To RAID, or Not to RAID

[Pyroflash]

That is the question.

 

The story goes as such:

 

I just bought(well actually just about to go and buy) a new hard drive that is the exact same as the one I currently have.

 

I have already backed up my data and plan on reformatting after the install in any case.

 

The one question I have is whether or not I should raid my two new drives together in a RAID 0 or not. They aren't SSD's or anything, just simple WD Caviar Black 1TB's.

[Druid_]

I think the question should be ... why not?

 

If you are after a performance increase then raid stripe. If you want to backup your other drive then raid mirror (no performance increase).

 

I have raided my last 3 PCs and with win7 I can honestly say its incredibly easy. Just make sure to read the instructions in your motherboard manual on Raiding. BIOS may need changes for instance.

 

Both your drives for RAID 0 (stripe) will appear as one drive in windows. Partition it and your away. As for the performance boost there are many factors affecting it but 50% increase minimum for 2 1TB drives with reasonable cache.

[PoleCat]

I use RAID 0 for my 2 128GB SSDs for 238GB of OS and games. I also use two mechanicals in RAID 0 for a secondary partiton used for storage and general use.

 

The speed increase is modest but perceptible. There is absolutely NOT a 50% increase in performance in any case. This information is totally inaccurate. Reading this article you can see that modest gains from about 4% -15% can be seen depending on the application. http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/Does-RAID0-Really-Increase-Disk-Performance/394/6

 

The chance of mechanical catastrophic failure destroying vauable data is double with RAID 0 so it is more important then ever to be sure to keep a good up to date backup.

 

Setup using Boards featuring Intel rapid storage controllers are relatively simple. Enter bios >enable Raid> save and exit>enter raid bios> Select disks and create array>save and exit>enter bios and set boot priority if needed>save and exit> Install OS.

 

(Raid storage controller drivers may be needed at install if using older OS. Available at board manufacturers download section or Intels web site).

 

Good luck!

:)

Out

Edited May 26, 2011 by PoleCat

[bumfire]

I would say yes, I do the same as polecat, raid 2 128 ssds, and at the begining of your ssd's fresh life their is a noticeable difference in speed, but since GC or Trim doesnt work on raid then your ssd's slow down drastically after a while, so keep that in mind if you ever raid ssd's.

 

However if its just mechanical drives, then you dont have any such problems.

 

I run raid 0 and have never had any problems related to it and never had data lose because of raid 0, so if you have the hardware, then go for it, if only to see what its like, chances are you wont look back if you do try it.

[Moa]

In general:

* RAM makes the biggest difference to game performance

* 64-bit operating system allows you to address the extra RAM

* Disk makes a difference to load times (including terrain texture loading in-mission).

 

Since you have plenty of RAM (and assuming you are not running 32-bit, which couldn't use the RAM) then getting disks and doing RAID makes sense.

 

There is one caveat with RAID. Try not to use hardware RAID. Initially this sounds counter-intuitive (why use software RAID when hardware is available?). Well there are several reasons:

* software RAID (especially under Linux) is reliable. In circumstances your software RAID is borked the chances are your hardware RAID would be borked as well, and

* (most importantly) if you lose your hardware RAID controller generally you need to get the *exact* same controller to access your drives. Good luck if your board/chipset is getting older. This is not a problem with software RAID. I've heard of cases where data was lost on RAIDED drives because replacement controllers could not be obtained and the RAID format was proprietary. Never heard of a problem using software RAID.

[Pyroflash]

Okay, well my one drive quest turned into three + a set of Saitek Combat Rudder Pedals.

 

So I think I will set up the raid with two of the four disks I now have, use the third(SSD) for games with heavy loading times like ArmA 2 and DCS + my OS, and use the other one for music and movies and such. Thanks for the input guys.

 

@ Bum, they do slow down after a while, but if you reformat every so often, they speed back up(should be easy if you only use a ~32GB SSD for Windows). Just don't be stupid and try defragmenting your drive.

Edited May 26, 2011 by Pyroflash

[EtherealN]

With caviar black I'd say the only reason not to RAID would be fear of failures, since with a RAID-0 stripe either drive failing will cost you your data. (But if you have a cheap backup medium somewhere then you truly have no possible reason not to RAID :P )

 

The only case where I would be skeptical about a RAID would be variable speed discs such as the GreenPowers, but even there it's not really a major issue.

[Druid_]

The speed increase is modest but perceptible. There is absolutely NOT a 50% increase in performance in any case. This information is totally inaccurate. Reading this article you can see that modest gains from about 4% -15% can be seen depending on the application. http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/Does-RAID0-Really-Increase-Disk-Performance/394/6

That review is from 2006, 80gb hdd with 8mb cache, those figures change when you are talking about large 1TB drives with larger cache sizes & newer controllers.

 

The performance boost of 50% I mentioned was refering to the Disk performance. Game/application performance is dependant on how much disk access and the block sizes etc of the app.

 

I might also add that how your format your Hard Drives in respect to block sizes will also affect your Raid 0 performance.

