intel raid or promise raid????????

>GSXR<mrbusa · Jul 14, 2004, 02:16 AM

hello,just got another 160gb seagate sata drive to go with my current drive of same size and mfg.i want to configure a raid 0 array,i would like to do this without reformatting,LOL.anyhow,i am wondering which is a better controller to use the onboard promise controller or the 1ch5 intel controller with the latest app acc drivers?i have never done a raid setup before and want to do it right the first time.the asus manual is kinda vague about both configurations.i want strictly a performance setup,and i would really apreciate any advise or input on which to use,thx later

Judas · Jul 14, 2004, 02:35 AM

there is no way to setup a raid array without formatting.... as the drives HAVE TO BE FORMATED with the block size selected to be able to use it.... I can't say anything about the raid controller to use.... i know Via and Highpoint Tech make some DAMN good raid controllers

>GSXR<mrbusa · Jul 14, 2004, 02:49 AM

hello,i was only joking about the reformatting,that is what LOL means,LOL.i actually have a bourd that has built in raid contollers,both the ich5 intel and promise controller,just wondering which one would give me better performance,and if anybody has any install tips for either driver.thx for your responce, later
p.s.-you can set up a raid 1 or raid 0+1 array on an existing formatted drive,that is atleast how i understood my mobo manual.the problem is a dont want to mirror my drive,all i want is raid 0 for performance.thx again

Judas · Jul 14, 2004, 08:45 AM

um.... raid 1 ... raid 0+1 wouldn't work enless you used the current drive as the mirror and bought to more for raid 0 mode...

... sorry....

**dj_stick** · Jul 14, 2004, 08:53 AM

yeh raid0+1 requires 4 drives minimum

raid 0 doesn't really have much affect on desktop processing, but raid 1 is excellent for redudancy

>GSXR<mrbusa · Jul 14, 2004, 03:09 PM

hello,this is the first time i have got any feedback from anybody who seems like they know what they are talking about.the way the asus manual explains the raid 0+1 is that you get the fast data access like raid 0 but with the ability to loose one drive and have a complete duplicate single drive or set of drives like raid 1.i took that as if you could set it up with only two drives.i really dont want a raid 1 or raid 0 + 1 setup,i have never had a crash in my pcing life and i back up to media anyhow,and i can reformat in a couple hours.all i even want the raid 0 for is bragging rights about the 80+mbs,i know it probably wont make my life any easier or anything.i have the drive now though just have to wait till the weekend to set it up.

keep the topic going though i am interested in all peoples experiences with any raid setup

thx

No_Style · Jul 14, 2004, 04:09 PM

Do it with the Intel ICH5 as well. After that, make sure to install Intel's Application Accelerator for RAID which you can download at their site. Don't forget to also download their latest Intel Chipset Installation utility as well. Some people report slightly faster HDD performance

As for no real life performance... That's B.S. I can tell the difference between RAID and non-RAID. If you do a lot of file transfering and installing off of mounted images. You'll see the performance there.

dipstick · Jul 14, 2004, 04:10 PM

Definitely use te Intel Raid. Intel has some of the fastest(if not the fastest) raid performance out there
Good luck

pr0digal jenius · Jul 14, 2004, 04:17 PM

i prefer the promise fasttrack controllers as they are sooooo easy to setup and are yet to die on me

Judas · Jul 14, 2004, 09:27 PM

Raid 0+1 doesn't require 4 drivers.... you need 3.... however. for it to work... 2 drives combined for the raid 0 must = the 3 drives total capacity.... so 30+30 for the 2 first drives.... the last must be 60 or larger... (although the rest would be wasted).... now you could have 80+120=160gb with the a 250gb drive for the 3rd... but it would only be seen with 160gb..... kinda a waste hey?

but it still can be done

pr0digal jenius · Jul 14, 2004, 10:18 PM

and the 2 drives in RAID 0 need to be as close to identical as possible(RPM and cache size)

>GSXR<mrbusa · Jul 14, 2004, 10:54 PM

do you loose any space with two matching drives configured in raid 0?just got the raid drivers on a floppy and going to do it today instead of this weekend.i hope it is worth the time and money compared to performance increase.thx later

Judas · Jul 14, 2004, 11:32 PM

No you don't in raid 0..... you get the combined total .... if you have 2 160gb drives.. in raid 0.... basically what windows or any other program will see... is a single 320gb drive.... and it'll show up as having the same speed as a single drive... but the sustained transfer rates (read and writes) are usually damn close to DOUBLED!

