Settings up RAID 5

D

dyesan

Limp Gawd
Joined
Nov 2, 2007
Messages
320
[H]ello,

I do quite a bit of photo/video editing along with graphical design for websites and such, maybe a game or two here and there. Harddrive failure is not an issue, as most of the data will be backed up. This is mostly for pure speed (although I'm aware I won't see effect in all applications). I heard these drives hold up their own, however this is my first time setting up a raid.

I would like to setup a striped raid with 3x 250gb 7200.10 Link

I was thinking about purchasing a raid card but the motherboard I have now has specifications indicating it can support:
SATA RAID 0/1/0+1/5

The motherboard is: BIOSTAR TF7025-M2 Link


Not sure what exactly this raid is indicating. 1/5 = mirror / ?
I would like to avoid dishing out for a raid card, but if it will improve performance or if it's required for a 3 disk striped raid, I will certainly look into it.

Thanks for the help.
 
Ok, I researched a bit, and I believe I got RAID 5 confused..what I want is a 3 drive RAID 0. (3 drives in stripe).

Question now is: What kind of performance loss (if any) would I see in using the mobo raid controller vs. a dedicated one?
 
SATA RAID 0/1/0+1/5

What that line is saying is that it can run these RAID levels:

0
1
0+1
5

The 0+1 was confusing you. This is where you take two RAID 0 arrays and then mirror them, this takes a minimum of 4 drives.
 
dyesan said:
Ok, I researched a bit, and I believe I got RAID 5 confused..what I want is a 3 drive RAID 0. (3 drives in stripe).

Question now is: What kind of performance loss (if any) would I see in using the mobo raid controller vs. a dedicated one?
Click to expand...

RAID0 with 3 drives isn't a smart idea if you care about your data. There is no redundancy in RAID 0. (Which means it shouldn't be called RAID at all. More like AID-0.) In any case RAID 5 with the motherboard controller is like a software RAID with some hardware acceleration. RAID 5 on most of your cheaper RAID controllers (sub-$300) are all going to be about as slow as the motherboard RAID or worse depending on the bus type. You won't really see any bennefit to using them over the onboard controller unless you get into the LSI, Areca, and other higher end controllers that cost upwards of around $400 or so.

Unless you are prepared to drop some real coin on a hardware based solution I'd stick with the onboard controller. Even then I'd recommend RAID1 or RAID 0+1. RAID-5 has quite a bit more overhead if you aren't using a dedicated hardware solution.
 
Ah, ok, I looked at it the wrong way; the 0+1 = RAID "10"

I will be backing up the data every week or so; failure isn't really an issue. Taking that aside, and just looking at performance wise, how would the onboard controller fare in a 3 drive stripe vs. the same setup except with a RAID card?

If there is significant improvement, then I would pay ~$50 for a PCI-e 1x RAID card. Is it worth it?
 
dyesan said:
Ah, ok, I looked at it the wrong way; the 0+1 = RAID "10"

I will be backing up the data every week or so; failure isn't really an issue. Taking that aside, and just looking at performance wise, how would the onboard controller fare in a 3 drive stripe vs. the same setup except with a RAID card?

If there is significant improvement, then I would pay ~$50 for a PCI-e 1x RAID card. Is it worth it?
Click to expand...

A $50 RAID card won't be any better than the onboard in any way shape or form.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top