RAID results

[dumass]

I just set up my new raid array on my Abit KR7a-ATA133RAID with 2x ATA133 maxtor 60gig 7200rpm HDDs and thought id post some results:

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1024x768x32/defult:

Without raid:

http://service.madonion.com/compare?2k1=3977047

4338 marks (note: a ata133HDD on the ata100 controller)

With raid:

5201 http://service.madonion.com/compare?2k1=3976048

= 19% increase

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Setup:

athlon @ 1.623GHz / 180fsb, 256meg DDR, Geforce 2 GTS o/c'ed.

What do u think? not a bad speed increase from RAID..

The windows installations have the same drivers and everything, they were installed about 2 weeks apart from each other otherwise identical.

(i think this is the right place to post it)

[Ragnor]

That's a pretty decent increase.. especially since 3dmark shouldn't really test/stress the hard drives much.

Download Sisoft Sandra and give the drive benchmark a run too.

[Control_Phreak]

Try it with pcmark 2002 and record the HDD marks

Still, not a bad increase with 3dmark2001

[Binky Stunt Cat]

are there any ATA133 RAID chips??
and also, how much cache do those drives have?
*thinks about RAIDing two WD 80Gb drives:D*

[Glycerine]

Originally posted by Binky Stunt Cat
are there any ATA133 RAID chips??
and also, how much cache do those drives have?
*thinks about RAIDing two WD 80Gb drives:D*

yeh there are, they where selling ata133 pci raid cards at ctech for 79+gst, cant remember the brand but it came with IDE leads aswell.

i was gonna get one but i thought it was a waste if i was just gonna chuck my roms and an old hdd on it, so i got a ata66 card for 20$... ill never go raid untill im not a poor student

[dumass]

The controler i used is onboardd my abit kr7a-r, a HPT 372 controller, which is ATA133 (UDMA6) complient. The HDDs are set to ATA133 in the controller/bios options. The hdds have 2megs cache on them :)

*goes of to get pc system mark thingermajiger*

[Binky Stunt Cat]

the ATA133 IDE controlers are better, so i would assume that any RAID controlers capible of taking ATA133 drives would be better in the same fashion...

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

I'm thinking of doing the same Binky.
I'll only be able to afford one drive at a time. Was thinking Maxtor but now thinking WD.

Have you read the review over at OCAU comparing the Maxtor, WD and IBM in both single drive and raid. The WD came out on top.

[shag]

I think it's safe to say u need more ram then;) . Shouldn't all the textures be loaded to ram with precache turned on in the bios? And whats your agp aperature size set too?

[Ragnor]

The Western Digital ATA100 drives with 8mb of cache.. kicked the Maxtor ATA133 drives witn 2mb cache.

The phat cache really makes a big difference, going from ATA100 to ATA133 doesn't do jack all because hard drives can only use about ATA66 worth of bandwidth normally... they only utilize ATA100 and 133 worth of bandwidth when reading form their cache.

That's the way I understand it anyway..

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

So really, what we need is a couple of 80GB drives with 1GB cache. :p:D

Oh well dreams are free. In the meantime I had better start saving again so I can make sure this time that I have a decent drive for L3.

[Agent666]

.... waits for the 8MB WD's on serialATA ..... mmmmm 150MB/s........ mmmmmm raid is good.......

speaking of anyone know when serialATA controllers are going to be availiable.......? have seen some articles about them being in the plans for several MB manufacterers but nothing concrete like some dates.........

[Ragnor]

hmm but a 7200rpm 8mb cache drive doesn't consume ATA100 worth of bandwidth except when bursting from cache does it?...

Wouldn't that mean serial ATA isn't going too make much difference unless it coincides with the release of 10,000rpm serial ATA drives with large cache.

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

From what I hear Serial ATA will be out the same time as 8x AGP and PC400 NB's. About the 4th Q to 1st of next year.

As for how Serial ATA works just go to the site it has heaps of technical info.

[Agent666]

Originally posted by Ragnor
hmm but a 7200rpm 8mb cache drive doesn't consume ATA100 worth of bandwidth except when bursting from cache does it?...

Wouldn't that mean serial ATA isn't going too make much difference unless it coincides with the release of 10,000rpm serial ATA drives with large cache.

yes but higher bandwidth for raid......... some of the drives today in a raid config can saturate the 100MB/s........

but yes 10000rpm IDE drives would be very nice........ but also expensive :(