New to raid
I have two 64-bit/66MHz PCI slots in my dually server/workstation mobo that I like to do video editing on. I'm currently using a dual udma100 hardrive setup to do high speed video editing allowing one to read as the other writes as fast as posible on my first IDE channel.
What I'm wondering is what is my best option for speed. What is the fastest way of moving files as large as 4gig.
Obviously 4 gig from drive 1 to drive 1 is the slowest...even if it's a 7200 rpm drive with 8mb cache.
Moving that file with 2 drives, off one onto another is much faster and its what I'm doing now.
I figure moving a 4gig file from a 2 drive raid 0 to a seperate 2 drive raid 0 would really kick arse.
I've given some thought to what would happen if I had a 2 drive raid 0 (holding my OS and software) and a second conventional ide single HD just for a place to bounce the files off of might be fast.
Are there single cards that fit 64/66 slots and can build 2 seperate raid 0 2 drive arrays? Or do I need two cards?
I dunno...lots of thoughts...Any advice?
Oh...I'm not concerned with a raid version with failure tolerance.
Raid 0 is fine. I just need R/W speed
What I'm wondering is what is my best option for speed. What is the fastest way of moving files as large as 4gig.
Obviously 4 gig from drive 1 to drive 1 is the slowest...even if it's a 7200 rpm drive with 8mb cache.
Moving that file with 2 drives, off one onto another is much faster and its what I'm doing now.
I figure moving a 4gig file from a 2 drive raid 0 to a seperate 2 drive raid 0 would really kick arse.
I've given some thought to what would happen if I had a 2 drive raid 0 (holding my OS and software) and a second conventional ide single HD just for a place to bounce the files off of might be fast.
Are there single cards that fit 64/66 slots and can build 2 seperate raid 0 2 drive arrays? Or do I need two cards?
I dunno...lots of thoughts...Any advice?
Oh...I'm not concerned with a raid version with failure tolerance.
Raid 0 is fine. I just need R/W speed
0
Comments
And let me start by saying my home network now has three servers on it with 64/66 slots and I seriously believe that a hotrod disk subsytemm is the biggest factor generally in the perceived "feel" of how fast a system is.
One of my servers is running Megraid elite 1600 disk controller and the other a 1500 disk controller. These are hardware based versus software based scsi raid, Both have dedicated i960 risc processors and 128mb. The 1600 lists for $1000 new. We buy them off ebay for about $125 used. Nice 10k 18gb drives run ya about 40 to 45 bucks a pop on eBay. So for $400 bills you can build a 6 drive raid-0 scsi setup basicaly that kicks sata raptor ass all over the place. Two SATA raptors and a controller cost the same and have less then half performance and a fraction of the disk space basicaly.
These are true 64bit/66mhz capable top end raid controllers as sold today in the high end Dell servers not yesterdays technology.... For $125 a pop.
Waiting to see any sata raid-arry in any computer kick over 140,000 on atto and I hit almost 230,000 with my $400 disk subsystem. I have gotten rid off two drives now but still hit close to 200,000 with four Atlas 10k III's so its basicaly a $320 disk subsystem now with drives and controller. It hit 120,000 on Sandra BYPASSING THE CACHE with a 2ms Avg access time. Check the Avg access on a IDE raid system bypassisng the cache. Its about 8.5 ms unless you get raptors that hit under 6ms in raid-0.
When you want to talk real disk subsystem performance, especially in a 64bit/66mhz slot you talk scsi. With the RIGHT ide raid controller thats 66mhz capable and copying between two differant controllers you will get pretty good performance though if tahts what you want.
Cheers and let me know if I can help ya pick out an ide controller.
Tex
I'm considering the SX4000 and TX4000 cards. I dismissed the Escalade 7506 Series stuff because of price.
I was hoping it was possible to build two two drive raid0s with one of the x4000's.
Would I be better off with two cheaper raid controllers or would I have to go with the two x4000's and use both of my 'super' pci slots?
You realy really should consider checking eBay for whatever you get. You can get a 66mhz capable promise there for maybe 40 bucks. The 3ware 7000 series can be had for a fraction of the new price also.
My needs are differant then most but... just what are you wanting to stick in the other 64 bit slot your saving but a disk controller? I run a fiber gigabit LAN with 64/66mhz LAN cards but... the differance in thru put on the LAN with the card in a 33mhz slot isnt as much differant as you might think either. A normal 100mbit LAN can't begin to saturate a 32bit/33mhz bus. Hell a two drive raid-0 can't saturate the bandwidth? So if a two drive ide raid-0 fiots in the bandwidth and thats what your copying to and from uhhhhhhh how cana lan card benefit from teh bandwidth? You really only have disk or lan cards to stick in those slots so just use them on what you need them for most. You only get half benefit with any 32bit ide controller anyway. But unless you have multiple servers with 64bit/66mhz slots your gonna copy to and from a box with a 32bit 33mhz slot so you gain notta by using a 64/66mhz slot on the server really for large copies even with gigabit. I have 3 servers at my house with 64/66mhz slots and a fiber gigabit LAN and file copies to and from the 32bit/33mhz KR7 with ide raid on the fiber is surprisingly close as 64bit/66mhz server to server actually??? I mean with a single fatsd scsi drive I get almost the same thru put over teh fiber gigabit lan as I do locally.
