- Joined
- Dec 19, 2005
- Location
- New York
Who says 2 Raptors isnt better than one? Anandtech?
To hear some of the results from other review sites about how one Raptor is better than 2, and a raid configuration makes no noticeable difference I decided to do my own testing to prove otherwise.
I just couldnt believe this argument to be true. So what did I do? I went out and I ordred my first Raptor. I posted my benching results and real life experience in another thread the other day and I can quote myself saying "I am a little dissapointed with my single raptor results. In actuality my old SATAII 250GB drive performed the same way in real world usage."
Here is a benchy of my first single raptor yesterday:
Being crazy about PC performance, I was dissapointed with my Raptor. So what did I do? I ordred another Raptor yesterday and I just finished setting up a Raid 0 configuration with 16k striping. I want to put the Anandtech.com: "Raid is not meant for the desktop" statement to rest or at least challenge it somewhat. I am very anal retentive when it comes to my PC not performing the way I like, as you can see with my impulsive second Raptor purchase. I also understand that the review site in question did not factor in a lot of variables during that testing, including the various different serial ata controllers that all perform at completely different levels, some differences are very substantial.
My own example is that my Asus A8N-SLI motherboard has 2 controllers with 4 sata ports on each controller for a total of 8 SATA ports. The first is the nvidia raid controller with a maximum of 300 MBps, and the Silicon controller with a maximum of 150 MBps. We are basically looking at burst rates or theoretical maximum transfer rates when comparing maximums on the controllers, but it was proven that various controllers definitely affect sustained transfer rates, and obviously burst rates. So by me using the silicon controller, effectively speaking I could have downgraded the performance and not reached the full potential of a Raptor striping array.
REAL WORLD PERFORMANCE
The first thing that I noticed after Raid-0 setup, was the Windows XP installation speed. The computer performs tasks so rapidly that I find myself turning my back for a few seconds and realizing that a task is completed. The windows XP installation, not counting format took approximately 10 to 15 minutes. LOL It was rediculous. On my WD2500, this would take around 30 minutes.
The next thing I noticed on my PC after I was completely done with the XP Professional install and completely configuring all of the hardware drivers and standard software was the shutdown and reboot.
This next feet is incredible. After the Asus bios flash screen pops up and the raid0 array is loaded obviously everyone knows that the Black Windows XP loading screen comes up. With my new Raptor Raid setup (All Kidding Aside) the Windows XP boot screen flicks on and off for a total of 1 second. It takes about 2 seconds to load Windows XP Professional to the login prompt. Everything in the OS environment feels fluid and instantaneous. All of you doubters about Raid on the desktop really have to try it for yourself.
I was skeptical at first, but the performance difference realized in my eyes was like going from a Pentium-III 800 Mhz to a Pentium-4 3.2 Ghz processor. It was just incredible. Remember, this is coming from a guy who thought his single Raptor drive purchase was worthless(and I still do). Fear and Quake 4 shaved off seconds on load times and the PC in general just feels snappy. Its the way I always wanted my computer to feel but never realized how I would go about attaining it. Well, I finally realized it.
This may sound crazy to some of you, but a simple addition of 2 Raptor 74 Gig hard drives in Raid 0 has put my PC up to a new level of performance. I hope you guys can appreciate the pure power of these drives combined.
On to the benchies:
My first HDTach 3.0 benchmark with the 2 X Raptor 74G raid 0 array:
An average read of 129 MBps is just incredible. I doubled the performance in sustained transfer rates over a single raptor. I think the most important thing to note is that from 0 to 27 Gigabytes the raptors maintain a sustained rate of over 140 MBps. Considering the fact that I do not use more than 27 Gigabytes on the OS 40 GB partition, my average throughput should be around 140 steady..
Another thing that I noticed was random access time did not even flinch. The other review site in question states that you will lose a load off of random access time when moving to a raid 0 setup. My times stayed identical from one drive to the next. Again, you see the burst speed of 217 MBps. If I was using the Silicon controller, I wouldve been held back to only 150 MBps technically bottlenecking and limiting my raid setup.
