2mb + 8mb For Raid0 Ok??

[redken]

HI
I have 3 maxtor's (80gb, ata133, 8mb cache) and wanted to add a 4th, but I can only get the 2mb one. Do you guys think it will impact my performance AT ALL ( take into account i want to squeeez every inch of performance out of these drives) and also will i see a BIG difference if i put another drive in or will it be the same?

[deathman20]

Well if its a 2mb might as well forget preformance then since all drives will be acting like that 2mb version since its the slowest drive. You probley see a increase in preformance but not like if you added a 8mb version.

[pik4chu]

newegg has 80gig 8mb WD for like 70 bucks right now.

[Miknow]

doesnt he have to get Maxtor?

[Th0r]

No, they can be any drive he wants, it just has to be the same Size....

[redken]

I would feel better if I added a maxtor instead of a wd since they are the same spec (aside from the cache) but thank you for your post. As for performance will there BIG difference if i put another drive in or will it be the same? I have tested with 2 drives and get 68w and 100r in ATTO but got a "free" drive yesterday and that's why I'm thinking of buying a 4th to make it a 4drv raid, but I use this rig for pure,raw, gaming maddnessss:) so load times are important to me. Maybe i'll start some mild a/v editting now that i'm soon to install a radeon 9800 pro (new, never used ati before and I hope it goes well).
thanks guys

EDIT: thanks I always thought that they had to be the same drives! but that is good to know for future upgrades!

[deathman20]

Why not just drop the 3rd drive in and call it a day then? Why would yea need to add another one besides saying that you had a 4 drive raid array?

[redken]

Good question deathman20.
The reason is that I thought it would increase my performance (not a lot but maybe enough to "feel" the difference).

[deathman20]

Oh yea btw they don't have to be the same drives. If you have 2 80gigs and threw a 60gig in there this is what would happen. First making the raid you'd get 180gig's to start off. The raid would be the same speed as your slowest drive (well say that the 60giger is the slowest). Now the 2 80gigs would be pentilized because they could write/read faster but they can't because of the other drive. Besides all that then you have the 20gigs on the 2 80gigs not being used in the raid array. Can be used for other purposes but its just not the same.

[deathman20]

Doh something else forgot to add. By adding more drives you actually increase your seek time on the drives. Which isn't a bad thing when you get lots of preformance out of it but still.

Do a search I'm to lazy to go looking for it now since it was deep in a thread if not mistaken but someone did some tests a while back on a review if not mistaken. Really nice link with info on it. A 3 drive Raid 0 would be the best but it seemed after that the preformance gain wasn't much. Raid 5 would be the best bet at that time then with Speed and Security.

[pik4chu]

as for drives. in RAID 5 ive heard the best performance/disk ratio is a 5 drive array. little side note.

[redken]

hmmm?
wouldn't it be the same to have 4 drives in raid0 than to have 5 in raid5?

[deathman20]

Nice side note always makes for good commits. Thats what I heard too about Raid 5 but I've never seen anyone running more then a 3-4 Raid5 array.

[deathman20]

Raid0 N drives will = N drives of space
Raid5 N(must be 3 or more) drives will = N-1 Drives of space

Raid5 is great for a sense of security.

[Tyberius]

I had myself a little fun in Paint, heres a diagram explaining the basics of RAID 5.
http://www.theforumisdown.com/uploadfiles/0103/RAID5.JPG
BTW, In my opinion I think if your gonna stripe with 4 drives, at least make them match, Ive seen bad things happen with mismatched drives in my old IT class back in high school. It makes drives happier. :)

[pik4chu]

Originally posted by deathman20
Nice side note always makes for good commits. Thats what I heard too about Raid 5 but I've never seen anyone running more then a 3-4 Raid5 array.

I will be running a 6 drive 120gig RAID 5 sometime in the near future.. (need 1 more drive and the controller)

I intend to do a bunch of benshmarks in diff configs. including RAID 0, 1, 0+1 with both 2 and 4 drives and then RAID 5... in order to end the "which RAID is better" arguments :)

[Tyberius]

That'll be fun!