150GB VelociRaptor Raid 0 Boot Drive (Forget SSD!!!)

B

Blk02

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 19, 2008
Messages
183
Well, I have waited patiently for an SSD worthy of my money but I want solid performance and I believe two 150GB VelociRaptors in Raid 0 cannot be beat price/performance wise by an SSD at anytime in the near future. Hell, one quality 128GB SSD costs around $650.00 bucks if not more (quality = Mtron, Memoright, Intel, etc.) I am going down to Directron in Houston tomorrow and picking up two OEM 150GB VelociRaptors and one more 640GB WD. Then I will have the dream machine I have been working towards. Let me know what performance increases your seeing if you already run a system similar to this.

2EA 150GB VelociRaptors in Raid 0 (Boot Drive)
2EA 640GB Western Digital in Raid 1 (Storage)
 
Just wondering, why do you even need a 128GB boot drive, let alone a 300GB one. I'm always baffled by people who post how they need more speed for their boot drive, but then complain that the fastest things are large enough (at their price point).

I'm not TC-ing or anything, I just never understood why more than 60GB was needed for a boot drive, that's all. Maybe you could explain your usage to help reason to my conscience :)
 
OP: I had THREE VR300's in RAID0 ($$), partially as my boot drive. Now I've got 2 128GB TITAN SSDs ($599) in RAID0 that replaced 'em. The TITANs blow away the VRs. I love the Velociraptors, but once you've experienced quality SSDs in R0, there's just no going back. Not to mention I can fit all of my games/apps on the SSDs, so they all load hella faster too.

I would not be buying any mechanical drives anymore at this point - only for storage drives. OS and game drives, SSD just wins.
 
crazjayz said:
Just wondering, why do you even need a 128GB boot drive, let alone a 300GB one. I'm always baffled by people who post how they need more speed for their boot drive, but then complain that the fastest things are large enough (at their price point).

I'm not TC-ing or anything, I just never understood why more than 60GB was needed for a boot drive, that's all. Maybe you could explain your usage to help reason to my conscience :)
Click to expand...

Well, personally I need more than just 60GB for a boot drive. I have already used up about 70GB with my current boot partition and I dont even have all of my programs and games loaded. In addition, you want at least an additional 30% headroom. To my knowledge the only option I have other than a 128GB SSD or 150GB WD VR is a Intel 80GB SSD, which has its own set of problems. This basically sums up my reasoning. If they made a 90GB drive I would buy it, but to my knowledge this does not exist.

I did alot of reading last night and the OCZ Vertex series SSD looks good and the upcoming SanDisk G3 SSD looks good. It seems that they have started to alleviate the stuttering issues and I hope Intel solves there degrading performance issue. After reading the article about the Intel drives Intel needs to do alot more than just refute the claims made by PC Perspective because the article makes perfect sense to me. I am currently researching the OCZ Apex with the Raid 0 internal JMicron controller.
 
Well, I've got two 80GB Velociraptors in RAID 0 presently, shortstroked to 40GB off each (so 2x40=80GB RAID 0 volume) and it's pulling down sub-7ms access times and 215MB/s average reads (193 min/228 max) and 210MB/s average writes (194 min/224 max) sooo...

Aside from the Intel SSDs, not much out there is gonna catch 'em, and since that's 80GB itself compared to the 80GB I've got in use, and I paid $150 for both drives whereas the Intel would be about $400, and considering the issues some folks are now reporting with the Intel SSD hardware, no thanks... I'll keep my tried and true Velociraptors and be happy.

Hell, Photoshop CS4 Extended loads in about 2.5 seconds first run, after that, about a second to restart it...

"How fast is fast?"
 
Joe Average said:
Well, I've got two 80GB Velociraptors in RAID 0 presently, shortstroked to 40GB off each (so 2x40=80GB RAID 0 volume) and it's pulling down sub-7ms access times and 215MB/s average reads (193 min/228 max) and 210MB/s average writes (194 min/224 max) sooo...

Aside from the Intel SSDs, not much out there is gonna catch 'em, and since that's 80GB itself compared to the 80GB I've got in use, and I paid $150 for both drives whereas the Intel would be about $400, and considering the issues some folks are now reporting with the Intel SSD hardware, no thanks... I'll keep my tried and true Velociraptors and be happy.

Hell, Photoshop CS4 Extended loads in about 2.5 seconds first run, after that, about a second to restart it...

