To raid or not to raid

[Maguscreed]

With raid you also have to worry about the raid card, or even worse the onboard raid controller failing. This happened to me in the past and is the reason I never raid anymore. Using windows software to raid is kind of like wiping before you poop it doesn't really make any sense. A proper controller is always faster, but also just another piece in the puzzle to go bad on you. My general thought on the subject is anyone saying otherwise doesn't have 20 years behind various computers to have the personal experience to realize this. The articles on the subject are meaningless to me when I have countless personal experience to counter them.

 

[pparks1]

The bottom line is we all strive for a faster machine!

Yes we do and there is nothing wrong with that. But I also hesitate to suggest this setup to others who might expect a night and day difference by investing the money and may just find that the real world performance isn't noticeably improved.

 

[Maguscreed]

It's sadly the same thing as sli/crossfire, the performance increase is barely noticeable in some instances, and you generally can't expect more than about a 25% increase even in good circumstances.
I say this having used both of them. Feel free to argue.

 

[pparks1]

It's sadly the same thing as sli/crossfire, the performance increase is barely noticeable in some instances, and you generally can't expect more than about a 25% increase even in good circumstances.
I say this having used both of them. Feel free to argue.

I totally agree. I've never once even considered screwing around with a crossfire or SLI setup. I've yet to find a game, that's performs unacceptably at the resolutions that I want with a single video card setup.

 

[society misfit]

Come on…if we were all worried about a piece of hardware failing then we would be back to pen and paper! And even that could fail!!!

I have to ask. How many of you owned one of those old IBM Deskstar drives? Sorry I can’t remember the model number but they were super-fast for their time. They were also prone to overheating and seizing. In fact they were so bad they earned themselves the nickname Deathstar! I owned one, and I can honestly say that there were numerous occasions where I yank it out of my pc to stick it in the freezer just to revive it! I bet that most of the ‘Deathstar’ owners knew of its failure rate but purchased the drive anyways only because if its performance! Sure a drive can fail in a RAID setup…it can also fail in a non RAID set up. As with a controller card or onboard chip. Be it RAID or not. Hence why we perform backups. And even they can fail!

Maguscreed,

With your 20 years of various computing experience you must know about the old Pentium bug from back in the 90’s. Or the flaws of the PIII when Intel was playing catch up with AMD. But yet that did not discourage you from purchasing another Intel CPU (according to your system specs)

Pparks1,

Have you ever experienced 2 or more SSD’s in RAID? Would you not be curious to see if it would improve on your video editing? And if it does would you buy into it or would you stick with your opinion? And remember, we are talking about SSD’s not HDD!

 

[Maguscreed]

I actually own intel and amd, I also have both ATI and Nvidia at this very moment no system is flawless. My other system is a old fx60 rig. This one will soon be replaced by another Intel system more than likely. I don't really have any brand loyalty, you buy enough stuff and eventually you'll get something bad from all of them. I do generally get XFX for graphics cards because they've been good on return policy.

Performance means a bit to me, I'm a die hard gamer have been since I was about 8 years old. I'm not going to abandon all reason in order to get it though. I barely overclock and when I do I keep it in the 15-20% area at the absolute most. I don't even mess with liquid cooling personally. Even though I've built several systems for others that used it.

In the end I suppose some of it's experience and some of it is maturity. 10 years ago I probably wouldn't have kept a hard drive with important data on it locked in a fire proof safe; today I do.

...and now that I think about it, brand really has very little to do with this discussion outside of you trying to support a point of view that has no real basis in logic.

...but screw logic, if you want the biggest baddest thing around at the moment more power to you. Just don't expect me not to warn you against the possible downsides of making that purchase.

 

[society misfit]

I just gave an example of you buying into something despite its past record. However your failure with RAID does not mean that mine or anyone else’s will fail as well. Just pointed out that that there are flaws and failures with all forms of computer technology and not just some old RAID setup!

The OP asked what others have for a set up based on 2 or more SSD. I thought it would be good to share mine for that’s exactly how my computer is configured. But I can see now that RAID seems to be a touchy subject. And according to you, those who do have a RAID set up are merely inexperienced.

Im sorry for you failure, hopefully you did not lose any important data. But if you have not experienced RAID on 2 or more SSD’s then your opinion is just biased based on old technology.

 

[Maguscreed]

There is no evidence to suggest SSD's are any more reliable than standard hdd's, and failure is always a option with hardware. Which was my basic point.

 

[WolfSoul]

Heated subject.. But it still doubles the failure risk right, raid is at least 2 disks

 

[society misfit]

Yes, a RAID array is at least 2 disks.

However only RAID0, which seems to be the debate here, is non-redundant…despite being called RAID (Redundant Array of independent Disks). It will give you the best performance but as others have pointed out, you lose 1 drive in the array you will lose all of your data on that array. You can still backup or even image a RAID 0 to a separate disk.

The other RAID Array’s, 1 through 10, will give you redundancy and some performance benefits depending on which type of RAID you choose. Linus from NCIX tech Tips best explains the differences here.