If you have the drives now get a couple promise 100 tx2 controllers for like 35 or 40 bucks a pop off eBay. If you want you can always stick all 4 ide drives with two arrays back on one controller and the 4000 series just suxs. Trust me. I have done more raid arrays with both scsi and ide then 99.5 percent of the people in this buisness and I am a benchmark nut. Most the guys here on the board know me. I had 10,000 posts at the old Icrontic and tuning raid was sorta my baby.
Tex
Just curious. Seems the bus on the mobo would be the bottleneck if I reached the theoretically speed limit
here you go...
whats the differance in the 8506 and the 8500 ? Do you know? The 8500 is running 300 bucks even on eBay and its 64/33 not 64/66. I have never benched my stuff to prove it but many have said that one you put a 33mhz card in a 64/66 slot then both the 64 bit slots have to bump down to that speed. Basicaly that cards on the same bus have to operate at the same speed. Thats whats cool about some of the dualie boards that actually provide 64/33 slots as well 64/66 or pci-x slots.
If the 8506 is running at 33 mhz that ATTO is doubly impressive though as its almost maxed out the possible bandwidth for that type of slot.
Once again... Thanks ! That was a killer SATA atto.
Tex
7506-n is PATA RAID controller with 64 bit 66MHz PCI interface
8500-n is SATA RAID controller with 64 bit 33MHz PCI interface
8506-n is SATA RAID controller with 64 bit 66MHz PCI interface
Where "n" is number of drives supported: 4, 8, or 12.
All of these models can do RAID 0, 1, 10, 5, and JBOD.
I've installed my 8506-4LP in my 100MHz PCI-X slot (which gets bumped down 66MHz). It's the only card on that particular bus.
I've collected some benchmark data (WB99 transfer rate graphs) to show how the 7500-4LP scales with number of drives: Escalade 7500-4LP Benchmark Results. I have a 7500-4LP installed in my nForce system which hits a hard limit at ~121MB/s. I'm sure the 7500-4LP controller would continue to scale well past the ~121MB/s limit if installed in a 64 bit PCI slot.
And again! Awesome atto for ide !
Tex
Can you run a sandra and have it bypass the cache for me? Sorta curiousa how it fares in that one also,.
trc
SiSoftware Sandra result with controller write cache enabled (Drive Index 123914kB/s):
Test Status
SMP Test : No
Total Test Threads : 1
SMT Test : No
Dynamic MP/MT Load Balance : No
Processor Affinity : No
Windows Disk Cache Used : No
Use Overlapped I/O : Yes
IO Queue Depth : 8 request(s)
Test File Size : 2047MB
File Server Optimised : No
Benchmark Breakdown
Buffered Read : 68 MB/s
Sequential Read : 192 MB/s
Random Read : 14 MB/s
Buffered Write : 82 MB/s
Sequential Write : 176 MB/s
Random Write : 41 MB/s
Average Access Time : 4 ms (estimated)
Drive
Drive Type : Hard Disk
Total Size : 458.0GB
Free Space : 457.9GB, 100%
SiSoftware Sandra result with controller write cache disabled (Drive Index 97473kB/s):
Test Status
SMP Test : No
Total Test Threads : 1
SMT Test : No
Dynamic MP/MT Load Balance : No
Processor Affinity : No
Windows Disk Cache Used : No
Use Overlapped I/O : Yes
IO Queue Depth : 8 request(s)
Test File Size : 2047MB
File Server Optimised : No
Benchmark Breakdown
Buffered Read : 68 MB/s
Sequential Read : 183 MB/s
Random Read : 14 MB/s
Buffered Write : 7 MB/s
Sequential Write : 14 MB/s
Random Write : 12 MB/s
Average Access Time : 4 ms (estimated)
Drive
Drive Type : Hard Disk
Total Size : 458.0GB
Free Space : 457.9GB, 100%
Test Status
SMP Test : No
Total Test Threads : 1
SMT Test : No
Dynamic MP/MT Load Balance : No
Processor Affinity : No
Windows Disk Cache Used : Yes
Use Overlapped I/O : Yes
IO Queue Depth : 8 request(s)
Test File Size : 2047MB
File Server Optimised : No
Benchmark Breakdown
Buffered Read : 68 MB/s
Sequential Read : 58 MB/s
Random Read : 10 MB/s
Buffered Write : 82 MB/s
Sequential Write : 48 MB/s
Random Write : 39 MB/s
Average Access Time : 5 ms (estimated)
Drive
Drive Type : Hard Disk
Total Size : 458.0GB
Free Space : 457.9GB, 100%