Comments on this storage setup?

S

Sgt_Strider

Gawd
Joined
Oct 29, 2003
Messages
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I was thinking of using 2 WD 640GB AAKS drives in a RAID 0 configuration with an ARECA ARC-1200 RAID controller. All important data will be saved to the Seagate 1TB HD which will be installed as a secondary drive. Is this a good setup? I only want to keep the OS and installed programs on the RAID while all data are saved to the secondary drive. I intend to use this setup for photoshop, compressing and uncompressing RAR files, moving large number of files back and forth, and gaming. Will I notice any performance increase with this setup? If not, maybe I should save my money and stick with a single card setup?
 
First of all, even onboard RAID is more than enough for a RAID 0 setup. So no need to waste money on an add-on card just for RAID 0 when onboard RAID is sufficient for that.

Second, you will see quicker load times with games but that's pretty much it. Maybe faster uncompressing.

If you really want to speed up Photoshop, get 8GB of RAM or more, get SuperSpeed's RAMDisk Program and turn some of that 8GB of RAM into a RAMDisk drive. Use that RAMDisk as a scratch drive. And I'll let Joe Average finish up with his experiences:
http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1033043311&postcount=16

But the RAMDisk isn't too useful for gaming, booting or loading purposes since all data is lost when the PC is shutdown

Anyway I'd say go with a RAID 0 setup if you have a proper backup solution and if you're using onboard RAID.
 
I think some people are saying that a hardware RAID solution is more reliable and it's faster.

Right now I'm debating on whether I should just get a VR 150GB drive instead and use that as the OS drive. I can't seem to decide if a RAID 0 setup would be better than a VR 150GB drive.
 
Right now I'm debating on whether I should just get a VR 150GB drive instead and use that as the OS drive.
Click to expand...

That's the ticket. Stay away from that RAID stuff, if only for simplicity's sake.
 
When it comes to performance, the name of the game is spindles. The more the merrier. Though one failed drive in a RAID0 will fail the whole Volume. Depending on which Hardware RAID controller you get, most comes with a decent amount of cache which can capture some significant performance increase over on-board software controllers.
 
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