Here is a direct comparison of a single raptor vs. my 2 X Raptors. As you can see I have doubled the performance spec and capability of a single raptor and my random access time has remained the same:
Finally, my atto results:
In the end after everything, I definitely recommend Raid to anyone with a single Raptor. If Anandtech.com said that Raid is not for the desktop I say this: Raid is not for the office professional or "stay at home mom" desktop. Raid is for the dektop user that wants the maximum possible performance squeezed out of his machine. The overclocker, the hardware fanatic, the geek.
DICLAIMER: Please note, this is based on an opinionated review merging synthetic benchmarks with "real world" analysis based on my personal opinion. Your results may differ depending on your mobo/card controller, raptor 74G model numbers, and/or your technical computer configuration. I made my best efforts to try and not be biased whatsoever towards the Raid configuration. My best advice is this: If you are skeptical on the so called "Real World Performance, my only recommendation is to try it out for yourself.
Kind regards,
Dom
------------------------------------------------------------------------
EDIT TO CONTAIN POST ARTICLE PROLOGUE:
I appreciate everyones comments in this thread and I really hope that it does steer away from a heated discussion and stay on the point of being a pure analysis from my own "personal perspective" of raid. I say personal, because my own perspective will most definitely differ from many of you and therefore the so called "real world feeling" results will differ again from one individual to the next.
On the subject of bottlenecking that one of you posted: I do own the best video card on the market right now, basically the fastest retail dual core AMD processor on the market besides the FX-60 (x2 4800+ @ 2.6Ghz), 2 gigs of ram with excellent overclockability, and basically a top of the line configuration, if you want to call it that.
Back to my post thread statement: "Raid is for the dektop user that wants the maximum possible performance squeezed out of his machine. The overclocker, the hardware fanatic, the geek. "
I use that statement because technically the only thing bottlenecking my computer was the hard drive. Heck, the only bottleneck to most non raid systems today is the hard drive. I am the individual that wants the maximum possible performance out of my PC even if it means spending the extra amount of money on 2 raptors for a raid array, or buying the latest and greatest video card every 3 months. Theoretically even if my 2 raptors performed the exact same as a single raptor and displayed a 2% to 5% improvement over a non raid system. That 2% to 5% means a heck of a lot to a person like me that wants maximum performance out of my PC. If that was the scenario and it was a small gain, was it worth the money? To some of you, it isnt. To me, it is.
If you also remember, I started a thread a couple of days ago that can be read here: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=441758
To the individual that was telling me numbers and benchmarks matter and the actual "feeling" of a difference does not. You can quote me on saying "I think I wasted my money on a single Raptor drive." Coming from a regular Western Digital SATA 7200rpm drive and moving up to the Single Raptor 74gig was a waste of money in my eyes. I did not notice the incredible improvement that I noticed when I bumped up to 2X Raptors. This is why I hope you can use my analysis as not being biased and most definitely valid. One raptor didnt show any improvement over my sata drive, but when I moved to a Raid 0 array of 2 raptors the improvement was dramatic. I apologize if I came off a little too "hurray hoorah, wow!!" in the comments about real world performance. Yes, if you psycho analyze my comments that may have sounded overly exaggerated to many of you, but you need to trust me on this one that I am not being biased here. I simply wanted to display the exact way I was feeling by using a keyboard and sometimes thats hard to do.
Simple math would be:
1 X WD2500 = Baseline SATA hard drive. Good performance, 7200rpm
1 X Raptor = No noticeable performance increase, or very little.
2 X Raptor (Raid 0) = Incredible gains realized, noted in every aspect of PC usage.
By looking at that simple equation I dont see how a biased opinion of PC performance can come out of it. Especially when I reviewed a single raptor one day before installing a second for the raid setup.
Anyhow, I hope this thread continues as non violent and as an analysis rather than a "Raid sucks, Raid Rules" argument.
