RAID Adapter Advice
- Thread starter SYROB
- Start date
ddrueding
Fixture
I am very spoiled by 3Ware controllers. They are not cheap, and certainly overkill for a mirrored set. But they do work very well. This is their lowest-end card for $150
If you want SATAII, it will cost you another $50.
If you want SATAII, it will cost you another $50.
Bozo
Storage? I am Storage!
Thanks guys,
I am looking for the most reliability, I do not want any software RAID, all done by hardware, cost of controller not an issue, but will stick to only 2 HD for now.
With that in mind any other suggestions to also look at
SYROB
I am looking for the most reliability, I do not want any software RAID, all done by hardware, cost of controller not an issue, but will stick to only 2 HD for now.
With that in mind any other suggestions to also look at
SYROB
ddrueding
Fixture
3ware just plain rules for maintainability / reliability.
Now took my big array down to an on board Intel on board controller. I haven't had any trouble with it yet, why didn't you like yours? Mine is the one included with ICH8 along with P965 north.
Now took my big array down to an on board Intel on board controller. I haven't had any trouble with it yet, why didn't you like yours? Mine is the one included with ICH8 along with P965 north.
Chewy509
Wotty wot wot.
Off chance, exactly what motherboard and have you researched that that particular motherboard is ok with RAID controllers in the x4,x8,x16 PCIe slots?
The Dell PERC5i has become quite popular due to low cost, but many have found that about 40-50% of desktop motherboards don't work with that controller in the PCIe x16 slot...
General rule with RAID,
1. Adaptec work extremely well, but are not speed demons.
2. LSI work work well, and are faster than Adaptec (many OEMs rebradge LSI controllers).
3. 3ware, Acera, new players but very well respected.
4. Tekram getting out of the RAID market.
5. Highpoint, or other SIL based controllers, don't expect too much. (They're great when they work, but if something goes wrong with controller/array, that's another story).
The Dell PERC5i has become quite popular due to low cost, but many have found that about 40-50% of desktop motherboards don't work with that controller in the PCIe x16 slot...
General rule with RAID,
1. Adaptec work extremely well, but are not speed demons.
2. LSI work work well, and are faster than Adaptec (many OEMs rebradge LSI controllers).
3. 3ware, Acera, new players but very well respected.
4. Tekram getting out of the RAID market.
5. Highpoint, or other SIL based controllers, don't expect too much. (They're great when they work, but if something goes wrong with controller/array, that's another story).
Chewy509
Wotty wot wot.
I had an issue on a motherboard with a ICH7R controller, and for no reason it would dump drives from the array and fail to rebuild unless a new drive was put in as a hot spare. The dumped drives passed ALL manufacturer and other tests.
** One case lead to a complete re-installation of a SBS2003 server.
Will try with x38 MB from ASUS, use X1 slot for now
WIll try the 3ware, report when it set up etc.
Thanks guys
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
I had a fancypants ICP RAID controller fail a while back in such a way that it corrupted a large portion of the data on a pair of mirrored drives. I was quite surprised that such a thing could happen on a mirrored set since no parity calculations/striping/whatever was being done.
One nice thing about OS supported SoftRAIDs is that they are easily recoverable and in some cases faster than dedicated hardware for RAID5 stuff.
One nice thing about OS supported SoftRAIDs is that they are easily recoverable and in some cases faster than dedicated hardware for RAID5 stuff.
ddrueding
Fixture
The biggest problem with SoftRAIDs is that only in *nix land can you put the OS on one. Unless you know something I don't (highly likely).
Bozo
Storage? I am Storage!
I found that Acronis doesn't work with Intels motherboard RAID controllers. It will make a backup but when booted from the recovery CD, it sees individual hard drives, not the RAID array.
Matter of fact, I believe that I had the problem on a ICH8 RAID controller.
Bozo :joker:
Bozo
Storage? I am Storage!
Be careful with the low end Adaptec SATA RAID controllers. The 2015000-R has issues with some hard drives. It will report the hard drive has failed when actually, nothing is wrong. I have repaced 4 of these in our work computers so far.
You have to dig deep into Adaptec's web site to find which models of which makes it doesn't work with. I believe it as in the FAQs. I had problems with WD and Seagates.
Stick with 3Ware.
Bozo :joker:
Interesting. I use ghost and I will make a note to check this out and see whats up.
I have two Seagate 750's mirrored and partitioned. I generally image the OS partition but I haven't done so yet (shame on me). As far as the data stored on the other partition I simply copy it to a USB hard drive, don't bother with imaging that partition.
Ghost on the several 3ware controllers worked fine you could see the drives defined on the array. Partition Magic boot floppies worked fine on 3ware arrays too.
I should also mention my advice is based on only several 3ware controllers maybe six promise controllers and maybe five motherboard setups, mostly intel. Not an expert by a long shot.
