Virtual File System Photoshop Raptor Raid 0 -> 2TB Green drive

[tradbourne]

We use Photoshop a lot and like the speed it works with RAID 0 when saving files over 1 GB. What I am looking for is a way to make the OS transparently treat a smaller (say twin 300 GB Raptor Raid 0 array) and a 2 tb or 3 tb green drive as nearline storage as one virtual unit, without the operator needing to physically move the files from the slow drive to the fast drive.

I want blinding speed and huge capacity, but still stay at a sweet spot for price.

For example, I start working on a project, and the files are on the slower 2tb drive, and my first access moves the files to the Raid 0 Raptor array, where I can work on them at the fastest speed, then after the project is finished, and the space on the Raid 0 array is needed for something else, to have the files silently moved, by the OS to the nearline storage disk without the operator needing to be aware of where the files really are stored.

We are using XP 64 and Win 7 Ult on our workstations, and have implemented hourly backups to our Linux unRaid 10 TB NAS (soon to be 20 TB), so we feel good about our backups (one copy of which are offsite)

 

[CrimsonKnight13]

The only way that I can think to make this work would be to use JBOD for the array & the additional drive. I don't know of any technologies that do it with simplicity w/o getting into more complex methods that are tasked by special file server apps. Someone else might give a better idea though.

 

[Snowknight26]

In the Disk Management section of the Device Manager, you can mount the smaller drive in an empty NTFS folder on the main array.

 

[tradbourne]

In the Disk Management section of the Device Manager, you can mount the smaller drive in an empty NTFS folder on the main array.

How will I sync the 2 storage areas? I would like the OS to archive off to the green 2 TB drive, and use the array as short term work space. Think of the array as being a persistent high speed cache for the 2TB storage drive.

Actually the array will be the smaller of the 2 if that matters. (say only 600 GB compared to 2000 GB for the storage drive)

 

[Snowknight26]

Nevermind, I missed the 'without the operator needing to physically move the files from the slow drive to the fast drive'.

 

[tradbourne]

Nevermind, I missed the 'without the operator needing to physically move the files from the slow drive to the fast drive'.

Yes, it seems that this kind of capability isn't quite there yet. Surely somebody other than me would want to benefit.

Imagine a pair of Raid 0 Raptors, even only 150 gig each, virtually tied to a parity protected storage with 4-10 TB of very safe storage. The entire system would feel like it was blinding fast, but most of it would be slow green drives that are even slower because of the parity protection. Total cost would be quite manageable.

 

[s0rce]

Yes, it seems that this kind of capability isn't quite there yet. Surely somebody other than me would want to benefit.

Imagine a pair of Raid 0 Raptors, even only 150 gig each, virtually tied to a parity protected storage with 4-10 TB of very safe storage. The entire system would feel like it was blinding fast, but most of it would be slow green drives that are even slower because of the parity protection. Total cost would be quite manageable.

What happened if a raptor died before the data was transfered to the large RAID array. You would lose the data...

ZFS has read/write cache...