"How fast is fast?"
Click to expand...

Those are some very nice benchmarks, Joe. :)

Are you running the Velociraptors on ICH10R, by any chance?
 
Yep, finally swapped out the Gigabyte EP45-DS3L board for an EP45-UD3LR, brand new one from them that Fry's got a few days ago. Better heatsinks on the MCH and SB, running nice and solid at 3 GHz again, idle temps are about 33C, load around 52-ish (the stock Intel HSF so that's expected). Going to grab one of those Freezer HSFs soon as they get some good reviews.

Haven't had any issues so far, knock on wood...

I'll probably revert the array back to the full capacity on the drives and get the 160GB going, got an old 250GB for raw storage, looking into a cheap terabyte for more, but as far as straight out performance is concerned, the Velociraptors are it for the foreseeable future. :D
 
Joe Average said:
Well, I've got two 80GB Velociraptors in RAID 0 presently, shortstroked to 40GB off each (so 2x40=80GB RAID 0 volume) and it's pulling down sub-7ms access times and 215MB/s average reads (193 min/228 max) and 210MB/s average writes (194 min/224 max) sooo...

Aside from the Intel SSDs, not much out there is gonna catch 'em, and since that's 80GB itself compared to the 80GB I've got in use, and I paid $150 for both drives whereas the Intel would be about $400, and considering the issues some folks are now reporting with the Intel SSD hardware, no thanks... I'll keep my tried and true Velociraptors and be happy.

Hell, Photoshop CS4 Extended loads in about 2.5 seconds first run, after that, about a second to restart it...

"How fast is fast?"
Click to expand...

OCZ Vertex drives will catch them it seems, from the review I saw they also don't suffer so badly with long term performance issues.
 
Perhaps, but it 200MB/s solid isn't worth what I paid for it, I don't know what the hell is anymore... :)

As for long term performance, they said the same things about almost all other SSD hardware when it was "new" and look what's become of it overall. Even the much praised Intel drives are "suddenly" having issues, whether Intel will outright admit it or not.

Suffice to say, hard drive technology has been around for 50+ years now, it's solid, it's stable, and the Velociraptors are the pinnacle of it (aside from SCSI stuff but I'm not going there, I'm talking about readily available fairly priced consumer class desktop drives - and yes I know technically these 80GB models would be deemed "Enterprise" drives) so...

Things will improve, but comparing the maturity of hard drive tech against SSD, I'll stay with hard drives for exactly what I said earlier: years to come.
 
I'm not only interested in the raw read/write speeds but also the access times which for me are another big advantage and something that no rotational drive will ever be able to match.

Yes I totally agree that there was a lot of bragging about SSDs but now without a doubt I expect this year to actually show true abilities of SSD. Next year I expect most computers will advance along the line of SSDs as primary drives and standard rotational drives as mass storage secondary drives.

Rotational drives are getting a bit long in the tooth and besides increasing data density and rotational speeds, naturally increasing rotational speeds is problematic at the moment, there isn't much more that'll be done due to the general shift of development to SSDs etc.

I'll personally have a mixed setup like most people who choose SSDs due to capacity/cost issues but I'm interested in upgrading the slowest part of my computer.........when you exclude me ;)
 
Joe Average said:
Well, I've got two 80GB Velociraptors in RAID 0 presently, shortstroked to 40GB off each (so 2x40=80GB RAID 0 volume) and it's pulling down sub-7ms access times and 215MB/s average reads (193 min/228 max) and 210MB/s average writes (194 min/224 max) sooo...

Aside from the Intel SSDs, not much out there is gonna catch 'em, and since that's 80GB itself compared to the 80GB I've got in use, and I paid $150 for both drives whereas the Intel would be about $400, and considering the issues some folks are now reporting with the Intel SSD hardware, no thanks... I'll keep my tried and true Velociraptors and be happy.

Hell, Photoshop CS4 Extended loads in about 2.5 seconds first run, after that, about a second to restart it...

"How fast is fast?"
Click to expand...
I just put a pair together 80GB VRaptors and I'm getting 6.4ms access times and 220MB/s average reads on a full capacity RAID0 array. Paid $190 for the pair which wan't bad at all IMO. SSD's are still in beta testing using the retail public..........
 