 

As for using software RAID, don't bother. It will never be as good as hardware raid and guess what, your CPU will take a hit. Most motherboards come with an onboard RAID controller these days. I have never had any problems with reliability either. RAID 0 on the last 4 PCs I've built.

 

With regard to performance drops using RAID 0 on SSDs. The latest SSDs, especially those using the latest version of the excellent Sandforce controller, have excellent garbage collection (similar to Trim) which work on RAIDed drives. Team this with a drive which has over provisioning (spare unused capacity) provides excellent performance with NO need to reformat and Negligable or NO performance drops with use.

 

By the way, those who are in the market for a SSD, this one gets my vote. just make sure you have SATA 6Gb/s on your motherboard.

Edited May 28, 2011 by Druid_

[Pyroflash]

Sorry Druid, I totally would get it, but I can't see myself able to justify the cost of something like that. It is triple what I paid for my 60 GB OCZ Vertex 2 drive, and only has double the space(add that to the cost of a new mobo, proc, and graphics card for later in the fall when I am doing my upgrade to Intel's Ivy Bridge). Not to mention I now lack a spare SATA 6 Gb/s slot on my motherboard.

 

I don't know, maybe if they come down in price in the future I will get one, but I am pretty happy as is right now.

Edited May 28, 2011 by Pyroflash

[topdog]

The Agility 3 is a slightly smaller brother of the Vertex 3, offering pretty good performance and smaller scale drives at slightly less cost per GB.

 

For instance, 240GB Vertex 3 = 450 quid or almost £1.9 per GB.

 

60GB Agility 3 is 100 quid, or about £1.65 per GB.

 

Just to keep in mind anyway, I guess it still wouldn't change your current situation.

Edited May 28, 2011 by topdog

[Pyroflash]

Yeah, to tell you the truth, I would have gotten the agility 3, but I only have two SATA 6GB/s slots on my mobo, and both of them are currently taken up.

 

Maybe when I get my Ivy Bridge mobo, I will have more slots and upgrade, but we will have to see.

Edited May 28, 2011 by Pyroflash

[Druid_]

tbh I'd rather buy 2 x 120Gb drives and RAID them. The difference in cost isn't much. As for the price, 1. Its only just come out so prices will fall after the Rush 2. Don't buy in UK, for instance amazon.com are selling the 120gb model for $270. I expect prices will fall below $220 in the next 4-6 months especially if competitors release similar performing drives.

 

Pyro, using the SATA 6gb/s for normal hard drives is a waste. Even a regular SSD wont bottleneck on a SATA 3Gb/s. Unless of course its a RAID controller issue with those ports.

[topdog]

By regular, you mean something that isn't already designed for a sata 6Gb/s interface (single Agility 3's will bottleneck on a 3 Gb/s interface and I'm not sure how irregular you'd call one of those).

[Druid_]

Well I wouldn't call a recently released Agility 3 a regular drive, by curretn standards its a performance drive & a price to reflect this. Although maybe I should have been a little more specific. Any SSD with a read/write throughput of less than 300 Mb/sec average is ok with SATA 3 which at the moment is a huge percentage of the SSD's out there, anything more you need SATA 6 as it will bottleneck.

[PoleCat]

That review is from 2006, 80gb hdd with 8mb cache, those figures change when you are talking about large 1TB drives with larger cache sizes & newer controllers.

 

Granted it is an older article. Much of it is still absolutely true. The differences in performance given the same drive (modern or not), in a RAID0 configuration as compared to the same single SATA drive in AHCI mode are modest. :)

 

Out

[Pyroflash]

Pyro, using the SATA 6gb/s for normal hard drives is a waste. Even a regular SSD wont bottleneck on a SATA 3Gb/s. Unless of course its a RAID controller issue with those ports.

 

To tell you the truth I was seriously considering swapping the cables out in my current drives in order to go out and buy an agility 3 as I can still return my Vertex 2. Maybe I will go back to the store, return the SSD, get an Agility 3, and pick up a Blu Ray drive while I am there.

 

As for raiding two 120 GB SSD's together, sorry, but I do not feel like spending $600 on drives ATM; maybe later when the cost of doing something like that actually becomes justified.

 

On a side note, this feels like I am buying hard drives in the 90's all over again, when a gigabyte hard drive would run a hundred dollars. And in 2004 when people gasped with mouths wide open at those who could afford a terrabyte of space.

Edited May 28, 2011 by Pyroflash

[Druid_]

Granted it is an older article. Much of it is still absolutely true. The differences in performance given the same drive (modern or not), in a RAID0 configuration as compared to the same single SATA drive in AHCI mode are modest. :)

RAID is a little more complicated than you & that old article imply & coming out with a blanket statement like that is inaccurate. It depends on how & what you use your PC for.

 

My Real Life experience of RAID 0 is this. Windows boots up 30% faster, Games boot up to 50% faster, DCS A10c loads up 30-40% faster.

 

In game load up times are negligible (small file transfers in short bursts).

 

In essence, it depends what performance you are measuring. LOts of small file transfers in short burts will provide little extra performance (partly due to all of the extra heads that have to seek and align), large chunks of sequential data (larger file sizes also help) however will provide huge gains in performance.

