Server - DELL R710
All speeds are designated in megaBYTEs, NOT BITS.
Setup 1:
Drive 1 - 240Gb Revodrive (PCIe SSD in RAID 0, retarded fast speeds)
Drive 2 - 1Tb WD drive which shipped with server.
Controller - Crap $15 "raid" card bought from new egg.
OS - Server 2003 x64
Result of 5Gb file FROM Revo TO WD - Steady speed of about 80Mb\s with initial burst of 300Mb\s.
Result of 5Gb file TO Revo FROM WD - Steady speed of about 60Mb\s with initial burst of 100Mb\s.
Setup 2:
Drive 1 - 240Gb Revodrive (PCIe SSD in RAID 0, retarded fast speeds)
Drive 2 - 1Tb WD drive which shipped with server.
Controller - SAS 6/iR
OS - Server 2003 x64
Result of 5Gb file FROM Revo TO WD - Inconsistent speed of about 18Mb\s-30Mb\s (3Mb\s prior to enabling "Enable Advanced Performance" on the WD drive in Windows; a setting change which was NOT REQUIRED by the cheap $15 newegg-bought controller for additional performance).
Result of 5Gb file TO Revo FROM WD - Steady speed of about 55Mb\s.
Setup 3:
Drive 1 - 1Tb WD drive which shipped with server. CONNECTED VIA $15 ADDON CARD.
Drive 2 - 2x 2Tb WD drives. CONNECTED TO ONBOARD SATA
OS - Server 2003 x64
Result - 80Mb\s-90Mb\s sustained reads (this is while transferring to both destination drives at the same time, each getting 40+Mb\s).
I've done a lot of googling on this issue. So let me pre-emptively address some things:
So here I sit with a $1500 server in my home office that gets shitty write speeds and no solution to be had that doesn't involve more money (which I am not willing to do and should not have to do). I've been patient in waiting for certain back ordered parts to arrive for this so that it can finally be configured the way it should be, but with the problems I'm running into, I'm wondering if it's within my right to return this after three months of problems with it (the disk IO speeds are just the straw that broke the camel's back, I've had other issues such as parts back ordered for months, idiot reps who can't place simple orders, etc).
I'm frustrated that DELL would sell garbage, I'm frustrated at myself for having bought this instead of building one myself and saving both time and money.
I wouldn't even be so bothered about needing to mess with the write cache setting in Windows if it actually provided the full performance I expect from these drives. It's not like 60Mb\s is breaking any land speed records. Crap "raid" card from new egg handles that, so does onboard. But for some reason, too much load for little ol' SAS 6\iR. That's unacceptable.
All speeds are designated in megaBYTEs, NOT BITS.
Setup 1:
Drive 1 - 240Gb Revodrive (PCIe SSD in RAID 0, retarded fast speeds)
Drive 2 - 1Tb WD drive which shipped with server.
Controller - Crap $15 "raid" card bought from new egg.
OS - Server 2003 x64
Result of 5Gb file FROM Revo TO WD - Steady speed of about 80Mb\s with initial burst of 300Mb\s.
Result of 5Gb file TO Revo FROM WD - Steady speed of about 60Mb\s with initial burst of 100Mb\s.
Setup 2:
Drive 1 - 240Gb Revodrive (PCIe SSD in RAID 0, retarded fast speeds)
Drive 2 - 1Tb WD drive which shipped with server.
Controller - SAS 6/iR
OS - Server 2003 x64
Result of 5Gb file FROM Revo TO WD - Inconsistent speed of about 18Mb\s-30Mb\s (3Mb\s prior to enabling "Enable Advanced Performance" on the WD drive in Windows; a setting change which was NOT REQUIRED by the cheap $15 newegg-bought controller for additional performance).
Result of 5Gb file TO Revo FROM WD - Steady speed of about 55Mb\s.
Setup 3:
Drive 1 - 1Tb WD drive which shipped with server. CONNECTED VIA $15 ADDON CARD.
Drive 2 - 2x 2Tb WD drives. CONNECTED TO ONBOARD SATA
OS - Server 2003 x64
Result - 80Mb\s-90Mb\s sustained reads (this is while transferring to both destination drives at the same time, each getting 40+Mb\s).
I've done a lot of googling on this issue. So let me pre-emptively address some things:
- Through testing, I've determined that the 1Tb and 2Tb drives have a real world throughput of 80-90Mb\s read, and 60Mb\s write. This is real world and not benchmark.
- It doesn't matter if the destination drives are in single or Raid 1. Write speeds suck through the SAS controller.
- The requirement of enabling "Enable Advanced Performance" in windows is ridiculous considering onboard and cheapy controller don't require this to be on to saturate the drive's bandwidth. Additionally, this only gives us HALF of the bandwidth that we should be seeing.
- No configuration changes reached through wdidle3, LSIUtil_1.62, or Hitachi Feature Tool 2.12 have resolved the issue. All settings look optimal with both drives and controller.
- The 1Tb WD shipped with the server, and as such has been the focus of my testing (since some people claim that DELL optimizes their shipped drives for their controllers). The 2Tb drives are third party purchases. All three drives achieve their proper speeds when not connected through the SAS controller. Once on the SAS controller, 3Mb\s or 20-30Mb\s depending if that write cache option is enabled.
- Firmware and drivers for the SAS 6\iR are the most recent that can be found online.
- The drives have been formatted a number of different ways with different block sizes during tests. None made any notable change on performance with the SAS controller.
- The backplane has already been replaced by DELL, it is not the culprit. The cables as well.
So here I sit with a $1500 server in my home office that gets shitty write speeds and no solution to be had that doesn't involve more money (which I am not willing to do and should not have to do). I've been patient in waiting for certain back ordered parts to arrive for this so that it can finally be configured the way it should be, but with the problems I'm running into, I'm wondering if it's within my right to return this after three months of problems with it (the disk IO speeds are just the straw that broke the camel's back, I've had other issues such as parts back ordered for months, idiot reps who can't place simple orders, etc).
I'm frustrated that DELL would sell garbage, I'm frustrated at myself for having bought this instead of building one myself and saving both time and money.
I wouldn't even be so bothered about needing to mess with the write cache setting in Windows if it actually provided the full performance I expect from these drives. It's not like 60Mb\s is breaking any land speed records. Crap "raid" card from new egg handles that, so does onboard. But for some reason, too much load for little ol' SAS 6\iR. That's unacceptable.
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