Four ST3500320AS in Raid 0

gigabit · Aug 12, 2009

Four of these
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148288

Will the P6T Deluxes onboard sata controller handle this without any problems?The fourth HD should be here in a day or so.And for the frist few days i will be using it to run my benchmarking OS setup.But after that its into my everyday rig.And im curious if anyone is running a similar setup.Right now with 3 of these im getting pretty good performance except acess times which is in the high 12's and low 13's.

johan851 · Aug 13, 2009

I would grab one of the newer X-25M's if you're only looking for performance.

gigabit · Aug 14, 2009

johan851 said:
I would grab one of the newer X-25M's if you're only looking for performance.

Looking for performance but i cant afford and X-25.Maybe a couple 30gb OCZ SSD's

johan851 · Aug 14, 2009

I have three of the 7200.10's, so the setups are sort of similar. The problem, like you said in the first post, is access times. Performance is good for big sequential reads, but the random read/write performance is absolutely dismal. You might see a bit of a boost adding a fourth drive, but you're approaching diminishing returns.

If you haven't already, you'd also benefit from short stroking your drives if you don't need the space.

gigabit · Aug 14, 2009

Yeah I have no need for that much space.Id be fine with 500 to 750gbs.I could short stroke them but not really sure how..lol

Voidn · Aug 14, 2009

The Intel ICH10R on your board will handle up to 6 drives no problem (make sure you enable write cache though). And short stroked (matrix) will make them pretty damn fast. I and others have seen very noticeable improvements with 4 vs 3 disks.

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=467848

gigabit · Aug 14, 2009

Voidn said:
The Intel ICH10R on your board will handle up to 6 drives no problem (make sure you enable write cache though). And short stroked (matrix) will make them pretty damn fast. I and others have seen very noticeable improvements with 4 vs 3 disks.

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=467848

Any place i can get info on how to short stroke?oops asked before i checked link

here is what im getting now

johan851 · Aug 14, 2009

Short stroking is simply using the outer edges of the drives and not putting anything on the inner edges. When you create a drive with the ICH10R, just make a smaller RAID 0 partition than normal and leave the rest of the drives untouched.

Run a search for "short stroking" in the forum search - there should be some threads.

Voidn · Aug 14, 2009

@gigabit have you enabled write cache?

@johan851: Why waste all that space when you can do a matrix raid and short stroke? I did 4x640gbs with a 256gb raid0 short stroke that does 400+ mb/s with sub 8 sec access times AND a 1600GB raid 5.

Just don't put disk IO intensive stuff on the raid 5 if you want to keep the raid 0 fast.

gigabit · Aug 14, 2009

Yep write cache is enabled

johan851 · Aug 14, 2009

Voidn said:
@gigabit have you enabled write cache?

@johan851: Why waste all that space when you can do a matrix raid and short stroke? I did 4x640gbs with a 256gb raid0 short stroke that does 400+ mb/s with sub 8 sec access times AND a 1600GB raid 5. Just don't put disk IO intensive stuff on the raid 5 if you want to keep the raid 0 fast.

I have a very similar setup. But if you don't need the extra space, having anything at all aside from a small RAID 0 partition is going to hurt your performance. It's better if the system doesn't see the slow end of the drive at all.

Check out this review: http://www.techwarelabs.com/seagate_1-5tb-mod/

If you want the extra space, then use it! But if you won't, you'll get better performance from short stroking with nothing else on the drives.

Voidn · Aug 14, 2009

If I wanted to pay $300 for 300gb I would get a raptor drive

. But I see what you are saying.

gigabit · Aug 14, 2009

I wish i had bought a couple raptors but even with four 500gb HD's i have less than $200 envolved

johan851 · Aug 14, 2009

Voidn said:
If I wanted to pay $300 for 300gb I would get a raptor drive . But I see what you are saying.

The point is that it costs $119 instead of the $229 Raptor price tag, and beats it in a lot of benchmarks. Honestly, though, if you have $300 to spend on performance (or just $229) you should be looking at the new revision of X-25M's Intel has out. They crush the Raptor.

Yes - I mostly posted that to demonstrate what can be gained by short stroking.

gigabit · Aug 14, 2009

I will try short stroking when i get the fourth HD and install it in my system.Or i might just stick it in my Rosewill enclosure.And just short stroke my current three drives

MongGrel · Aug 14, 2009

I hate barracuda's myself, I've had too many fail on me over time, but thats just me I guess.

Short stroking 3 Raptors here I guess at 240 on RAID0. I had 5 at one time, once I got to the 4th, things didn't improve a whole lot, but that was before the i7.

Not sure it would matter much, but was on a Rampage formula with the Q9650 @ 4.05 with that OCS LV 9600 RAM running at 1200.

:beer:

gigabit · Aug 14, 2009

Ive had a few die on me also.But i got most of these cheap so its not a big deal.two have 3 year warranty's and the other two still have 1 year

MongGrel · Aug 14, 2009

Ah, I missed were 4x500 etc doesnt sound bad if ya picked the stuff up cheap

silly me

gigabit · Aug 14, 2009

off topic but what temps you seeing with your Copper TRUE at 4.2ghz?I have one but im debating on using it?

Four ST3500320AS in Raid 0

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