Bozo
Storage? I am Storage!
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Windows mirror sets can be made the System drive, just not stripe sets or RAID5s.
Hi,
Got the more expensive SATA II
Very poor results writing to array
Results from HDTach and PerformanceTest 6.1
3ware
*******
Burst 138.6 MB/s
Random Access 14.0 ms
Average Read 75.6 MB/s
CPU 2%
Sequential Read 70.4 MB/s
Sequential Write 1.4 MB/s
Random Seek + RW 1.6 MB/s
Disk Mark 265.7
X38_Intel
Burst 238.1 MB/s
Random Access 20.6 ms
Average Read 88.6 MB/s
CPU 3%
Sequential Read 114.2 MB/s
Sequential Write 36.8 MB/s
Random Seek + RW 5.8 MB/s
Disk Mark 566.8
ddrueding
Fixture
Wow, that is a poor result. I don't have an answer off the top of my head, but the first thing I would do is look in their configuration to see if caching or DNS are disabled. The next thing I would do is call them; the advantage of paying this kind of money (my controller was ~$1200) is that the support is great. I even had them re-create my array as part of troubleshooting once.
blakerwry
Storage? I am Storage!
Is the array in the process of initializing? (check the 3ware app for array status)
No, it finished that already.
What type of numbers are you all getting for writes?
Borys
blakerwry
Storage? I am Storage!
I'm getting a fairly mediocre 16MB/sec writes on a 2x Hitachi 7k500 setup w/ 3ware 8006-2LP.
SR says I should get at least twice that with individual drives. Read speeds on this thing are limited by the poor PCI implementation of the motherboard... don't think I can top 60 to 70MB/sec.
I'm pretty sure I got better write speeds on my 3ware 7500-4 in RAID5... which doesn't make a lot of sense... should be a comparable card, but I was running linux so the drivers could be responsible for a lot.
SR says I should get at least twice that with individual drives. Read speeds on this thing are limited by the poor PCI implementation of the motherboard... don't think I can top 60 to 70MB/sec.
I'm pretty sure I got better write speeds on my 3ware 7500-4 in RAID5... which doesn't make a lot of sense... should be a comparable card, but I was running linux so the drivers could be responsible for a lot.
blakerwry
Storage? I am Storage!
Your write speeds seem kind of slow in general... If I remember correctly, individual drive's write speeds aren't too much slower than their read speeds.
One thing I would suggest is to test the drives individually. If both are up to snuff, then put them in an array together and re-test.
One thing I would suggest is to test the drives individually. If both are up to snuff, then put them in an array together and re-test.
ddrueding
Fixture
I'm running a RAID-5 of 10 750GB drives on a 9650-16ML, Writes and Reads are a bit under 200MB/s. I suspect it is limited by my target array (RAID-0 of Raptors).
If you tell me what tests you are running and how to run them, I'd be happy to give you some comparable numbers.
If you tell me what tests you are running and how to run them, I'd be happy to give you some comparable numbers.
Bozo
Storage? I am Storage!
Check with 3Wares FAQs. There were some Registry hacks listed for poor performance a while back.
Bozo :joker:
Bozo :joker:
blakerwry
Storage? I am Storage!
I missed it the 1st time, but he's running PerformanceTest 6.1 (30 day free trial). I ran BST (bart stuff test) and it gave me similar numbers.
I don't think either test uses OS caching, and both likely sync writes. Making their numbers quite a bit less than file copy operations.
ddrueding
Fixture
Results from BST, default install and I just picked a temp folder in my nearly full array and hit "run". I was using the machine the whole time, and there were only 360GB of free space, so it's on the slowest parts of the drives.
Write:
Blocks: 1448757
Total: 353.7GB
Max/s: 254.9MB/s
Avg/s: 161.9MB/s
I need to go, so I can't let the read portion finish. But it is pegged at 178.6MB/s throughout.
Write:
Blocks: 1448757
Total: 353.7GB
Max/s: 254.9MB/s
Avg/s: 161.9MB/s
I need to go, so I can't let the read portion finish. But it is pegged at 178.6MB/s throughout.
WOW, that sure is better than 1.4MB/s, like 100X better.
are you using write and read cache?
SYROB
ddrueding
Fixture
Yup, all cache set to maximum. I have the on-card battery and a UPS on the system, so I don't worry too much. But the test was over 300GB, so most of it was from disk.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
ddrueding is using a much newer card with a much newer processor and firmware than anyone else.
ddrueding
Fixture
Even I would be hard-pressed to recommend this card for a RAID-1 array.
Mine: 3ware 9650SE-2LP (love the rest of it)
Same new family as his, but only 2 port and 2 HD,
(Samsung F1 750GB, 32MB) ...
Borys
Bozo
Storage? I am Storage!
BST??
Bozo :joker:
Bozo :joker: