RAID or 2 drives

[Long View]

If this post belngs somewhere else perhaps it can be moved ?


I have never tried RAID in any form but it seems to me that by having the OS and programs on one hard disk and data on a second drive that I am getting 3 benefits (1) Speed improvement as both drives are working at the same time - RAID 0 to a degree ? (2) If C: is attacked then my data is safer on another drive (3) if C: dies then data is still safe

From a security point of view 2 drives are safer than one and perhaps quicker.

So why do people use RAID ? Is it really that much faster with 0 or safer with 1 ?

[tradetime]

This could be quite an interesting topic, as people with knowledge of benefits and drawbacks of Raid setups comment. I intend to have a new working machine built next year. My thought for my needs was to install 2 x 500 GB HDD's and partition them identically with system, data, and backup partition. Install an OS into both system partitions. The first OS, on drive one, would then be my working one, while the OS on the second drive would remain simply as a backup. The data partition and backup partition of drive one would be replicated to drive 2, thus on a failure of drive one, I would simply have to change the boot sequence to boot into drive 2, update that OS from the backup copies on its drive and carry on as normal, replacing drive one. (How computer feasable this is I don't know yet)
From my understanding an appropriate Raid would do this just, if not more simply. However suppose the disaster was malware in nature, does Raid not copy this all over your drives.

[Peter2150]

Both Desktops and one laptop I have are classified as gaming machines, and I bought them from Velocity Micro which is one of several companies who's specialty is gaming machines. They all have Raid 0 on them.

Since the desktops have 3 identical drives, 2 in raid 0 as the c: drive and one extra as a d: drive. It was interesting to test them and the raid 0 does yield about a 20% improvement. Do I see that in use. Hard to say. All these machines are equally fast in all departments, so it's hard to have a realistic feel.

One of my prime considerations in getting the machines with raid 0 was buying them from someone who really knew what they were doing with it. One of the key questions for me was do I have to do anything special, is there anything I can't do, etc. Velocity micro folks told me with these machines, as far as usage, I just had a c: drive, and go. That has pretty much been the case.

I also don't partition the drive, I keep my data all on the c: drive, but I don't have huge libraries of photo's music or video's. For me it has worked out fine, no issues, no loss, no threat's etc.

Questions.

Pete

[Mrkvonic]

Hello,

Never tried raid for one simple reason - simplicity.
I don't like the idea of things going semi-bad or semi-corrupt.

Then, the following issue might come into effect:

- only one hard disc gets worn all the time
- the backup hard disk really is what it is - a backup
- performance, not really sure, but so far, everything runs great, so if it ain't fixed, don't broke it

Cheers,
Mrk

[Peter2150]

{QUOTE-> Hello,

Never tried raid for one simple reason - simplicity.
I don't like the idea of things going semi-bad or semi-corrupt.

Then, the following issue might come into effect:

- only one hard disc gets worn all the time
- the backup hard disk really is what it is - a backup
- performance, not really sure, but so far, everything runs great, so if it ain't fixed, don't broke it

Cheers,
Mrk <-QUOTE}

Hi Mrk

Don't disagree. I think with Raid, the key is that it is set up right. I've never had a lick of problem on 3 systems with it. But I'd never set it up myself. Also from my perspective it's fairly simple. I just have a c: drive. I put them under warranty, so if something breaks, they fix the hardware, and I restore image. Simple.

Pete

[Chris12923]

I had RAID 0 and noticed quite a bit of speed gain. I removed one of the drives and and could tell a difference. mainly at boot up and drive intensive operations of course. I set it up myself (first one) and never had any trouble.

Thanks,
Chris

[farmerlee]

I just use raid 0 for the added speed it gives. I always use it alongside a backup drive, as i wouldn't have a clue as to how to recover data from a raid array gone bad.

If you only have 2 drives, for safety i'd leave them seperate. At the moment i only have 2 drives in this system so i'm running it exactly like your setup. I am getting another drive soon in which case i will change to 2 drives in raid 0 and the third for backing up.

[Rilla927]

I have used Raid0 with a pair of Raptors (my old AMD system for 3 years) 10,000rpm for my OS and my scan times flew, but I ran out of room really quick cuz they 74.5 x (2)= 149gig. I never ran into a corrupt Raid Array. The drivers were Via Technology. The Array literally only takes a couple of seconds to setup.

I pulled the Raptors out and replaced:

I purchased two Seagate Sata II 750gig each at 7200rpm and paired the two up as Raid0 and there is a big difference between the two. With the Raptors I seen a big performance increase but the Seagates I didn't, although they are slower. I think a lot depends on what speed the drives you are going to use the drives for the Raid0 to see the performance increase. The Raptors are good drives but you get so little room for the money you pay compared to the Seagates 7200rpm. I purchased (2) more 500gig Seagates.

I recently built a new system so I'm using the new Seagates (2) 750gig, (2) 500gig with a Q6600 and no Raid0 this time because I seen no performance increase and it's humming a long beautifully and I have loads of room.

Two years ago I started reading about the Intel Matrix Storage Technology and it sure has a lot to offer compared to the old Raid setups. Eventually I want to set mine up like this:

{QUOTE-> Storage in the Digital World

We live in a digital world. We digitally create, record, edit, share, and save practically everything from the movies we watch, to the pictures we take, to the documents we store. Today's digital home demands we protect this data against loss. Intel® Matrix Storage Technology provides improved performance and reliability for systems equipped with Serial ATA* hard disk drives, today's proven storage solution. Intel® Matrix Storage Technology provides support for features that enable lower power consumption. For mobile systems this provides a longer battery life. <-QUOTE}

{QUOTE-> The Intel® Matrix Storage Solution

Intel Matrix Storage Technology provides new levels of protection, performance, and expandability in 2007 for desktop and mobile platforms. Whether using one or multiple hard drives, users can take advantage of enhanced performance and lower power consumption. When using more than one drive the user can have additional protection against data loss in the event of hard drive failure.

Valuable digital memories are protected against a hard drive failure when the system is configured for any one of three fault-tolerant RAID levels: RAID 1, 5 or 10. By seamlessly storing copies of data on one or more additional hard drives, any hard drive can fail without data loss or system downtime. When the failed drive is removed and a replacement hard drive is installed, data fault tolerance is easily restored. In this way, Intel Matrix Storage Technology provides the level of data protection necessary for today's digital compute platorms. In the digital office the increased redundancy reduces costly downtime and maintains employee productivity involving the PC.

Intel Matrix Storage Technology can also improve the performance of disk intensive retrieval applications such as editing home video. By combining from two to six drives in a RAID 0 configuration, data can be accessed on each drive simultaneously, speeding up response time on data-intensive applications. Also, due to drive load balancing, even systems with RAID 1 can take advantage of faster boot times and data reads. In the office there are more background tasks such as virus scans, data backup, e-mail, and data processing consuming storage resources. Implementing a basic RAID 1 configuration helps alleviate the bottleneck encountered by running these added tasks.

Intel Matrix Storage Technology provides benefits to users of a single drive as well. Storage performance is improved through Native Command Queuing (NCQ), harnessing the quad DMA controllers in the hardware, and optimized hardware & software tuning. For mobile systems, longer battery life is enabled through Link Power Management (LPM) which can reduce the power consumption of the chipset and SATA* hard drive. To warn of possible hard drive failures, SMART alerting is provided, notifying users when the drive detects potential oncoming failure. For those who wish to later upgrade to RAID capabilities, a system with Intel Matrix Storage Technology pre-installed allows a simplified upgrade to any supported RAID level from a single drive without having to reinstall the operating system or incur any downtime.

Intel® Rapid Recover Technology (Intel® RRT): With the ability to instantly boot off a clone, Intel Rapid Recover Technology (part of Intel Matrix Storage Technology) provides a fast, easy-to-use method for the end user to recover their data and return their system to an operational status. <-QUOTE}

Full Atricle
http://www.intel.com/design/chipsets/matrixstorage_sb.htm

[lucas1985]

{QUOTE-> So why do people use RAID ? Is it really that much faster with 0 or safer with 1 ? <-QUOTE}
There are very few people who can argue that they really need the increased STR (sequential transfer rate) offered by RAID 0. High STR is important in video editing (HD video) and making/editing large models with huge amounts of polygons/textures (CAD/CAM/etc).
On the other hand, RAID 0 suffers from serious disadvantages: higher latencies, higher risks of data loss, etc.
RAID 1 makes some sense in a workstation. It provides a mirror which is always updated and it provides some fault tolerance against disk failure (it doesn't protect you from your mistakes, malware infections, etc). RAID modes which uses parity blocks are only used in servers.
Matrix RAID probably offers the best balance of speed/fault tolerance in a desktop-oriented RAID solution for a workstation.
Remember that RAID = higher uptime/always online (you don't have to interrupt your work because a disk goes south). RAID isn't backup.

[lodore]

the main problem is software raid using drivers (bulti on motherboards) vs the real raid via real hardware raid cards.
software raid bulti on motherboards uses drivers and uses some cpu usage.
if there are any problems with the array hardware raid has much better tools.
but a hardware raid cards cost alot of £££££
lodore

[dja2k]

I've been running a dual Raid0 setup since I got my motherboard around 2+ years ago. Both are running via the motherboard, one via the Intel and the other via HightPoint. I haven't had any problems so far and the speed benefit is really noticeable. I of course backup any important data to an external drive.

dja2k

[lucas1985]

{QUOTE-> software raid bulti on motherboards uses drivers and uses some cpu usage. <-QUOTE}
RAID 0/1/10/JBOD have negligible CPU usage. The problem with fake/software RAID is parity calculations (RAID 3/4/5/6)

[lodore]

my main point was that the raid on motherboards has some cpu usage and is no way near as fast or reliable as a real hardware raid card.
loore

[dja2k]

My R$aid0 setups don't show any CPU usage other than that of my applications running. Not doing anything, I am always at CPU Idle 98% or so. :D I agree though that real hardware Raid cards are faster than software Raid's.

dja2k

[EASTER]

Never tried a RAID setup and likely never will although i had a box with that set up i got at discount, i disassembled the entire structure and took the common route of setting up individual drives via IDE harness.

As far as speed goes, i feel like the Hard Drive manufacturers need to get busy and roll out nothing but 10,000 RPM as a norm and then some. I feel stuck in 7200 rpm speed like a governor on a truck set at 55 mph back in the 70's.

They can juice them up and crank them out i'm sure. Speed and drive velocity IS everything in a Hard Drive but then so is overclocking the CPU which i used to tamper around with a bit, but the increases are not so remarkable IMO.

All PC hardware componants that meld together to create instant impulse need a strong dose of speed 'em up like adding a high voltage coil to a hi-performance engine, the more RAW POWER, the quicker the response, and so on.

But, more power to the RAID fans if it works for you, go far it. :thumb:

[Long View]

Looking at some of the new solid state Drives ( Samsung 64gb) I have to wonder
how much longer hard drives, in their present form, will exist. Look like generation 1 are a bit slow but give it a couple of years and 500 gig solid state fast drives will be the norm. Initially I wondered how this might impact on RAID - I guess some will always want that extra speed and others the security.
Personally I can't stand heat or noise so I only buy small 160 gig drives and then run them one for the OS and programs and one for data. I could use the extra speed for video work but for most other tasks ( I don't play games - well not on a computer anyway) sata II is fast enough for me.

[lucas1985]

{QUOTE-> I agree though that real hardware Raid cards are faster than software Raid's. <-QUOTE}
Not for RAID 0/1/10.
{QUOTE-> As far as speed goes, i feel like the Hard Drive manufacturers need to get busy and roll out nothing but 10,000 RPM as a norm and then some. I feel stuck in 7200 rpm speed like a governor on a truck set at 55 mph back in the 70's. <-QUOTE}
10,000 RPM drives are smaller, more expensive, noisier and hotter than 7,200 RPM drives. 10,000/15,000 RPM drives are only useful in some usage patterms. Also, rotational speed isn't everything, see what a 5,400 RPM drive can do:
Western Digital (http://techreport.com/articles.x/13379) Green Power (http://www.storagereview.com/1000.sr?page=0%2C8)
{QUOTE->
The GP does easily draw the least amount of power of any 3.5" drive we've ever tested... less than 1/2 of any other unit when idle. Even under a full seek, the GP enjoys an advantage of over 30% over the typical 7200 RPM SATA drive. In what almost seems like an ancillary effect, the GP also happens to be the quietest drive we have ever measured and heard here at SR. Its miniscule power dissipation also translates into far less need for cooling which yields yet more acoustic benefit. Especially when taken in the context of arrays featuring many drives that run 24x7, lower cost of operation also becomes significant.
<-QUOTE}
{QUOTE-> Looking at some of the new solid state Drives ( Samsung 64gb) I have to wonder
how much longer hard drives, in their present form, will exist. <-QUOTE}
HDDs will always have a lower cost per GB of storage. SDDs should replace HDDs in laptops and desktops, but HDDs will continue to exist in large datacenters and in your home server storing your multimedia library, shared files and backups ;)

[Long View]

{QUOTE->

HDDs will always have a lower cost per GB of storage. <-QUOTE}

You may be right - but I have "always" been concerned about using the word "always". Today I find it increasingly difficult to remember what we all thought would always be the case when using an Olivetti 101 back in 1968
http://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/c-programma101.html

anyway for what it's worth I'm passing on RAID for now. My best guess is that every time I buy a new machine ( about once a year) the new machine is faster than the last one would have been with RAID anyway.

