Storage mess!?!? Help?

Christobevii3

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jul 13, 2008
Messages
294
I think I have too many storage devices right now:

Hardware:
2 400GB hitatchi hard drives
1 RE2 wd 400GB
1 wd 400GB
asus 790fx sb600 motherboard
3ware 9650se 8 port
4 1TB WD GP
1 OCZ 30GB ssd coming

Issue:
My vista install had an update show up that I installed that broke the onboard raid. So now i have an unbootable vista install. It apparently made it into a non harddrive volume that was read only.

It was setup in raid 0 with the wd drives since when i'd try to do raid 0+1 the hitatchis would drop out constantly. I use to have 4 hitatchis but they keep dying.


Trying to do:
Option 1:
Install vista into a raid 10 array with the 4 400GB's booting from my 3ware raid card. This causes and infinite bootup in vista after things are installed

Option 2:
Install vista on the ssd and all my programs into the raid 10 array since its only a 30GB ssd

Option 3:
Buy 3 more wd re2 400GB's and hope the onboard wont constantly drop the 400's

What should I do? I like the idea of the fast boot of the sdd, but it really is a moot point now since the 3ware takes a while to post. Other option is sell the 30GB ssd and get a 128GB and install my operation system and games onto it and set the 400's to more storage?

What should I do?
 
Other option too is get the 16 port of the raid card. Keep my files array, so i can still expand it how i planned, build a raid 10 programs array on it, then boot from 30GB ssd.
 
Just a couple of observations.

The RE2 drives are meant to be run in a Raid with some kind of error correction such as 5 or 6. TLER, that is built into those drives limits the onboard error recover attempts to 7 seconds and lets the RAID controller take care if any serious error recovery. Running them any other way is asking for trouble.

I would ditch the small drives and go with fewer TB drives. I am a KISS fan. The Rock group too.

30 GB is pretty small for a Vista boot partition. But then again with a SSD, fragmentation is not an issue, so your could prolly live with it for a while.

Any particular reason for you to be running RAID 10 for your programs? Raid is not a good substitute for an offline backup of your data.

Don
 
There really isn't a good reason. I'd just rather be able to replace one dead drive than have to rebuild a raid 0 array. As for the vista install. It is around 10GB installed. I'd install almost everything outside of the ssd.
 
I would just boot off the SSD, I would also install my Programs there.
i have a 32GB boot partition, and i have Office, VS2008, VMWare, and some other progs and I'm only using 22GB. You would have to install games on a different volume.
I would ditch the 400gb's and get a couple 1tb drives instead.
+1 for KISS
 
Alright, i got it down to this.

30GB ssd for boot
300GB raptor for games/programs
4 x 1TB storage on raid card
4 sata ports free then on raid card for expansion

This will simplify because the 30GB and 300GB can run on the onboard in normal ide mode and not have the screwy sb600 issues it has with vista.
 
Got the 300GB raptor in today. Got windows installed and games installed to the raptor. I left 1 400GB in for the swap drive. I will say that the combo of ssd and raptor is a huge boost of the 400's.
 
Sounds like a quick solid setup with some flexibility for the future. I am jealous. ;)

Don
 
you have a lot of $$


keep spending, you single-handedly may do more for the economy that Bernanke or Bush


:)
 
lolol, I've always cheaped my way out on things. My problems were from the hitatchi 400's I got. I bought 4 from a business a year ago for $200 for 5. I had 2 die in roughly 6 months and hitatchi said they were from europe so i couldn't get them fixed. So i found some wd 400's and the hitatchis never played good and would drop off my 790fx's southbridge raid. So after fighting that for 6 months I just bit the bullet.
 
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