Regards,
Dom
To hear some of the results from other review sites about how one Raptor is better than 2, and a raid configuration makes no noticeable difference I decided to do my own testing to prove otherwise.
I just couldnt believe this argument to be true. So what did I do? I went out and I ordred my first Raptor. I posted my benching results and real life experience in another thread the other day and I can quote myself saying "I am a little dissapointed with my single raptor results. In actuality my old SATAII 250GB drive performed the same way in real world usage."
Here is a benchy of my first single raptor yesterday:
Being crazy about PC performance, I was dissapointed with my Raptor. So what did I do? I ordred another Raptor yesterday and I just finished setting up a Raid 0 configuration with 16k striping. I want to put the Anandtech.com: "Raid is not meant for the desktop" statement to rest or at least challenge it somewhat. I am very anal retentive when it comes to my PC not performing the way I like, as you can see with my impulsive second Raptor purchase. I also understand that the review site in question did not factor in a lot of variables during that testing, including the various different serial ata controllers that all perform at completely different levels, some differences are very substantial.
My own example is that my Asus A8N-SLI motherboard has 2 controllers with 4 sata ports on each controller for a total of 8 SATA ports. The first is the nvidia raid controller with a maximum of 300 MBps, and the Silicon controller with a maximum of 150 MBps. We are basically looking at burst rates or theoretical maximum transfer rates when comparing maximums on the controllers, but it was proven that various controllers definitely affect sustained transfer rates, and obviously burst rates. So by me using the silicon controller, effectively speaking I could have downgraded the performance and not reached the full potential of a Raptor striping array.
REAL WORLD PERFORMANCE
The first thing that I noticed after Raid-0 setup, was the Windows XP installation speed. The computer performs tasks so rapidly that I find myself turning my back for a few seconds and realizing that a task is completed. The windows XP installation, not counting format took approximately 10 to 15 minutes. LOL It was rediculous. On my WD2500, this would take around 30 minutes.
The next thing I noticed on my PC after I was completely done with the XP Professional install and completely configuring all of the hardware drivers and standard software was the shutdown and reboot.
This next feet is incredible. After the Asus bios flash screen pops up and the raid0 array is loaded obviously everyone knows that the Black Windows XP loading screen comes up. With my new Raptor Raid setup (All Kidding Aside) the Windows XP boot screen flicks on and off for a total of 1 second. It takes about 2 seconds to load Windows XP Professional to the login prompt. Everything in the OS environment feels fluid and instantaneous. All of you doubters about Raid on the desktop really have to try it for yourself.
I was skeptical at first, but the performance difference realized in my eyes was like going from a Pentium-III 800 Mhz to a Pentium-4 3.2 Ghz processor. It was just incredible. Remember, this is coming from a guy who thought his single Raptor drive purchase was worthless(and I still do). Fear and Quake 4 shaved off seconds on load times and the PC in general just feels snappy. Its the way I always wanted my computer to feel but never realized how I would go about attaining it. Well, I finally realized it.
This may sound crazy to some of you, but a simple addition of 2 Raptor 74 Gig hard drives in Raid 0 has put my PC up to a new level of performance. I hope you guys can appreciate the pure power of these drives combined.
On to the benchies:
My first HDTach 3.0 benchmark with the 2 X Raptor 74G raid 0 array:
An average read of 129 MBps is just incredible. I doubled the performance in sustained transfer rates over a single raptor. I think the most important thing to note is that from 0 to 27 Gigabytes the raptors maintain a sustained rate of over 140 MBps. Considering the fact that I do not use more than 27 Gigabytes on the OS 40 GB partition, my average throughput should be around 140 steady..
Another thing that I noticed was random access time did not even flinch. The other review site in question states that you will lose a load off of random access time when moving to a raid 0 setup. My times stayed identical from one drive to the next. Again, you see the burst speed of 217 MBps. If I was using the Silicon controller, I wouldve been held back to only 150 MBps technically bottlenecking and limiting my raid setup.