Judas · Jul 14, 2004, 11:33 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by pr0digal jenius
and the 2 drives in RAID 0 need to be as close to identical as possible(RPM and cache size)

for optimal preformance and guarantee of zero troubles.... they should be the same model... but you can mix RPM's.... Size/Cache sizes.... you name it.. even interface (ATA66 with ATA133 or even SATA)

>GSXR<mrbusa · Jul 15, 2004, 04:32 PM

hello,thx to all of you who replied.i completed my setup late lastnight.WOW,it has been about 5 months since i last reformated,didnt notice i had over 60 gig of games installed.that was not my problem though,let me tell ya,i did one of the dumbest thing not just once but twice,i went through all the steps of the install with my 24/7 dsl connection hooked up,did i say TWICE.by the time i got arround to turning the firewall on i had a worm or trojan,my explorer.exe process was at 100k+.so i called verizon because i didnt want to activate windows again,ill get to that,and they said it could be one of fifty viruses,so i should call microsoft.i know that norton should have been able to get rid of whatever this was but i could not get it to install after i configured for raid,i have been useing this same hacked version of nav 2003 pro for 2 years now on three or four systems and never had an install error.anyhow so i started another setup and did the same damn thing cause i was pissed at verizon,but it is all good now cause did things right the third time.but this norton thing has me puzzled,anybody heard of such a thing about norton not installing on a raid setup?and about MICROSOFT,everytime time i reinstall windows i have to activate by phone because i exceeded my instances of keycode entries.my copy of xp is from a dell i have that i dont use anymore and when i started out with pcs i reinstalled windows every month.now i have to call them and get a 36 digit id number to activate,this really sucks cause you have to talk to some guy from india and you just cant understand him.i still have to do it again but this time i am waiting to see if my system is stable.

does anybody have an easy way for non distructive partitioning of a 300gig drive,i had probs using windows during install so mi left it as one partition fo now.

thx for all the input,later

sry,didnt realize how winded this post was

Judas · Jul 16, 2004, 07:18 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by >GSXR<mrbusa
hello,thx to all of you who replied.i completed my setup late lastnight.WOW,it has been about 5 months since i last reformated,didnt notice i had over 60 gig of games installed.that was not my problem though,let me tell ya,i did one of the dumbest thing not just once but twice,i went through all the steps of the install with my 24/7 dsl connection hooked up,did i say TWICE.by the time i got arround to turning the firewall on i had a worm or trojan,my explorer.exe process was at 100k+.so i called verizon because i didnt want to activate windows again,ill get to that,and they said it could be one of fifty viruses,so i should call microsoft.i know that norton should have been able to get rid of whatever this was but i could not get it to install after i configured for raid,i have been useing this same hacked version of nav 2003 pro for 2 years now on three or four systems and never had an install error.anyhow so i started another setup and did the same damn thing cause i was pissed at verizon,but it is all good now cause did things right the third time.but this norton thing has me puzzled,anybody heard of such a thing about norton not installing on a raid setup?and about MICROSOFT,everytime time i reinstall windows i have to activate by phone because i exceeded my instances of keycode entries.my copy of xp is from a dell i have that i dont use anymore and when i started out with pcs i reinstalled windows every month.now i have to call them and get a 36 digit id number to activate,this really sucks cause you have to talk to some guy from india and you just cant understand him.i still have to do it again but this time i am waiting to see if my system is stable.

does anybody have an easy way for non distructive partitioning of a 300gig drive,i had probs using windows during install so mi left it as one partition fo now.

thx for all the input,later

sry,didnt realize how winded this post was

300gb is pretty massive... you deal with nearly 10 times more space then i usually do....

Considering the amount of space you have.... i'd suggest creating seperate partitions...

SAY:

First C: 25GB (windows and program files)
D: 5GB (for swapfile)
E: (150gb? ) for games
F: for Other and download....

the C: partition is still a debateable subject on size..

Perferably, 10gb is all you need.. this will prevent the main windows and program files from fragmenting and just speading out to much... i use 5gb for a server computer through as there isn't much of addition programs.... just enough room for the nessities..

5GB right now is all you need max for a swap file.... 4096mb of space is all XP can allocate for swapfile ussage.... what's the extra 1gb for? well... if you fill up 4096mb of space... you won't get that bloody "low hd space" warning.... (however, this could be easily turned off... i prefer not to mess with windows)

the rest is up to you... keeping your games in a seperate partition well organized will keep it from fragmenting easily.... and easy as hell to navigate....