[farmerlee]

Just installed a raid 0 setup in my old p4 machine yesterday. Used a couple of WD 160gb sata drives. Had a few issues with drivers but thats all sorted now. Also got a seagate 160gb ide hdd installed for backups. So far its working good, the perfomance increase is very nice, i'm a happy chappy :).

[WSFuser]

Hey Peter, Ive read in several places that RAID has little benefit for gaming. What do you think?

[Peter2150]

{QUOTE-> Hey Peter, Ive read in several places that RAID has little benefit for gaming. What do you think? <-QUOTE}

Not sure I can answer. I know on my machines, I can measure a 20% difference on test, and also the drives are fast. If the biggest load of the game is graphics then no. It just depends. Since I haven't seen any downside with 3 different machines from Velocity Micro with raid 0 my feeling is why not.

Pete

[dja2k]

I think that hard drive access times are faster with Raid0 for gaming. At least I can tell right away when the game loads with Raid0 than without. Rest of it depends on your Video Card.

dja2k

[Kees1958]

Hi,

Raid 0 in striping with say 16 MB of memeory per disk, makes the write speed enormeous of smaller files. Read speed in particular game performance is at streaming data level 40% higher compared to sata 2, 50% sata 1. In practice (loading games) it is indeed somewhere between 20 to 35 percent.

Only Vista had some funny disk access usage when just released, lates fixes took care of that. On XP 32 and vista 64 we aways had raid 0.

Specially the new Intel raid chips are great.

On our other home PC, we still have old fashoined sata 2 drives. The ease of image cloning with the free Maxblast is preferable over speed. Tips on image baclup software on raid 0 are welcome.

Regards Kees

[Peter2150]

Imaging hasn't been an issue for me with Raid 0. I've imaged and restored with Drive Snapshot, IFW/IFD, Acronis V9 and now Shadow Protect. No issues at all.

In fact when I was testing Shadow Protect's HIR, I restored an image from my laptop which has Promise Raid, onto my desktop which has nvidia raid. All I had to do was feed it the nvidia drivers and away it went.

Pete

[farmerlee]

{QUOTE-> Hey Peter, Ive read in several places that RAID has little benefit for gaming. What do you think? <-QUOTE}
The major benefit i find when playing games is the reduced loading time. In game i see no improvements.

[Long View]

{QUOTE-> The major benefit i find when playing games is the reduced loading time. In game i see no improvements. <-QUOTE}

This is one reason why I have held off. It seems to me that there is a difference between what something can theoretically do and what is actually does in practice. A drive may be capable of delivering blistering performance but show little or no benefit when writing an e-mail. Going back a few years I recall a gaming company saying that they would rather have a fast graphics card with my 286 processor than a duff card and a new 386. Speed is still set by the weakest
component I would have thought ?

[Kees1958]

{QUOTE-> Imaging hasn't been an issue for me with Raid 0. I've imaged and restored with Drive Snapshot, IFW/IFD, Acronis V9 and now Shadow Protect. No issues at all.

In fact when I was testing Shadow Protect's HIR, I restored an image from my laptop which has Promise Raid, onto my desktop which has nvidia raid. All I had to do was feed it the nvidia drivers and away it went.

Pete <-QUOTE}

Thx Pete,

Reason for asking is that I used Maxxblast to restore an image on a raid drive on XP 32 bit. After backup the NTdetect file was missing (ir something which sounds like it).

Regards Kees

[Peter2150]

{QUOTE-> Thx Pete,

Reason for asking is that I used Maxxblast to restore an image on a raid drive on XP 32 bit. After backup the NTdetect file was missing (ir something which sounds like it).

Regards Kees <-QUOTE}

Thats a core windows file. The restore must have been bad. I don't see that as a raid issue.(now waiting to be corrected;D )