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Help expanding my fileserver

F

FlyingPenguin

n00b
Joined
Jan 7, 2003
Messages
39
I have gotten to the point where the storage in my fileserver can no longer cut it.
It currently has 2x 250gb drives for storage and a 30gb for the OS and uploads.

I am think I am going RAID 5 and have picked out this a PROMISE controller.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16816102006
Any thoughts on this card?
Can the array be expanded without destroying and creating a new one?

The drives I am looking into are the Maxtor DiamondMax 10
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822140154
and the HITACHI Deskstar 7k400
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822145066

Any opinions or suggestions?
 
I haven't heard great things about the Promise sx series. Why not SATA? This card is the same price for 8x sata instead of 6x ide, and its brother the 1820 does fairly well in Tweakers.net's review. The linked page shows it leading the pack in 8x raid5 configuration, with low CPU usage. Check out the other pages for a well-done review of the other cards on the market.

What I'd do is make a raid5 for big stuff in long-term storage and then either:
a) make those 2 250s into a raid1 for documents and music or something
b) make the 250s into a scratch disk for Photoshop or video editing or something.
You know what you do with the disks, pick one and go with it.

WRT the disks, I've heard good stuff about the Diamondmax 10 drives. Fast.
 
Well that card you suggested is PCI-X and I don't have any express slots on my mother board. Another reason for going PATA was that its a bit cheaper than SATA

Edit: Upon reading stuff I realize I was mistaken. PCI-X is backward compatable with PCI according to this article http://www.processor.com/Editorial/article.asp?article=articles/p2606/30p06/30p06.asp&guid=

Edit 2: From reading more about the card suggested is it correct to say that the array can be expanded without recreating the array?
 
It can, but you can't move drives from one raid controller type to another (if that was your plan) you will lose everything recreating the new array. You can add only to an exsisting array on the same controller. Might want to remember that pci-x and pxi-e are not the same thing so that card will not work in a pci-e slot later on. People tend to get these two confused alot.
 
Yep, this card will work fine in a regular PCI slot; the extra connector just sticks off the end.

According to the manual, this card does support OCE (online capacity expansion) but I wouldn't rely too heavily on it. It's a tricky operation, and it'd be easy for one little bug to completely kill all your data forever. Use with caution and backups.

As to cost of drives, here's a Maxline III 300gb drive. It's $40 more (or 25%) but it's faster and a newer line of drives. The diamondmax 10 in that capacity is more at that site. I recommend buying drives from ZZF, they pack hard drives better than newegg does. Can't be too careful.

HTH ;)
 
How does ZZF packaging differ from newegg?
All hd's I have gotten from newegg are individually wrapped in bubble wrap then in a box with packing peanuts.
 
FlyingPenguin said:
Well that card you suggested is PCI-X and I don't have any express slots on my mother board. Another reason for going PATA was that its a bit cheaper than SATA

Edit: Upon reading stuff I realize I was mistaken. PCI-X is backward compatable with PCI according to this article http://www.processor.com/Editorial/article.asp?article=articles/p2606/30p06/30p06.asp&guid=

Edit 2: From reading more about the card suggested is it correct to say that the array can be expanded without recreating the array?
Click to expand...

PCI-X is not PCI Express, PCI Express is PCIe.

PCI-X is a backward compatable 64bit PCI standard, that will work with your 32bit PCI slots just fine.

==>Lazn
 
unhappy_mage said:
As to cost of drives, here's a Maxline III 300gb drive. It's $40 more (or 25%) but it's faster and a newer line of drives. The diamondmax 10 in that capacity is more at that site.
Click to expand...
As has been discussed various times before, the DM10 and the ML3 are the same exact drives; Maxtor bins them for reliability, so "supposedily" the ML3 are more reliable, hence the 5yr warrenty vs 3yr warrenty. But they perform exactly the same. It's your call, but I figured that 3 years from now I wouldn't even have the drive anymore.
 
FlyingPenguin said:
How does ZZF packaging differ from newegg?
All hd's I have gotten from newegg are individually wrapped in bubble wrap then in a box with packing peanuts.
Click to expand...
I seem to recall that someone said ZZF packages their disks in foam rubber, which is better than the bubble wrap/peanuts. I haven't ordered a disk in a while, this could have changed (or not have been true).