Here is a direct comparison of a single raptor vs. my 2 X Raptors. As you can see I have doubled the performance spec and capability of a single raptor and my random access time has remained the same:
Finally, my atto results:
In the end after everything, I definitely recommend Raid to anyone with a single Raptor. If Anandtech.com said that Raid is not for the desktop I say this: Raid is not for the office professional or "stay at home mom" desktop. Raid is for the dektop user that wants the maximum possible performance squeezed out of his machine. The overclocker, the hardware fanatic, the geek.
DICLAIMER: Please note, this is based on an opinionated review merging synthetic benchmarks with "real world" analysis based on my personal opinion. Your results may differ depending on your mobo/card controller, raptor 74G model numbers, and/or your technical computer configuration. I made my best efforts to try and not be biased whatsoever towards the Raid configuration. My best advice is this: If you are skeptical on the so called "Real World Performance, my only recommendation is to try it out for yourself.
Kind regards,
Dom
------------------------------------------------------------------------
EDIT TO CONTAIN POST ARTICLE PROLOGUE:
I appreciate everyones comments in this thread and I really hope that it does steer away from a heated discussion and stay on the point of being a pure analysis from my own "personal perspective" of raid. I say personal, because my own perspective will most definitely differ from many of you and therefore the so called "real world feeling" results will differ again from one individual to the next.
On the subject of bottlenecking that one of you posted: I do own the best video card on the market right now, basically the fastest retail dual core AMD processor on the market besides the FX-60 (x2 4800+ @ 2.6Ghz), 2 gigs of ram with excellent overclockability, and basically a top of the line configuration, if you want to call it that.
Back to my post thread statement: "Raid is for the dektop user that wants the maximum possible performance squeezed out of his machine. The overclocker, the hardware fanatic, the geek. "
I use that statement because technically the only thing bottlenecking my computer was the hard drive. Heck, the only bottleneck to most non raid systems today is the hard drive. I am the individual that wants the maximum possible performance out of my PC even if it means spending the extra amount of money on 2 raptors for a raid array, or buying the latest and greatest video card every 3 months. Theoretically even if my 2 raptors performed the exact same as a single raptor and displayed a 2% to 5% improvement over a non raid system. That 2% to 5% means a heck of a lot to a person like me that wants maximum performance out of my PC. If that was the scenario and it was a small gain, was it worth the money? To some of you, it isnt. To me, it is.
If you also remember, I started a thread a couple of days ago that can be read here: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=441758
To the individual that was telling me numbers and benchmarks matter and the actual "feeling" of a difference does not. You can quote me on saying "I think I wasted my money on a single Raptor drive." Coming from a regular Western Digital SATA 7200rpm drive and moving up to the Single Raptor 74gig was a waste of money in my eyes. I did not notice the incredible improvement that I noticed when I bumped up to 2X Raptors. This is why I hope you can use my analysis as not being biased and most definitely valid. One raptor didnt show any improvement over my sata drive, but when I moved to a Raid 0 array of 2 raptors the improvement was dramatic. I apologize if I came off a little too "hurray hoorah, wow!!" in the comments about real world performance. Yes, if you psycho analyze my comments that may have sounded overly exaggerated to many of you, but you need to trust me on this one that I am not being biased here. I simply wanted to display the exact way I was feeling by using a keyboard and sometimes thats hard to do.
Simple math would be:
1 X WD2500 = Baseline SATA hard drive. Good performance, 7200rpm
1 X Raptor = No noticeable performance increase, or very little.
2 X Raptor (Raid 0) = Incredible gains realized, noted in every aspect of PC usage.
By looking at that simple equation I dont see how a biased opinion of PC performance can come out of it. Especially when I reviewed a single raptor one day before installing a second for the raid setup.
Anyhow, I hope this thread continues as non violent and as an analysis rather than a "Raid sucks, Raid Rules" argument.
Regards,
Dom
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