Going RAID

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furiousV

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im just placing an order for a 2nd S-ATA Maxtor Diamondmax Plus 9 80GB, so i have two identical 80GBs (and a 160 ATA133) and intend to run in RAID 0.
before i do some stupid things and all, i would appreciate some handy notes.
will i have to re-install my OS? (i would like to install OS on it)
do i need drivers? i got a hardware RAID controller as well as standard non-raid S-ATA ports

as usual, theyre stupid questions i usually ask, but heres something that might be alittle tough to answer:
Page File.
Im aware that the page file performs better if it is spread out over several drives.currently its over 2 (the 133 and the sata, 1GB each)

will it be better to partition out 2GB on the RAID system and let it handle it as "one chunk" have the RAID itself make it go at better performance, or as 1GB on RAID and 1GB on the non-Sata drive.

dammit im confusing myself now.
is the impact that the page file has on your computer neglible and im just making a deal out of something small.

some opinions/explanations/comments would be great.

oh btw, P4 2.8E
Asus P4P800E Deluxe [i865PE + ICH5R or something]
1GB Corsair Value Select PC3200 Dual Channel
Maxtor Diamondmax 9 160GB ATA133
Maxtor Diamondmax 9 80GB S-ATA (which gets pretty hot, 59C)
WD 30GB 5400 (old, used for messin with linux)
and im gettin hard drive coolers along with that order
 
RAID only helps a couple applications and actually hinders performance in games and other applications but if you are going with raid for sure I would make sure you have your drivers on a floopy just in case and that I would let the raid controller handle the page file seeing as it usually does not make a very big difference.
 
furiousV said:
im just placing an order for a 2nd S-ATA Maxtor Diamondmax Plus 9 80GB, so i have two identical 80GBs (and a 160 ATA133) and intend to run in RAID 0.
before i do some stupid things and all, i would appreciate some handy notes.
will i have to re-install my OS? (i would like to install OS on it)
do i need drivers? i got a hardware RAID controller as well as standard non-raid S-ATA ports

as usual, theyre stupid questions i usually ask, but heres something that might be alittle tough to answer:
Page File.
Im aware that the page file performs better if it is spread out over several drives.currently its over 2 (the 133 and the sata, 1GB each)

will it be better to partition out 2GB on the RAID system and let it handle it as "one chunk" have the RAID itself make it go at better performance, or as 1GB on RAID and 1GB on the non-Sata drive.

dammit im confusing myself now.
is the impact that the page file has on your computer neglible and im just making a deal out of something small.

some opinions/explanations/comments would be great.

oh btw, P4 2.8E
Asus P4P800E Deluxe [i865PE + ICH5R or something]
1GB Corsair Value Select PC3200 Dual Channel
Maxtor Diamondmax 9 160GB ATA133
Maxtor Diamondmax 9 80GB S-ATA (which gets pretty hot, 59C)
WD 30GB 5400 (old, used for messin with linux)
and im gettin hard drive coolers along with that order
Click to expand...
NO DONT DO IT :P




JK sounds good go for it , i have pretty much the same set up its awsome.
 
ah, i forgot to mention, was meaning RAID 0.
doesnt it spread the files out over two hard drives, therefore seperate portions of files, such as games, be accessed much quicker.
i hear it can significantly reduce the bootup times for windows. and i just want to clarify that it can help speed up loading times for games, especially half life 2 :P
but will it actually improve general gameplay? i would think that is now between the CPU, RAM and GPU.
 
furiousV said:
ah, i forgot to mention, was meaning RAID 0.
doesnt it spread the files out over two hard drives, therefore seperate portions of files, such as games, be accessed much quicker.
i hear it can significantly reduce the bootup times for windows. and i just want to clarify that it can help speed up loading times for games, especially half life 2 :P
but will it actually improve general gameplay? i would think that is now between the CPU, RAM and GPU.
Click to expand...
My half life 2 loading times are 7 seconds long each one from start to finish. its great when you have extra ram. i was going to get another gig but one of the MODS here siad it will actually slow down loading times because 1 GIG isnt needed yet for gaming.
 
as for the other questions you have BEATS ME i just play the games on my PC.
 
lol
Brothers in Arms actually "recommends" a gig of RAM. First game ive seen that says that.
ive done a little research on RAID and guess what . . .
ive managed to confuse myself greatly!
now what RAID level will give me greatest performance, im not fussed about redundancy (or data safety or whatever)
i always thought iwas RAID 0, and RAID 1 gives the safety. blablabla http://searchstorage.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid5_gci214332,00.html was one site i read that helped confuse me :P

Freeman, what RAID level do you use, and a 7 second load time for HL2 would kick ASS! a nice change from the 20 second since my gig of RAM (and well long with 512, probably 1-3 minutes, depending what map <--at least thats inthe past)
 
after doing a bit more reading, it seemsthat you can not have RAID 0 on your boot/system volumes.
eep
does RAID 1 offer the same improved read speed as RAID 0? i dont care about writing speed, its something im willing to put up with.
it also seems that you need to have a "simple volume", does that mean that i can not have like a Windows partition, a page file partition and a 'general/games' partition?
any advice appreciated

thanks in advance
 
Again before you setup RAID 0 I am telling you to read everything you can about it. Well respected sites like anandtech and even MAXIMUM PC have proven raid increases loading times and windows boot time. You are going to decrease performance in many applications. Here is the final words from their article:

"If you haven't gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place, and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer. The real world performance increases are negligible at best and the reduction in reliability, thanks to a halving of the mean time between failure, makes RAID-0 far from worth it on the desktop.

