- Joined
- Mar 24, 2008
- Location
- Chicago, IL
I just want to get you guys opinion on using on-board mobo RAID.
Is it reliable, similar to the standalone RAID cards?
Is it reliable, similar to the standalone RAID cards?
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Onboard Mobo RAID???
- Thread starter DigitalMonkey
- Start date
- Joined
- May 15, 2006
It is not comparable to full blown hardware RAID cards, on any level. While it certainly has cost on its side, performance is not going to be ideal when you need parity calculations (anything but RAID 0) since it relies on the system processor. You would also be tied to that motherboard/chipset. So, if the board dies, you'd need to get a similar one -- this may not be a huge negative to you.
What are you going to be running as the OS?
What are you going to be running as the OS?
OP
- Joined
- Mar 24, 2008
- Location
- Chicago, IL
- Thread Starter
- #3
Win7 Ultimate 64bit
- Joined
- Jun 21, 2011
Huh?
This is why on many cheaper mobos you will see that they will only offer RAID 0, 1, and JBOD. Having to include a chipset that actually does parity is more costly.
As to the OPs question: Onboard RAID is not bad. But I will agree with Thideras that it is not in the same league as an actual RAID card. Depending on what you are trying to do however it might work just fine.
Further to Thideras' point about the OS you intend to use there is the option of using software (the OSs) RAID which with that level of Win7 is a pretty good option as well. You will however be using CPU cycles there to power your RAID but you will likely have many more options as well as not being locked into that mobo/chipset should it fail. (IE you could just put the RAID discs into another computer that has Win7 on it and it would see the RAID.)
While I can speak for every mobo out there in the world I am going to have to disagree with this as a rule. The RAID that comes with a mobo is going to be hardware raid that is run from the motherboards chipset that does not use any CPU cycles at all.
This is why on many cheaper mobos you will see that they will only offer RAID 0, 1, and JBOD. Having to include a chipset that actually does parity is more costly.
As to the OPs question: Onboard RAID is not bad. But I will agree with Thideras that it is not in the same league as an actual RAID card. Depending on what you are trying to do however it might work just fine.
Further to Thideras' point about the OS you intend to use there is the option of using software (the OSs) RAID which with that level of Win7 is a pretty good option as well. You will however be using CPU cycles there to power your RAID but you will likely have many more options as well as not being locked into that mobo/chipset should it fail. (IE you could just put the RAID discs into another computer that has Win7 on it and it would see the RAID.)
- Joined
- May 15, 2006
Onboard RAID (such as the Intel ICHxxR series) use the system processor for parity calculations. It is basically software RAID. Because of this, if you are running a RAID level that requires parity calculations, it is going to be using the same processor as all your programs, which may or may not slow it down noticeably.
- Joined
- Nov 5, 2011
There is more than parity calculations that can take CPU cycles. Parsing files into Raid 0 stripes for write. Read and rejoin stripes. Small unstriped file handling. Raid 1 read queue balancing.
Marvell WEB site has a pdf buried somewhere that shows a hardware raid section in the SATA controller chip.The south bridge SATA likely have a much better hardware sections. Still, these are hybrids of hardware and software.
The better RAID cards have their own CPU on board and some kind of cache.
W7 raid 0 stripe works well, and I would not worry about CPU cycles on my i7 2600K 4 core multi-threaded beast.
Marvell WEB site has a pdf buried somewhere that shows a hardware raid section in the SATA controller chip.The south bridge SATA likely have a much better hardware sections. Still, these are hybrids of hardware and software.
The better RAID cards have their own CPU on board and some kind of cache.
W7 raid 0 stripe works well, and I would not worry about CPU cycles on my i7 2600K 4 core multi-threaded beast.