Downloads? well with the amount of HD space you have.... you can do whatever makes you happy

BTW... i would recommend you save up and purchase a true copy of XP... those DELL XP installs are terrible... .and i'm serprised you are able to even use it

KraXed112 · Jul 16, 2004, 07:34 AM

I tried using a raid setup with promise mbfasttrak that was built into the motherboard. .. and running hdtach the results b4 raid was 47megs and afterwards was 59 megs not much of a boost.. im gonna do it again when a real raid card with 2 wd 80gig jb drives

Judas · Jul 16, 2004, 07:45 AM

HD tach 2.7 and before gave me absalutely terrible results.. worse then running single hd.... i mean.. it gave me 99%CPU usage and 60mb burst and 20 max.... 8mb average.. and a low of 1mb.... terrible... HD tach 3.0 however gives me some nice figures... 3-7% cpu usage.... 100mb burst... 90mb max read.... 85mb avearge.. and a low of something like 60 or 70....

>GSXR<mrbusa · Jul 16, 2004, 08:00 AM

hello,i am getting 87+mbs on built in intel Ich5R raid controller,from what sisoft says,this setup is faster than both wd and maxtor setups of the same type of drives.i really havent done anything yet to benefit from the extra bandwidth yet,i might have to edit some video just for the heck of it to see how fast it acually is.fun fun

about the multiple partitions,i wanted to do three partitions of 100gb,but on the first try something went wrong.i was partioning the drive from the install cd and everything was fine,i thought,then when windows was done installing it only recognized 136gb.i thoght when i installed the raid app. acc. that it enabled the large drive support.then i got to thinking that i couldnt create multiple partitions on a raid array with only two drives,duh.that was one of the few things i forgot to check into,then when it was time to do it i had no internet.now i have a 300gb partition.then i got a virus during install because i was being DUMB,and by this time i wanted to throw my pc at my wife.i just dont have any patience anymore.
i also have an issue with being over the limit of activations on my xp keycode and have to call microsoft every time i install.the copy that shipped with my dell 4400 is oem,but it is a full version disk,not a restore disk like hp or compact.the only thing ive noticed that it installs extra is some help and support customizations,so i have a dell icon in my start menu on my custom built pc,lol.

i am looking into a way to do a non-distuctive partitioning of my drive,everyone ive talked to says partition magic is the best and easiest,but it is 75.00.if anybody know a good way to do this,let me know.thx for all your help,later

Judas · Jul 16, 2004, 08:34 AM

the demo version might be able to do it.... but you shouldn't have a problem partitioning each drive..... weird..... Remember.... to partition it before it loads everything up in windows... pop in the install disk.... then when you get to were you'd like to install windows to (what patition).....C KEY to set a partition size.... then hit enter after setting the size... then hit C again on the Unpartitioned space again to create another patittion.... i REALLY hate doing any partitioning in windows itself.. i've always gotten some kind of issue as windows itself tried to do the work....

>GSXR<mrbusa · Jul 16, 2004, 08:55 AM

sry,that is what i did was during install i created the three partitions,100gb,100gb,then the third one was the remander of like 295?gb.then when windows was finished loading i checked the drive config to make sure it was right and all that was recognized was the standard 136gb.maybe the first time something went wrong in the install of my raid drivers?maybe i enabled the wrong model of controller?sometimes i amase myself,when you think your doing something right,then a day or two later you find out that it wasnt,it kinda funny sometimes.im going away for the weekend,maybe by the time i get back i will be in the mood to start from scratch.i would really like to not have to use a third party app to partition.i really liked having seperate partitions for os,games and data.i would have already tried it again if it wasnt for that microsoft issue,the popups eat at my temper,even after i told windows to remind me in a couple of days they were still popping up,YOU ONLY HAVE 30 DAYS TO ACTIVATE WINDOWS,its like bill gates is in my machine.now i understand why so many people run those other type of windows,the free ones.lol
thx again judas

Jul 14, 2004, 02:16 AM	#1
>GSXR<mrbusa im a FREAK Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 2,107 Rep Power: 0 System Specs	intel raid or promise raid???????? hello,just got another 160gb seagate sata drive to go with my current drive of same size and mfg.i want to configure a raid 0 array,i would like to do this without reformatting,LOL.anyhow,i am wondering which is a better controller to use the onboard promise controller or the 1ch5 intel controller with the latest app acc drivers?i have never done a raid setup before and want to do it right the first time.the asus manual is kinda vague about both configurations.i want strictly a performance setup,and i would really apreciate any advise or input on which to use,thx later