YouTube - RAID 0 & RAID 1 Setup Guide (NCIX Tech Tips #77)
YouTube - RAID 5 & RAID 10 Tutorial & Explanation (NCIX Tech Tips #79)

If you are pondering the thought of getting a second SSD, I say try a RAID 0 set up and be you own judge. Just make sure you perform routine backups of your data. I use both Acronis and SyncBack and have absolute no worry about losing data due to a failed disk in my array.

 

[pparks1]

I have to ask. How many of you owned one of those old IBM Deskstar drives? Sorry I can’t remember the model number but they were super-fast for their time.

I did, it was a 30GB Deskstar. In fact, I still have it and it works fine to this day. However, when problems came out, I didn't buy another one...i found alternative drives that were more reliable for machines that I build for family and friends.

Pparks1,

Have you ever experienced 2 or more SSD’s in RAID? Would you not be curious to see if it would improve on your video editing? And if it does would you buy into it or would you stick with your opinion? And remember, we are talking about SSD’s not HDD!

I've not run with 2 SSD's in a RAID0 array. As far as my video editing, the problem here is processing power in my CPU and my GPU....drive throughput is not the issue.

As i stated above, if I were using SSD's for storage and were moving very large files frequently than the RAID array would be a sure thing. But for my OS drives and such, and the fact that SSD's are so expensive for so little space...I don't use them as storage drives and thus don't run them in a RAID0 configuration.

The biggest improvement, as far as the OS running is concerned, between an SSD and a standard Hard Disk is not XXX Megabytes per second. It's the insanely low random access time and the fact that it can access files in any location on the hard drive in the exact same time regardless of their location. SSD's get you booted into Windows so much faster not because they are loading GB's of data sequentially fast, but rather than they are loading tons of small files and writing small files at a blistering fast pace.

If you don't believe my last paragraph test it. Put in a standard hard drive and load Windows 7 to it. Then boot it and time it with a stop watch. It might take 25 seconds. Now, replace that standard hard drive with a single SSD drive. The boot time might drop to 14 seconds. Now, replace that single SSD with 2 SSD drives in a RAID array. Time it....Are you now booting in 7 seconds since you are twice as fast? Put in a 3rd drive in the RAID 0 array, are you now into windows in 5 seconds or less? I'm willing to bet with a 2 drive RAID0 array, or 3 drive, or 4 drive array your boot times will be close to 12-14 seconds in each configuration.

 

[enkur]

Raid is fine if you cannot afford downtime or you want to squeeze the last bit of performance. I was advised that a single disk with backup is more robust because it eliminates the RAID controler as a single point of failure. Consider the cost difference between an SSD and standard disk for backup (and you might already have one).

My file server is RAID 1. Its one failure was the controller which took the whole thing down. It took a week to copy the disks to the replacement because of a Windows unfriendly disk format plus not having the contents available for two weeks.

Gary

 

[thehappyman]

Two SSD's are great - whether they are running discreetly or whether they are raided. In simple RAID-0 you pretty much double the risk of a disk failure since both drives are being used simultaneously BUT, by taking that little bit of extra risk, you do get some performance advantages (not seek times) and you do get more storage space.

"Go for it"
"Some like it Hot"
"You Play, You Pay"
"You only live Once"
"Life in the Fast Lane"
:devil::devil::devil::devil::devil::devil::devil::devil:

 

[profdlp]

...and you do get more storage space...

I've been giving some thought to adding another X-25M and RAIDing them for that very reason. I've used about 45GB of the 80GB available on the single drive I now have, but could probably find something to throw on there if I had another 80GB to play with. I wouldn't be expecting any great performance increase, though.

(And before anyone asks, all my data is on a 1TB drive with another 1TB drive holding backups of everything. I do a drive image of my SSD automatically every Sunday morning, so I'm not too concerned with reliability issues.)

If I didn't have an SSD at all I might be tempted to grab a pair of these:

Newegg.com - Crucial RealSSD C300 CTFDDAC064MAG-1G1 2.5" 64GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

and get 128GB for $200.

 

[diehrd]

Nice find on the drives !

 

[WolfSoul]

I'll be ordering SSD 2 this week.. meanwhile Ive gained a G3 Samsung 2 TB
Of which I don't understand the included tools yet... but 1 of the 2 is a backup utility

 

[WolfSoul]

Hm this is one statement by Intel that makes one think and wonder (besides the fact it seems a rather pointless statement)

Intel® Rapid Storage Technology 9.6 supports TRIM in AHCI mode and in RAID mode for drives that are not part of a RAID volume.

A defect was filed to correct the information in the Help file that states that TRIM is supported on RAID volumes.

So Im still in hesiation about this purchase, seeing alot of sites/people say gaming does not benefit very much from SSD

 

[WolfSoul]

Well I have 2 vertex 2 160 Gb in raid now

 

[pparks1]

Well I have 2 vertex 2 160 Gb in raid now

Did you test with just 1, before you went with 2, so you could report how much difference it really made in your day-to-day usage?

 

[WolfSoul]

I had 1 until today.. and yea the 2nd does speed it up a bit