SATA3 compatible drives.

Thanks.

 

[groberts101]

So Robert,
Would you suggest that I get rid of the LSI and run the Force 3 in RAID 0 with the Intel ICHR?
Here's what I need to be connected but not always on as I do hot swaps and only turn them on as I need the data.
-OCZ 256GB Agility 4.
-2X Corsair Force 3 120GB.
-1 DVD burner, in case I need to read some dvds later. I could run this of the Jmicron or Marvell onboard. Along with the rear eSATA.
-Front eSATA from case connector.
-4 swaps hard drives.
I have a few of the PCIe X1 cards which give me 2 more SATA2 ports. The Asus P6T gives me 7 ports including the Marvell. So that's overall 9 ports.
Is there a PCIeX1 card that would give me 4 ports? Other than the SSDs, I don't think any other drives will transfer that much through put even the SATA3 compatible drives.

Thanks.

no.. not really. I'd try like hell to keep that card running as many devices as possible if it were my system.

Should have asked which LSI card you had to begin with???? If it has 4 ports?.. see below.

Agy4 on the ICH
Raided Force 3's on the LSI
DVD on the LSI
stay off the JMicron and Marvell if possible as that will also free up the shadow memory as I already mentioned above.

I'd nix the cheapy PCIe cards as they suck up shadow memory for running that LSI card and may be the leading cause of your LSI's non-detection issues here to begin with.

You can also use the process of elimination by disconnecting everything but the boot drive. Add the LSI card and get the drive/s attached to it to see if it detects at boot. Then start reconnecting things in the priority needed and figure out what causes the card to start non-detecting once again. That will show you where the bios memory limits lie and you'll have to just start working around it from there.

 

[Bad Dude]

no.. not really. I'd try like hell to keep that card running as many devices as possible if it were my system.

Should have asked which LSI card you had to begin with???? If it has 4 ports?.. see below.

Agy4 on the ICH
Raided Force 3's on the LSI
DVD on the LSI
stay off the JMicron and Marvell if possible as that will also free up the shadow memory as I already mentioned above.

I'd nix the cheapy PCIe cards as they suck up shadow memory for running that LSI card and may be the leading cause of your LSI's non-detection issues here to begin with.

You can also use the process of elimination by disconnecting everything but the boot drive. Add the LSI card and get the drive/s attached to it to see if it detects at boot. Then start reconnecting things in the priority needed and figure out what causes the card to start non-detecting once again. That will show you where the bios memory limits lie and you'll have to just start working around it from there.

LSI SAS3442E-R PCI Express SATA / SAS Controller Card .

The card play nice without the Intel RAID. Right now, I have not install any of the SSDs yet. However, I got all 6 ports from the LSI card loaded with drives for hot swaps and 2 of the ports are in RAID 0 with my WD blacks. I use the onboard ports for DVD burner and eSATA and 2 other hot swaps as well.
So in this case, should I go ahead and run RAID0 for the 2 Corsair Force 3 and the rest on that controller as well? No Intel RAID and Marvell.

One more thing, the card works great until a few months ago, when I shut the system off. I came back home from work and one of the drive got kick off and lost every thing which mostly the Windows installation. I checked the drives and both the WD Blacks are fine and no bad sectors or errors. Set it up for the same thing again with RAID0, but it has been detecting the drives slow then normal. This is off and on. I wonder what could be wrong as it's intermittent and I have not changed any thing other than taken off all of the drives and only use them for hot swaps. Now I just have the 2 WD Blacks on the RAID0, but it seems some time to detect slow or takes a while to get to the Windows screens.
I am wondering if it's the card overheating or the drives bad that I could not detect?

Thanks.

 

[Bad Dude]

Just an update. I got the Force 3 drives to run RAID 0 with the Intel ICH10R and the latest drivers. When I check the drives with Crystal Disk Info, it shows that both drives are TRIM activated in RAID 0. I didn't know that the X58 chipset with ICH10R has TRIM support in RAID 0. That is nice.
I did the command in Windows and it shows 0 as TRIM activated.
Is there another way to check for sure?

Thanks.

 

[groberts101]

those utilities only show that it's available/activated.. not that the commands are actually passing down the storage stack to the drives firmware.

Most of these guys have been checking for hex changes after trimming...

and some(including myself.. at least when it comes to Sandforce controlled drives).. will use HDTach ot HDTune to graph read speed changes(lower speeds/dips) in locations that previously held incompressible data prior to trimming.

I've also mod'd my OROM as required to help my system towards this end as well.. but without some additional wizardry being worked(correct alternate device ID).. it just isn't happening yet. Hopefully it's just a matter of time until these guys figure it out and X58 can be added to the list.

The relevant thread and links are < here >.