to all
i am thinking of upgrading my system and am wondering about setting up a RAID 0 configuration. does anyone here have any experience with this?
does a RAID 0 significantly improve speed in graphics apps? or would just a faster hard drive be an answer (10,000 rpm)?
thanks
ghi
Comments
Originally posted by ghiangelo
to all
i am thinking of upgrading my system and am wondering about setting up a RAID 0 configuration. does anyone here have any experience with this?
does a RAID 0 significantly improve speed in graphics apps? or would just a faster hard drive be an answer (10,000 rpm)?
thanks
ghi
I am currently running RAID 0 'Striping' on my Powermac G5 Dual 2.0Ghz. I bought an exact duplicate of the Segate Baracudda that comes with the G5, 7200 RPM 8MB Cache. I ran XBench before and after and my results are listed below.
SINGLE DISK TEST
Results\t101.92\t
\tSystem Info\t\t
\t\tXbench Version\t\t1.1.3
\t\tSystem Version\t\t10.3.4 (7L32)
\t\tPhysical RAM\t\t512 MB
\t\tModel\t\tPowerMac7,3
\t\tProcessor\t\tPowerPC G5x2 @ 2.00 GHz
\t\t\tL1 Cache\t\t64K (instruction), 32K (data)
\t\t\tL2 Cache\t\t512K @ 2.00 GHz
\t\t\tBus Frequency\t\t1 GHz
\t\tVideo Card\t\tATY,RV360
\t\tDrive Type\t\tST3160023AS
\tDisk Test\t101.92\t
\t\tSequential\t103.46\t
\t\t\tUncached Write\t130.23\t54.28 MB/sec [4K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Write\t108.02\t44.24 MB/sec [256K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Read\t76.82\t12.16 MB/sec [4K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Read\t114.84\t46.40 MB/sec [256K blocks]
\t\tRandom\t100.41\t
\t\t\tUncached Write\t94.86\t1.42 MB/sec [4K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Write\t99.85\t22.52 MB/sec [256K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Read\t96.23\t0.64 MB/sec [4K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Read\t112.53\t23.16 MB/sec [256K blocks]
RAID DISK TEST
Results\t146.03\t
\tSystem Info\t\t
\t\tXbench Version\t\t1.1.3
\t\tSystem Version\t\t10.3.4 (7L32)
\t\tPhysical RAM\t\t512 MB
\t\tModel\t\tPowerMac7,3
\t\tProcessor\t\tPowerPC G5x2 @ 2.00 GHz
\t\t\tL1 Cache\t\t64K (instruction), 32K (data)
\t\t\tL2 Cache\t\t512K @ 2.00 GHz
\t\t\tBus Frequency\t\t1 GHz
\t\tVideo Card\t\tATY,RV360
\t\tDrive Type\t\tPowerMac G5
\tDisk Test\t146.03\t
\t\tSequential\t165.71\t
\t\t\tUncached Write\t293.49\t122.34 MB/sec [4K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Write\t259.21\t106.15 MB/sec [256K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Read\t76.70\t12.14 MB/sec [4K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Read\t260.68\t105.33 MB/sec [256K blocks]
\t\tRandom\t130.54\t
\t\t\tUncached Write\t169.63\t2.54 MB/sec [4K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Write\t139.29\t31.41 MB/sec [256K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Read\t103.31\t0.68 MB/sec [4K blocks]
\t\t\tUncached Read\t126.76\t26.09 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Both tests were on the exact same setup with 512MB RAM, with the same programs installed and nothing else running. I have had this setup for about 7 months now and wouldn't trade it for anything. I have noticed a difference between that and 1GB RAM extra.
i have similar set up as you - dual 2 Ghz and 2 GBs of RAM
so the results of striping 2 HDDs works well then?
http://barefeats.com is the place to go.
I think a 10K Raptor would give you more overall benefits.
Originally posted by hmurchison
RAID 0 isn't really recommended. The performance ehancements aren't significant enough IMO to warrant the risk potential of losing all your data should one drive fail.
I think a 10K Raptor would give you more overall benefits.
I would argue that if you bought drives with consecutive serial numbers, used the same power supply and same enclosure, the chance of failure on one drive or all drives is about the same.
Almost always, the problem with drives happened in the factory, and it happened to 500 drives in a row. That's just the way it works I guess.
And raptors aren't quite fast enough for some things.
I have a 75GB raptor, a 2 drive raid-0, and another single HD, I find booting off the raptor is best, and working off the raid-0 is best.
7200rpm drives with 16MB of cache
SATA II with NCQ support.
I'd love it if Powermacs came with 3 drive bays so that a mini RAID5 setup could be achieved. Looking for huge speed gains in RAID0 is pointless for the effort involved unless you have a decent controller card and pretty fast drives. This isn't coming from me but rather reports from Storagereview.com and Anandtech.com that show that overall RAID0 isn't worth the effort if speed is your primary goal.
It's only marginally slower than the raptor, yet it offers amazing capacity.
Raptor = 74gb for ~ $175
Maxtor = 300gb for ~ $200
newegg link to maxtor
maxtor vs raptor review & shootout
Seagate, hitachi/IBM, and Western digital are the only hard drives you should buy, the rest are usually not worth using.. unless you don't like your data.
Originally posted by slughead
anyone who uses maxtor almost deserves what they get
Seagate, hitachi/IBM, and Western digital are the only hard drives you should buy, the rest are usually not worth using.. unless you don't like your data.
That's interesting. All I have ever used (Mac/PC) are Maxtor drives and never any problems. I have 3 Maxtors in my G4 tower right now. I built a pc tower for my bro-in-law half a year ago and I used a WD drive at the time because sharkeyextreme had been bragging them up, and after 2 buggy days it died. Needless to say it has a Maxtor in it now and working great.
Originally posted by slughead
anyone who uses maxtor almost deserves what they get
Seagate, hitachi/IBM, and Western digital are the only hard drives you should buy, the rest are usually not worth using.. unless you don't like your data.
I must have owned 50+ hard disk drive mechanisms in the last few years, and I had never had a single problem with any of the drives until the two WD Raptors I bought died on me (so much for Enterprise Class reliability).
Of those 50+ mechanisms, I'd say that 6 were maybe Seagates (usually Baraccudas, six were Western Digitals, four were IBMs and the rest were all Maxtors.
It's interesting, that out off all the drives, it should be the two most expensive drives (expensive by a long, long margin) that boast "Enterprise Class" performance and reliability that died on me. They both died on separate occassions, and in different ways.
I'm now sitting with two of the most "Recertified" drives that money can buy, and I'm too scared to put anything valuable on them.
I'd personally plump for Maxtors everytime.
What test software should I use?
Here's what I did with my G4 at work-- I had 2 80 GB drives, one for primary use, the other for backup, using CCC to clone it weekly. When I ran out of space, I installed a third drive (SATA on a PCI card) with 160 GB capacity. I then made a RAID 0 out of the two 80 GB drives, and use them for my primary drive, backing up to the 160 GB SATA drive weekly. It has been a breath of new life for my QS Dual 1.0. (the RAID is substantially faster that the SATA drive).