There are some exceptions, especially if you are running a particular application that itself benefits considerably from a striped array, and obviously, our comments do not apply to server-class IO of any sort. But for the vast majority of desktop users and gamers alike, save your money and stay away from RAID-0.

If you do insist on getting two drives, you are much better off putting them into a RAID-1 array to have a live backup of your data. The performance hit of RAID-1 is just as negligible as the performance gains of RAID-0, but the improvement in reliability is worthwhile...unless you're extremely unlucky and both of your drives die at the exact same time.

When Intel introduced ICH5, and now with ICH6, they effectively brought RAID to the mainstream, pushing many users finally to bite the bullet and buy two hard drives for "added performance". While we applaud Intel for bringing the technology to the mainstream, we'd caution users out there to think twice before buying two expensive Raptors or any other drive for performance reasons. Your system will most likely run just as fast with only one drive, but if you have the spare cash, a bit more reliability and peace of mind may be worth setting up a RAID-1 array.

Bottom line: RAID-0 arrays will win you just about any benchmark, but they'll deliver virtually nothing more than that for real world desktop performance. That's just the cold hard truth."

The article can be found here:

http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2101&p=1

RAID 1 can be benificial however if you want data security as it makes a backup of all your files.
 
Raid is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Fully twice as fast HD reads and writes. That's about it.
 
hmm people seem to be saying different things about it.
i shall set up RAID once i receive my 2nd hard drive, and see for myself. if i notice no difference, or a cripple in performance, i will do the next smartest thing: just have the extra 80Gigs, what else am i going to do?

i appreciate all your input
 
I have sata raid, btw - not that it makes much of a difference, but my case is tider for it.
 
Alan Freeman said:
My half life 2 loading times are 7 seconds long each one from start to finish. its great when you have extra ram. i was going to get another gig but one of the MODS here siad it will actually slow down loading times because 1 GIG isnt needed yet for gaming.
Click to expand...


I bet it was Asus.. :)
 
Here's the article for you.
There is also a link near the bottom of the first page (see IDE RAID round-up) for differences between RAID 0,1 and 5 etc.

Also, using a PCI RAID card will give you better results than onboard solutions.
 
right, my 80GB hard drive has just arrived, and i have decided to proceed setting up RAID 0.
but before i do, i have a few questions:

is it possible to partition several partitions on the array?
if so, what is a good size for Windows Partition, Page File Partitoin, and the Rest (games/apps/general)

if i set up in the ICH5R chipset, do i need to make a boot floppy for drivers to set it up?

oh, any ideas on where to / how to get a windows 2000 boot disk, i hate runnin off the 4 floppys.

one more thing, installing/taking out hard drives is a pain, i always nearly, or do, touch the motherboard, as it is so close.

oh, what is a good stripe size? 64k 128k? or what do u recommend
 
Alan Freeman said:
My half life 2 loading times are 7 seconds long each one from start to finish. its great when you have extra ram. i was going to get another gig but one of the MODS here siad it will actually slow down loading times because 1 GIG isnt needed yet for gaming.
Click to expand...

that is the worst crap I ever heard. 1 Gyg for gaming is very very recommendable these days. 2 Gyg is another story.

As for RAID 0 : it does increase write speeds on the disks, so if you have a fast system it can give you extra performance.
 
Geronimous said:
that is the worst crap I ever heard. 1 Gyg for gaming is very very recommendable these days. 2 Gyg is another story.
Click to expand...
I don't think anyone told him games don't use 1gb. Probably said 1gb is enough. ;)
 
my RAID setup is not going smooth at all.
get the BSoD after the 4th boot floppy, sometimes ntfs.sys is 'corrupt' or or the BSoD saying 'error reading from unbootable drive' or so.

its in the SATA_1 and SATA_2 ports, which is going into the ICH5R controller. not the Promise 378 controller. northbridge is 865PE

any ideas?
do i actually need to set up a driver-floppy for the Intel controller? it is only said in the manual i need to do so for the Promise 378 / FastTrack 378 controller.
 
I'm pretty sure you will need some sort of driver on a floppy.
 
im about to lose it!
well, i made a driver floppy, for the ICH5R its the Intel IAA, which i did correctly.
booted from the win2k floppy, after 2nd (which takes forever!) it asked for the 3rd party driver, done, worked.
4th floppy, once thats done, get the BSoD
error this time:
Session3_initialization_failed

and my sis isnt too happy with me constantly coming in her room to google the error and to check back here.

a thing to note:
even though my hard drives are the same mode;, Maxtor Diamonxmax 9 80GB S-ATA 8MB Cache, the 'true capacity' of one is 74GB and the other 76GB.
oh what am i doing wrong?

im just not sure if its the Array causing the problem or if its maybe the boot disks/ win2k cd, which is quite scratched, but onthing stopping it from being read.

as a last resort, il use the Promise controller, which will involve me switching the SATA on the motherboard, and setting up the Array using the Promise BIOS stuff, and makign another floppy. grrr

any suggestions? thanks again in advance
 
I can almost guarantee you it'll run slower, RAID eats up resources.

For the desktop, avoid RAID.

BTW, to make an array, you have to restart from scratch. You can't create a RAID with Windows and stuff already installed.
 
i managed to find a Windows XP lying around my house and installed that onto my new RAID 0 array, stripe 128k.

one problem now:
if i set the Array to be th efirst device to be booted from in BIOS, i get a message saying "Please insert a bootable media into the selected boot device".

but, Asus P4P800E Deluxe, it lets u press F8 at POST to select what device to boot from, and i select the RAID array there, it works. now what is going on?
im really having a great time i tell ya
 
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