Jul 14, 2004, 04:09 PM	#7
No_Style Styleless Wonder Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: Ottawa, Ontario Posts: 6,034 Rep Power: 0	Just setup RAID 0 Do it with the Intel ICH5 as well. After that, make sure to install Intel's Application Accelerator for RAID which you can download at their site. Don't forget to also download their latest Intel Chipset Installation utility as well. Some people report slightly faster HDD performance As for no real life performance... That's B.S. I can tell the difference between RAID and non-RAID. If you do a lot of file transfering and installing off of mounted images. You'll see the performance there. __________________ "The Best Style Is No Style" Specifications Here

Jul 16, 2004, 07:34 AM	#17
KraXed112 DriverHeaven Junior Member Join Date: Dec 2002 Posts: 90 Rep Power: 0	I tried using a raid setup with promise mbfasttrak that was built into the motherboard. .. and running hdtach the results b4 raid was 47megs and afterwards was 59 megs not much of a boost.. im gonna do it again when a real raid card with 2 wd 80gig jb drives __________________ AMD 4800 X2 / ASUS A8N-SLI Premium 2024 Corsair PC3200 CPT BFG Tech 7900 GTX 512 Pioneer A04 DVD/RW 1 x 120GB Western Digital Caviar Hard Drive (8MB Cache, 7200rpm) 5 x 200GB Western Digital Caviar Hard Drive (8MB Cache, 7200rpm) Soundblaster Live 5.1 Platinum, Logitech Z-680 Antec TrueControl 480W, RAIDMAX 420W Coolermaster CM-Stacker STC-T01 Case (Crossflow Fan + Extra 4in3 Module)

Jul 14, 2004, 02:49 AM	Thread Starter #3
>GSXR<mrbusa im a FREAK Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 2,107 Rep Power: 0 System Specs	hello,i was only joking about the reformatting,that is what LOL means,LOL.i actually have a bourd that has built in raid contollers,both the ich5 intel and promise controller,just wondering which one would give me better performance,and if anybody has any install tips for either driver.thx for your responce, later p.s.-you can set up a raid 1 or raid 0+1 array on an existing formatted drive,that is atleast how i understood my mobo manual.the problem is a dont want to mirror my drive,all i want is raid 0 for performance.thx again

Jul 14, 2004, 03:09 PM	Thread Starter #6
>GSXR<mrbusa im a FREAK Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 2,107 Rep Power: 0 System Specs	hello,this is the first time i have got any feedback from anybody who seems like they know what they are talking about.the way the asus manual explains the raid 0+1 is that you get the fast data access like raid 0 but with the ability to loose one drive and have a complete duplicate single drive or set of drives like raid 1.i took that as if you could set it up with only two drives.i really dont want a raid 1 or raid 0 + 1 setup,i have never had a crash in my pcing life and i back up to media anyhow,and i can reformat in a couple hours.all i even want the raid 0 for is bragging rights about the 80+mbs,i know it probably wont make my life any easier or anything.i have the drive now though just have to wait till the weekend to set it up. keep the topic going though i am interested in all peoples experiences with any raid setup thx

Jul 14, 2004, 04:10 PM	#8
dipstick HardwareHeaven Extreme Member Join Date: May 2002 Location: USA Posts: 3,609 Rep Power: 71 System Specs	Definitely use te Intel Raid. Intel has some of the fastest(if not the fastest) raid performance out there Good luck

Jul 14, 2004, 04:17 PM	#9
pr0digal jenius Delete Me Join Date: Mar 2004 Posts: 14,648 Rep Power: 0	i prefer the promise fasttrack controllers as they are sooooo easy to setup and are yet to die on me

Jul 14, 2004, 10:18 PM	#11
pr0digal jenius Delete Me Join Date: Mar 2004 Posts: 14,648 Rep Power: 0	and the 2 drives in RAID 0 need to be as close to identical as possible(RPM and cache size)

Jul 14, 2004, 10:54 PM	Thread Starter #12
>GSXR<mrbusa im a FREAK Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 2,107 Rep Power: 0 System Specs	do you loose any space with two matching drives configured in raid 0?just got the raid drivers on a floppy and going to do it today instead of this weekend.i hope it is worth the time and money compared to performance increase.thx later

