my first post...just want some input

[Electronic Punk]

My understanding of raid was that you had to have two identical drives that act as one drive (no sure whether it is the combined size or the same asize) and because the data is being pulled from two different IDE channels then it is twice as fast.

An expensive but worthwhile feature! Well at least, thats what I could come up with, never really read up on it as my mobo doesn't have that feature and I have no plans on buying a second HDD at this time (other upgrades to dream about)

Am I right? Or am I way off

 

[Sazar]

Posted by Electronic Punk
My understanding of raid was that you had to have two identical drives that act as one drive (no sure whether it is the combined size or the same asize) and because the data is being pulled from two different IDE channels then it is twice as fast.

An expensive but worthwhile feature! Well at least, thats what I could come up with, never really read up on it as my mobo doesn't have that feature and I have no plans on buying a second HDD at this time (other upgrades to dream about)

Am I right? Or am I way off

RAID controller is not that expensive per say...

can be if you get a fancy shmancy one lol

its worthwile to have if you are going to have a lot of IDE devices or even if you plan to have a lot of atapi devices coz then you can just move the ide drives to the RAID controller...



you can either have everything running as separate drives or MIRROR the drive so that you have backup... personally I do not have RAID but I do setup frequent restore points and all my important docs are on the 2 drives I have...

for mubbers

sorry m8.. didn't mean to sound over bearing in my last post on this thread on the 4600 v/s the 9700pro..

when the 4600 first came out on the market it commanded the same premium price as the 9700pro does now.. and the 4600 is a nice card... BUT my thing is the lad is setting up a new rig... and with something that is dx9 compliant he is more future proof...

personally if you are looking to save money I would either wait for a lower clocked iteration of the nv30 card from nvidia or get a 9xxx series card from radeon...

am not going by spec sheets either though I do post em a bit lol... I build computers at work and work on em quite a bit... am talking from personal experience...

again the 4600's are NOT BAD.. I just don't think it is worth getting the gf4 ti series when you have similar priced cards coming on the market with future software/technology compliance...

end mubbers section

btw nice points out there by him and zedric... read up other related posts as well concerning how different parts of hardware work..

concerning RAM... I would advise you to either buy a week ago or wait for the prices to drop back.. samsung and co have pushed prices up a touch..

ddr2700 512mb costs around 120-130 bucks... for a namebrand certified clip...

 

[Mubbers]

Sazar - no problemo!

I never knew about DX 9.0, is the 4600 going to struggle with it???

Zedric may have mis-understood me... I rated his advice on HDD's as top notch That I didn't spend a lot of $£ on the wrong stuff for me was entirely down to the good info. Thanks.

Oh yeah when I said:

I just went for a good drive.

I meant in the country with the Mrs! Nice cuppa tea and a cake, much cheaper...

But tell me more about RAID 5... - you see these are exactly the kind of issues I'd like to help out with (EP....???)

Mubbers [reducing to defcon 5]

 

[ditchhopper]

If your lookin at the soyo kt400 then the ati 9700 pro is perfect for that board. They both support 8xAGP. As for the raid I can say from experience that its worth it. Mirroring your drives is kinda a waste since its so easy to back up data now. But just striping 2 drives will double your access times and youll really notice it. I striped 4 drives so I could run a gaming server and it works great.
I keep an extra drive off the array just for backing up data. The Soyo your lookin at comes with an onboard High Point Raid chip that can use up to 4 drives for mirror or stripe. Soyo Rocks.

 

[Zedric]

Ok dudes! Here comes "What You Need To Know About RAID".

RAID - Redundant Array of Independant Disks.
There are several types of RAID. Here are the most important.

RAID 0 - Stripe:
======================
Disk 1		Disk 2
------		------
|  1 |		|  2 |
|  3 |		|  4 |
|  5 |		|  6 |
|  7 |		|  8 |
|  9 |		| 10 |
| 11 |		| 12 |
| 13 |		| 14 |
| 15 |		| 16 |
------		------

RAID 1 - Mirror:
======================
Disk 1		Disk 2
------		------
|  1 |		|  1 |
|  2 |		|  2 |
|  3 |		|  3 |
|  4 |		|  4 |
|  5 |		|  5 |
|  6 |		|  6 |
|  7 |		|  7 |
|  8 |		|  8 |
------		------

RAID 3 (unusual):
======================
P = Parity information

Disk 1	Disk 2	Disk 3
------	------	------
|  1 |	|  2 |	|  P |
|  3 |	|  4 |	|  P |
|  5 |	|  6 |	|  P |
|  7 |	|  8 |	|  P |
|  9 |	| 10 |	|  P |
| 11 |	| 12 |	|  P |
| 13 |	| 14 |	|  P |
| 15 |	| 16 |	|  P |
------	------	------

RAID 5:
======================
P = Parity information

Disk 1	Disk 2	Disk 3
------	------	------
|  P |	|  1 |	|  2 |
|  3 |	|  P |	|  4 |
|  5 |	|  6 |	|  P |
|  P |	|  7 |	|  8 |
|  9 |	|  P |	| 10 |
| 11 |	| 12 |	|  P |
|  P |	| 13 |	| 14 |
| 15 |	|  P |	| 16 |
------	------	------

RAID 0: Striping. Two disks where the data is spread across the disks so that every second block is on one of the disks.
+ Improves speed.
- Unsafe.