@Vertigo Acid: That's especially odd, considering that the dm10 is $5 more than the maxline 3. The warranties are as you say, too. I guess we know which one to buy now... :cool:
 
ok i think i found my set up and am going to spend way more than i wanted but oh well

Highpoint RocketRAID 2220 8-Channel PCI-X SATA II RAID Host Adapter
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=132234

8x Maxtor Maxline III 7B300S0 300GB Serial ATA 7200RPM Hard Drive w/16MB Buffer
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=100719-1
(yes that is an 8 and yes I am an idiot for blowing that much money)

Coolermaster STC-T01 CM Stacker Aluminum Full Tower Case
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=141623

Coolermaster STB-3T4-E1 4-in-3 Device Module
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=370698

Final Price: $2146.87

Ok now another question does the Highpoint card come with 8 SATA cables or do I need to get them separate, and do you think I need to get the power cables separate or is there any chance that they will come with the drives?

Also concerning power. Will a 500w cut it or will I need to put in a 300w I have laying around?
 
ZZF said:
Bare drives have a great price, but do not come with cables, drivers, or other software
Click to expand...
And sata cables are $10 each at zzf... :eek:

I'd recommend something like this for the power supply. Check out the stickies in the PSU forums for more help, but I really like the one of these I have; no problems at all with 6 drives: 2 120s, 2 60s, 1 18, and 1 scsi 9gb.

edit: don't know if the highpoint includes cables, definitely doesn't include power cables. Those'll be expensive, too, unless you can find them locally.
 
Last I saw the RR1820A was about $60-70 cheaper, and AFAIK the only difference is SATA-II support, which probably will be pretty much meaningless. Also the CM drive modules can be had for closer to $20 if you look around.
 
FlyingPenguin said:
Also concerning power. Will a 500w cut it or will I need to put in a 300w I have laying around?
Click to expand...

You need to journey to the far away place known as the Power Supply Forum You will need ~2A on +12 for each drive on spinup, and about 1A for each drive at idle. You will also want to investigate and find out if your controller will allow staggered spin-up of the drives to reduce load on startup.
 
Is there a difference between the 1820A and the 2220 other than SATA-II ?

both cards support staggard spin up
 
IANAE but the 2200 looks like an 1820A updated for SATA-II support. Which is functionally meaningless in most situations. From this thread at least, it apparently also has online capacity expansion added (that or I just didn't realize my 1820A supports that)...then again you're plugging 8x drives in to start with so you can't expand it anyway, so it doesn't matter. OCE is risky business at best anyway, you'd still have to backup pre-expansion even if you had it.

Re: the ZZF packaging, they put the drive inside a clamshell and that inside a foam box. This meets the requirements drive manufacturers (well, Seagate at least) have for RMAs. Many other places just put the drive in a clamshell or antistatic bag and that inside packing peanuts with everything else you order. Bad ju-ju. I'll still buy from somewhere else if there's a significant price margin, but apples to apples ZZF is getting my HD orders.
 
Yeah I was looking at the wrong thing as far as both cards supporting staggard spin up. The 2220 does but I can't find anything that says if the 1820A does.

Also the 2220 supports 64-bit LBA and has hotswap capibilities.
 
All SATA supports hot swap, unless someone was totally drunk when they designed it...

Also does the 64-bit LBA (2TB support).

Think it does staggered but not sure, regardless it's only 8 hard drives. As long as your PSU isn't a POS it shouldn't be a problem. I've ran more than that on a high quality 300W PSU without so much as a wait-on-boot setting.
 
fatrhino said:
do any other SATA RAID cards out support OCE?
Click to expand...

Yeah, but it doesn't negate the necessity of backing up the entire array first...OCE is sometimes conveniant but usually relatively meaningless. How often are you planning on expanding the thing anyway? It's another one of those things designed to keep the server from having to be off for any time at all. If it's for home use, I'd go with the cheaper card that is functionally the same 98% of the time.
 
FP: I can attest to the 1820A coming with eight blue SATA cables with black plugs.

The 2220A should come with cables too. OEM disks do not come with cables, but motherboards and controllers do.

SATA power adaptors aren't that expensive, but eight of them...that's nickel and diming it. But hell, if you're going to spend 2 grand on an array, what's another 30 bucks?
 
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