Raid 2 hdd's with ssd cashing

[L424RU2]

It's been a long time coming, but I finally received the 12pin pci-e cables from seagate. This means that I have to dismantle my Core 500 anyway, so I might just upgrade the
cooling and add a M.2 on the back of the mobo. The new cooling being a 280mill AIO, and making room for a second harddrive.

Long story short, I have an existing 2tb hdd with a 850evo installed in my system, and have 2tb lying around that actually fits, and the nvme will replace the 850evo.
So can I raid the 2hhd's (doesn't have to be 0, as long as they are seen as one big drive I'm happy) and use my 256gb 850 evo as cashe?

Also I don't have a backup drive big enough to fit all the data on my 2tb drive, will I have to source one for this to work?
My motherboard (asrock Z97-itx/ac) has a buildin raid function, but could get it to work without formatting he drive and even then I'm not sure it will work

Please help

 

[don256us]

In all of my experience with creating RAIDs and even with ssd caching, all data on the current drives will be lost. You won't need to format the drive(s), the setup will clear the data for you as you proceed. Basically, the data won't move but the "maps" (file allocation tables) will be rewritten to reflect the RAID/SSD cache.

 

[L424RU2]

In all of my experience with creating RAIDs and even with ssd caching, all data on the current drives will be lost.

Ok so I will need a way to backup my data. So 2 harddrives with ssd cashe will work? My steam library is located on the hdd, so I guess it will make a big performance difference.


If I get it right, back up data, wipe drives, raid, and then enable ssd cashe? How will this perform with linux? Granted I only game on w10 but my day to day workflow includes arch, my movies/flac-music has to be accessible on linux

 

[caddi daddi]

a link to the m.2 drive please.
I have that board and it does NOT support nvme, it supports m.2 sata drives.

 

[L424RU2]

a link to the m.2 drive please.
I have that board and it does NOT support nvme, it supports m.2 sata drives.

Are you sure? the official website suggests that the slot supports up to gen 2 pci-e modulse
sauce:http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z97E-ITXac/

The ssd I am aiming for is a samsung sm951 256gb

 

[EarthDog]

I have no idea why you would do that... run the os and some major apps off the ssd, not R0 hdd...or any raid...or cache... that is unless youse frequently use the data off those hdd? If its mostly cold storage, it really isnt worth the hassle.

As far as m.2.. its pcie gen 2... not pcie 3.0 x4. And i dont think it supports nvme drives either.in other words you are going to neuter that sammy 951.

 

[L424RU2]

I do frequent my harddrive, the one I installed is getting full, and I have the exact same one spare. I want them to be a single partition, I could just do a logical link but copy times are going to be lower in R0 no?

Ssd cashing came to mind because all my games/vm's are on the storage, as well as music. Load times would be a lot better after playing the game twice, and the drives won't make a sound while listening to my favorite tracks.
VM is mostly to mess with linux distro's, bootup should be slightly better too.

So it doesn't support nvme drives, that's a shame. it says up to 10gbps with pci-e gen 2 x2, so I have to look for a pcie m.2 ? I thought that nvme uses the pci-e intereface

 

[caddi daddi]

I guess i thought it was m.2 sata due to the storage support list.


Z97E-ITX/ac
M.2_SSD (NGFF) Module Support List
Vendor Size Interface Length P/N
ADATA 32GB SATA3 2230 AXNS330E-32GM-B
Team 128GB SATA3 2242 TM4PS4128GMC105
Team 256GB SATA3 2242 TM4PS4256GMC105
Transcend 256GB SATA3 2242 TS256GMTS400

 

[EarthDog]

Yoy need 32gbps to max out performamce. 10gbps will limit an nvme drive...

 

[L424RU2]

So buy a cheap M.2 that performs around 1000 mb/s writes. I can't use the SM951, the motherboard only supports up to 42mm. Hopefully I'll find a cheap one used.

As for the raid, if I really wanted to I can raid 0 two drives and use ssd cashing at the same time?

- - - Updated - - -

I guess i thought it was m.2 sata due to the storage support list.


Z97E-ITX/ac
M.2_SSD (NGFF) Module Support List
Vendor Size Interface Length P/N
ADATA 32GB SATA3 2230 AXNS330E-32GM-B
Team 128GB SATA3 2242 TM4PS4128GMC105
Team 256GB SATA3 2242 TM4PS4256GMC105
Transcend 256GB SATA3 2242 TS256GMTS400

That's probably because there are no 42mm pci-e ssd's on the market, I just checked. And with sata interface I won't get better speeds than my 850evo. Not really worth it

 

[EarthDog]

Caching...not cashing.

I dont know if you can cache raided drives... thats a lot of software magic. I really dont see its worth. Id rather you sell the two HDDs and get a larger hybrid HDD if you inisist you need caching...

 

[L424RU2]

Well it would save me the money of buying a larger hdd

Thank everyone for getting my feet back on the ground, I'm just gonna keep the 850 for my os and put the 2 hdd's in a spanned volume.

cheers!

 

[Soulcatcher668]

How old is that HDD? If it is 3 years old I would not put it in Raid 0...... one drive fails and it gone.

 

[EarthDog]

Id put a 3 y.o drive in RAID?? Why wouldn't you????????

 

[Soulcatcher668]

HDD failure rates.

I would specifically not RAID 0 these drives when he has already said that he has no way to back up 2 TB of data, let alone 4.

 

[don256us]

Caching...not cashing.

I dont know if you can cache raided drives... thats a lot of software magic. I really dont see its worth. Id rather you sell the two HDDs and get a larger hybrid HDD if you inisist you need caching...

I was just coming back to say the same thing. I think that SSD caching only supports one SSD and one HHD.

 

[EarthDog]

HDD failure rates.

I would specifically not RAID 0 these drives when he has already said that he has no way to back up 2 TB of data, let alone 4.

So, that useage model is the same as ours? Beating on drives for years in DC?Back up environment is reason to worry for our uses which don't come close to that? Good info, and seen it before, but, grain of salt with that is needed.

Now, if he can't back it up, that actually makes sense, but, not the 3 year thing you mentioned.

 

[Archer0915]

I have a raid 10 with SSD caching and... Because of the amount of data on storage drives and the usage it generally is not worth it. You will see little to no improvement in day to day usage.

 

[knoober]

I have a raid 10 with SSD caching and... Because of the amount of data on storage drives and the usage it generally is not worth it. You will see little to no improvement in day to day usage.

Can you explain how exactly you go about caching on your SSD? I am generally curious about this because when I look around I dont find much. There is plenty of info and opinions about pagefile size and also about moving browser caches and temp directories to a custom location, but it doesn't sound like we are discussing those things. I am all about getting whatever extra performance I can grab from my aging beast

 

[Archer0915]

Caching...not cashing.

I dont know if you can cache raided drives... thats a lot of software magic. I really dont see its worth. Id rather you sell the two HDDs and get a larger hybrid HDD if you inisist you need caching...

Can you explain how exactly you go about caching on your SSD? I am generally curious about this because when I look around I dont find much. There is plenty of info and opinions about pagefile size and also about moving browser caches and temp directories to a custom location, but it doesn't sound like we are discussing those things. I am all about getting whatever extra performance I can grab from my aging beast

My cacheing SSD is a Mushkin 120 with a few partitions. Besides SRT I use the drive as my for a copy of my 12 GB ramdisk (for loading it up after reboot that contains my virtual memort partition).

There is really no need to cache an SSD though, use it for cacheing.

To setup you need to make sure you bios supports it and then get things going in BIOS first. Honestly, it is not worth it unless you are cacheing a boot drive.