Jul 15, 2004, 04:32 PM	Thread Starter #15
>GSXR<mrbusa im a FREAK Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 2,107 Rep Power: 0 System Specs	hello,thx to all of you who replied.i completed my setup late lastnight.WOW,it has been about 5 months since i last reformated,didnt notice i had over 60 gig of games installed.that was not my problem though,let me tell ya,i did one of the dumbest thing not just once but twice,i went through all the steps of the install with my 24/7 dsl connection hooked up,did i say TWICE.by the time i got arround to turning the firewall on i had a worm or trojan,my explorer.exe process was at 100k+.so i called verizon because i didnt want to activate windows again,ill get to that,and they said it could be one of fifty viruses,so i should call microsoft.i know that norton should have been able to get rid of whatever this was but i could not get it to install after i configured for raid,i have been useing this same hacked version of nav 2003 pro for 2 years now on three or four systems and never had an install error.anyhow so i started another setup and did the same damn thing cause i was pissed at verizon,but it is all good now cause did things right the third time.but this norton thing has me puzzled,anybody heard of such a thing about norton not installing on a raid setup?and about MICROSOFT,everytime time i reinstall windows i have to activate by phone because i exceeded my instances of keycode entries.my copy of xp is from a dell i have that i dont use anymore and when i started out with pcs i reinstalled windows every month.now i have to call them and get a 36 digit id number to activate,this really sucks cause you have to talk to some guy from india and you just cant understand him.i still have to do it again but this time i am waiting to see if my system is stable. does anybody have an easy way for non distructive partitioning of a 300gig drive,i had probs using windows during install so mi left it as one partition fo now. thx for all the input,later sry,didnt realize how winded this post was

Jul 16, 2004, 08:00 AM	Thread Starter #19
>GSXR<mrbusa im a FREAK Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 2,107 Rep Power: 0 System Specs	hello,i am getting 87+mbs on built in intel Ich5R raid controller,from what sisoft says,this setup is faster than both wd and maxtor setups of the same type of drives.i really havent done anything yet to benefit from the extra bandwidth yet,i might have to edit some video just for the heck of it to see how fast it acually is.fun fun about the multiple partitions,i wanted to do three partitions of 100gb,but on the first try something went wrong.i was partioning the drive from the install cd and everything was fine,i thought,then when windows was done installing it only recognized 136gb.i thoght when i installed the raid app. acc. that it enabled the large drive support.then i got to thinking that i couldnt create multiple partitions on a raid array with only two drives,duh.that was one of the few things i forgot to check into,then when it was time to do it i had no internet.now i have a 300gb partition.then i got a virus during install because i was being DUMB,and by this time i wanted to throw my pc at my wife.i just dont have any patience anymore. i also have an issue with being over the limit of activations on my xp keycode and have to call microsoft every time i install.the copy that shipped with my dell 4400 is oem,but it is a full version disk,not a restore disk like hp or compact.the only thing ive noticed that it installs extra is some help and support customizations,so i have a dell icon in my start menu on my custom built pc,lol. i am looking into a way to do a non-distuctive partitioning of my drive,everyone ive talked to says partition magic is the best and easiest,but it is 75.00.if anybody know a good way to do this,let me know.thx for all your help,later

Jul 16, 2004, 08:55 AM	Thread Starter #21
>GSXR<mrbusa im a FREAK Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 2,107 Rep Power: 0 System Specs	sry,that is what i did was during install i created the three partitions,100gb,100gb,then the third one was the remander of like 295?gb.then when windows was finished loading i checked the drive config to make sure it was right and all that was recognized was the standard 136gb.maybe the first time something went wrong in the install of my raid drivers?maybe i enabled the wrong model of controller?sometimes i amase myself,when you think your doing something right,then a day or two later you find out that it wasnt,it kinda funny sometimes.im going away for the weekend,maybe by the time i get back i will be in the mood to start from scratch.i would really like to not have to use a third party app to partition.i really liked having seperate partitions for os,games and data.i would have already tried it again if it wasnt for that microsoft issue,the popups eat at my temper,even after i told windows to remind me in a couple of days they were still popping up,YOU ONLY HAVE 30 DAYS TO ACTIVATE WINDOWS,its like bill gates is in my machine.now i understand why so many people run those other type of windows,the free ones.lol thx again judas