Arent the IOPS the most important thing to consider when looking at SSD's versus Mechanical drives. Hell a SCSI 15,000rpm drive only has like 250 IOPS while a typical SSD has over 1,500 IOPS in most cases. From all the SSD reviews I have read the application and OS MB/s are always substantially higher with a single SSD than even a pair of 300GB VelociRaptors in Raid 0. I believe the responsiveness inherent to SSD's comes more from the IOPS and not the average write or average read. IOPS is like torque and the average write/read is like horsepower. The IOPS is what gets you off the line as in allowing the applications and OS to access all the little tiny files it needs at once in order to open quickly. The average write/read comes into play during large file transfers, which is less of an issue on a application/OS boot drive. I believe this is why the OCZ Vertex firmware was held back so long because they were increasing the IOPS and bringing down the average write/read. No matter what average write/read you can pull out of a pair of VelociRaptors in Raid 0 they can never match the shear torque (IOPS) of an SSD. If you look at the reviews for the Intel SSD it has a massive amount of IOPS compared to other bargain SSD's. This is why the Intel SSD has remained the champ for so long.
 
Joe and TR,

These are some Very nice numbers you guys are cooking up. My brother-in-law and I are actually going the same route with his build tomorrow night after work.

Any recommendations on stripe/cluster size? We're using the 150's. Planned on short-stroking 80/220.

Primarily using the pc for gaming and web-browsing only.

Thanks in advance.

Liquid Cool
 
I'll "forget" about SSDs when you can beat this 4k write test

ft7ag.jpg
 
I'll "forget" about SSDs when you can beat this 4k write test
Click to expand...

Lol, AMEN brother-

How bout this one?

2-X25M-RAID0-CrystalDisk.jpg


No, that ain't MFT on my drives.. just 2 X25-M's doin their thing-
 
Well after talking to the community OCZ changed the final firmware for the Vertex drives to reduce burst write speed and increase IOPS performace.
 
Hulahoops said:
Well after talking to the community OCZ changed the final firmware for the Vertex drives to reduce burst write speed and increase IOPS performace.
Click to expand...

That's what I've been trying to tell them since I had my first core drives back in July-

Maybe they'll listen about quality assurance and compatibility testing on the Summit, cause there's no way they have enough time to do thorough testing of this new firmware before release.
 
I suspect the Vertex with its more advanced Indilinx controller is the first time they've been able to play so much with the settings.
 
EnderW said:
I'll "forget" about SSDs when you can beat this 4k write test
Click to expand...
That's a nice picture. Wish I had the money to blow on undeveloped products myself. It's a good thing you don't need data that actually stays intact for a couple of months to run a benchmark.........
 
Look, I have been playing with computer equipment for a couple of decades now, and believe me, SSD's arrived on the scene a whole bunch more ready for the market than hard drives. Yes they have some issues. But the issues are the difference between faster than hard drives in most situations, and really faster than hard drives in most situations.

Yes, there are a few instances where you can bog down some drives. Do those situations occur frequently in real life? I chose to address that issue personally by RAIDing my SSD's. Of course I paid a price premium to do it, but for once in my life I am in a position that that is not an issue.

Are they for everyone right now? Of course not. They are still expensive, and have some quirks.

Are SSDs mainstream? Not yet, but within a year, a majority of notebooks will be shipping with SSDs. You will soon start seeing performance systems shipping with RAIDED SSDs.

Mark my words. They are that good, and getting better. 6 months ago, I would have been happy with a single Vraptor. Now that I was ready to move up, I went with Raided SSDs. It worked so well in my new system, I bought a set for my older system.

Don
 
tuskenraider said:
That's a nice picture. Wish I had the money to blow on undeveloped products myself. It's a good thing you don't need data that actually stays intact for a couple of months to run a benchmark.........
Click to expand...

Wow... you mean my SSD array is going to magically go poof! in two months. I better change my weekly backups to daily inc's, I've only got 2 weeks left. Good grief dude. Please tell me you didn't write that sober.

That's just it. It's new technology. Yes it has it's quirks. So does i7, so does just about every other new tech we buy. The gains and every day real performance is available now. Do I give that up and wait another year for it to be a little cheaper and a little more polished? Sure I could, but then I would be just another smart consumer with a boring computer A YEAR FROM NOW. You're either into tech or you aren't. I like cutting edge and I'll put up with some of the drawbacks. So far, SSDs have been awesome for me and this is coming from a die-hard Raptor/VR fan.
 