 

This is one reason why I hate patching & prefer a complete re-install with patched executable. If the files are on the disk & can be read sequentially then I get excellent load times.

 

(my timings are taken from an identical PC I built for a friend without Raid).

[PoleCat]

RAID is a little more complicated than you & that old article imply & coming out with a blanket statement like that is inaccurate. It depends on how & what you use your PC for.

 

My Real Life experience of RAID 0 is this. Windows boots up 30% faster, Games boot up to 50% faster, DCS A10c loads up 30-40% faster.

 

In game load up times are negligible (small file transfers in short bursts).

 

In essence, it depends what performance you are measuring. LOts of small file transfers in short burts will provide little extra performance (partly due to all of the extra heads that have to seek and align), large chunks of sequential data (larger file sizes also help) however will provide huge gains in performance.

 

This is one reason why I hate patching & prefer a complete re-install with patched executable. If the files are on the disk & can be read sequentially then I get excellent load times.

 

(my timings are taken from an identical PC I built for a friend without Raid).

 

I am not speaking to how complicated RAID is, I have been using it for years. Forget the article for a minute. My experience with using Raid 0 on multiple machines for many years is completely contrary to your results for general use and gaming. (Which means overall. I use my PC for many things). Not even close to performace gains like those. Frankly I think the expectations set by your statements are unrealistic and anyone spending money on a second drive to test it will likely be disappointed by the results. It is perceptible but far from stunning in most cases. Your splitting hairs as far as noticable differences are concerned. I have many friends that have set up RAID 0 with my help tried it and quickly reverted citing that the improvements in performance were negligable for them. This is not a blanket statement I don't know everything this is just my experience.

 

Out

Edited May 30, 2011 by PoleCat

[RIPTIDE]

One thing that is missing from this thread is the controller used. If its the onboard ICHR10R controller then that's one thing and needs to be stated. Because you will most likely get very different performance from plugging the same drives into Adaptecs latest and greatest offerings.

[EtherealN]

What Riptide said.

 

(And whoah, I need to be careful with my mouse. I almost clicked the "warn" button instead of the "rep" one. :D )

[Pyroflash]

So, I am going back to the store to get a Blu-Ray drive and a 120 GB SSD(OCZ Vertex 3)(yeah, I know I said I wouldn't, but some voice in the back of my head kept telling me to) is it going to be worth it to buy a RAID card while I am there, or are the onboard controllers in my ASUS R3F going to be enough considering I am just raiding two regular HDD's together and not SSD's?

[Druid_]

One thing that is missing from this thread is the controller used. If its the onboard ICHR10R controller then that's one thing and needs to be stated. Because you will most likely get very different performance from plugging the same drives into Adaptecs latest and greatest offerings.

Absolutely agree, in fact my motherboard when released had some issues with one of the Marvel raid controllers which provided very poor results. I switched to the other controller and all was well. Also not mentioned is format block size which can also affect performance. Also how you partition your hard drives, set up Windows Swap files & a few other tweaks will also affect your RAID performance.

 

RAID ing and getting the best performance out of you system can be a lengthy process but one which when done properly can yield good worthwhile results. Polecat, my experiences with RAIDing are obviously very different to yours. Maybe post up your specs & someone here can help.

 

Pyro, what onboard controllers do you have? I would at the very least try them out before spending money on a dedicated card. Tbh I doubt the performance gains will be worth the money of a dedicated RAID card.

Edited May 31, 2011 by Druid_

[emenance]

That is the question.

 

The story goes as such:

 

I just bought(well actually just about to go and buy) a new hard drive that is the exact same as the one I currently have.

 

I have already backed up my data and plan on reformatting after the install in any case.

 

The one question I have is whether or not I should raid my two new drives together in a RAID 0 or not. They aren't SSD's or anything, just simple WD Caviar Black 1TB's.

 

AS a long time user of WD drives I thought I would add this. I even have expensive data recovery and harddrive tools for WD drives :)

 

First if you Raid WD drives you should really go look at the WD website for the Raid edition drives. Raid edition drives are ....made for Raid and have a 5 year warranty, your black has 5 and supports 6gb/s I dont know if I would sacrafice moving away from a real RE drive for that. I am using Raid edition 3 drives and they have been absolutley perfect. Better to trust my work with them than a plain old drive version. I wouldnt raid SSD drives either. Sorry, but i dont think anyone should raid anything without raid edition drives that are made better and a solution to image and reinstall your OS to DISIMMILAR hardware like Symantec Backup exec Desktop edition 10 that you can find on ebay with a single license.

 

We have too much time invested in our OS build to just trust it to standard drives and a weak backup solution. So yes IMO go for raid, you can use the Motherboard controller just test it compared to someone else who has a similar board or a review. pcper.com is a great forum for that. http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/SpecSheet/ENG/2879-701281.pdf

Edited June 1, 2011 by emenance

[Pyroflash]

Marvell 88SE9128 on the 6Gb/s, and Intel ICH10R controllers for my 3 Gb/s ports.