RAID 1: Mirroring. Both disks contain the same data.
+ Safe.
- Wastes half the space.

RAID 3: A third drive stored parity information (XOR). If one disk dies, the data can be rebuilt using this information. One disk is the parity disk. Can be used for more than 3 disks as well.
+ Safe.
- Requires complicated controller.

RAID 5: Every n:th block in an array of n disks is a parity block. If one disk dies data can be saved. Can be used for more than 3 drives.
+ Safe.
- Requires complicated controller.

RAID configurations can sometimes be combined if the controller alows it. For example, RAID 50, RAID 10 and so on. RAID 50 requires at least 6 drives.

All RAID configurations require the disks to be of the same size. If they are not the size of the array is based on the size of the smallest drive.

If you don't have drives with the same size and want to run them as JBOD (Just a Bunch Of Disks). A bit like RAID 0 except it's not faster than a single drive.

Ouch, that took a while! Hope you like it.

 

[pr00fX]

hmm...im not really worried about the safety of my data...would RAID 0 give me a noticable speed increase?

 

[Mubbers]

RAID 5 nnnggghhhh.....

Well I did ask

Mubbers.

Got any Aspirin??

 

[Zedric]

pr00fX: Noticable, yes. I don't know the numbers but I'm guessing 10-20% depending on what you do. Does anyone else know better?

mubbers: LOL RAID 5 is good if you have a big file server. Since you can have more than 3 disks in one array you can have a whole rack of disks and if one fails you just rip it out (while running, hotswap) and plug in a new one. The space wasted by the parity is just 1/n on n disks.

 

[Mubbers]

Well I think (as far as raid goes) that the "proof of the pudding is in the eating"

Sounds to me like RAID 0 with a third HDD as a backup is a good option.

Tell me though and forgive me if I already asked elsewhere but:

could you say for example have two RAID drives each with a partition for normal access:

RAID 0 - Stripe:
======================
Disk 1 Disk 2
------ ------
| 1 | | 2 |
| 3 | | 4 |
| 5 | | 6 |
| 7 | | 8 |
| 9 | | 10 |
------ ------
|ntfs| |ntfs|
------ ------

Where ntfs is a standard ntfs (or other) partition of each raid drive?


Mubbers

 

[Zedric]

No, I don't think so. The RAID is set up in the RAID controller and that only deals with the physical disks, not partitions. Partitioning comes later in the OS.

 

[Mubbers]

Shoot.

I think we should congratulate pr00fx - his 1st post got over 30 replies!!

I am definitely going to raid up on read.

Mub's

 

[djmgyx]

Hey pr00fx, just wanted to welcome another Arizonian like jewelzz, what part of this vast desert are u in? If ur anywhere near the Phx area their are a few good places to pick up the equip u mentioned at a decent price

 

[pr00fX]

im down in tucson djmgyx but ive found a few good places for computer parts around here.

raid 0=faster speed huh? well i guess ill have to look into it...could be interesting

 

[pr00fX]

OK heres what i think I am getting

Soyo KT400 Dragon Ultra Platinum
Athlon XP 2400+
MS Wireless Desktop Pro
512mb PC2700 DDR SDRAM
Diamondmax 80GB 7200RPM ATA133 hard drive
Norcent 48x12x48
KDS 17XFE Xtreme Flate Monitor
MSI Geforce4 Ti4200
Skyhawk Aluminum ATX 400W

i thought about the ATI card but Seeing as how this card is half the price ill just stick with it...anyway its gonna be awhile before i need a card like that

 

[The Lexx]

x

 

[Mubbers]

Sounds pretty good pr00fx!!

What's that in $ by way of a comparison to price in £ over here...

Mub's

 

[pr00fX]

heh...i know this is a dumb question but, what currency is £?

 

[Mubbers]

£ = Pounds Sterling = GBP wot we use over here in Great Britain.

Current exchange rate: $1.565 = £1.00 or $0.639 = £1.00

Although that's not all. In the USA a HDD might be say $157 but in Britain it wouldn't be £100 but more likely £157.

To say we get ripped off over here is an understatement!! grrrr down with the government!

Mubbers

Edited, sorry, got those numbers totally the wrong way round at first!!

 

[pr00fX]

here it is...

Live mid-market rates as of 2002.11.03 17:15:03 GMT.

1,078.00 USD United States Dollars _ = _ 688.906 GBP United Kingdom Pounds

1 USD = 0.639059 GBP 1 GBP = 1.56480 USD

 

[Mubbers]

buy buy buy!!!

How much is the radeon 9700 pro in Arizona? In the UK this card:

Sapphire Radeon 9700PRO Atlantis 128MB DDR DVI AGP TV-Out

is £270 or $422!!

Mub's