Brahmzy said:
Wow... you mean my SSD array is going to magically go poof! in two months. I better change my weekly backups to daily inc's, I've only got 2 weeks left. Good grief dude. Please tell me you didn't write that sober.
Click to expand...
I don't think the subject of this thread has anything to do with SSD benchmark d!ickswingers showing us something we already know. Sorry there is still a majority in the enthusiast market that doesn't want to play Russion roulette with their data(whether it's days, weeks, months) and overspend on unreliable products. Enjoy the edgy side of PC tech and SSD speeds. Thanks for the refresher on why I don't visit here much.
 
tuskenraider said:
I don't think the subject of this thread has anything to do with SSD benchmark d!ickswingers showing us something we already know. Sorry there is still a majority in the enthusiast market that doesn't want to play Russion roulette with their data(whether it's days, weeks, months) and overspend on unreliable products. Enjoy the edgy side of PC tech and SSD speeds. Thanks for the refresher on why I don't visit here much.
Click to expand...
what the hell are you talking about by unreliable? I'm pretty sure the failure rates of SSDs are at worst the same as hard drives and at best far superior
 
EnderW said:
what the hell are you talking about by unreliable? I'm pretty sure the failure rates of SSDs are at worst the same as hard drives and at best far superior
Click to expand...
Since you're "pretty sure", I'll concede you must be right, based on the lack of evidence on my part. *Goes to read in the forums some more about all the successful SSD lines.........I'll be back in a couple of months to see what I can find.
 
tuskenraider said:
Since you're "pretty sure", I'll concede you must be right, based on the lack of evidence on my part. *Goes to read in the forums some more about all the successful SSD lines.........I'll be back in a couple of months to see what I can find.
Click to expand...
I said pretty sure because I haven't seen people posting about their SSDs failing and usually if something like that is happening, it's all over the place
have you seen such events or are you just speculating they aren't "safe"?
 
EnderW said:
I said pretty sure because I haven't seen people posting about their SSDs failing and usually if something like that is happening, it's all over the place
have you seen such events or are you just speculating they aren't "safe"?
Click to expand...

He's probably just seeing the reports about OCZ drives and other JMicron issues. The only data reliability issues I have seen are of course the corruption I experienced with the core drives, and others on the forum. Then the other issue is when the drive stops being recognized as the correct drive, and is then just detected as a JMicron 2GB drive or something random like that.

Other than that, I have not seen data integrity issues with the other various MLC/SLC drives. Another thing OCZ/JMicron/(cheap brand MLC) has done to tarnish SSD reputation.
 
*cough*Intel and the slow write issues now coming to light on their much vaunted X series SSDs might be something to look into with further study*cough*... ;)
 
Everyone calm down now.

SSD will become the new standard, it's just a question of time.
There is no doubt about it, as much as you want to stick to the noisey, spinning platter monsters called HDD.

It's a no-brainer really.

Brahmzy said it very nicely in his posting above ...

Brahmzy said:
... It's new technology. Yes it has it's quirks. So does i7, so does just about every other new tech we buy. The gains and every day real performance is available now ...
Click to expand...

See, either you HHD hardcore fanbois relax and go with the flow, or you ...
Censored_3fd65923-24e5-4a0b-bd1e-cd669dbe774f.png
 
Blk02 said:
Well, I have waited patiently for an SSD worthy of my money but I want solid performance and I believe two 150GB VelociRaptors in Raid 0 cannot be beat price/performance wise by an SSD at anytime in the near future. Hell, one quality 128GB SSD costs around $650.00 bucks if not more (quality = Mtron, Memoright, Intel, etc.) I am going down to Directron in Houston tomorrow and picking up two OEM 150GB VelociRaptors and one more 640GB WD. Then I will have the dream machine I have been working towards. Let me know what performance increases your seeing if you already run a system similar to this.

2EA 150GB VelociRaptors in Raid 0 (Boot Drive)
2EA 640GB Western Digital in Raid 1 (Storage)
Click to expand...

Make sure the SSD is somewhat around 150gb.
 
Blk02,

We Finally got the Velociraptor drives in and the raid set up. Very pleased with the performance of these drives. Did you decide on going with the V.Raptors or SSD?


Liquid Cool

ICH 7, Raid 0

VeloRaid0.gif
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top