Hi, newbies ask lots of questions ( considered rubbish questions by some expert) well this question maybe asked before......not sure if yes point it to me (url) ok all tech experts out there......wanna ask a few..... should i get a RAID or ATA133 (pci form) and put it to the mobo or to get a RAID mobo. well I'm using a IBM 40.1GB 60GXP (72000rpm) ops 7200 :rofl: on a Win2K on an E-PoX P2-133A , P2-400MHz, 256 + 128 sdram which I only get ATA-33 Will I feel any peformance?(while using the pc; data transfer and so on) Thanks for the help
over ata-33 - definately! RAID cards are usually better performace wise, but RAID on mobos is cheaper and good for a beginner as it will also give you 2 extra ATA-133 channels which means then you can stick 4 devises on different channels giving you the best performace. Its best to invest in 2 identical drives when you use RAID, and you will have to reformat and reinstall your OS etc
wow darn fast replyies <----bad at grammar replies..... just 10 min ago post this msg .... Huh? why I need to reformat and reinstall my OS ????
You need to reformat, as when you create a RAID array over your two disks (whether it be a RAID 0 or RAID 1) your data is all erased.... so effectively, it reformats them for you Cheers, BiGGiE
definately go for a raid board so you can have up to 8 ide devices, rather than 4, even if youre not gonna use RAID.
I don't use RAID, but Ive got the RAID board, so I can have all my hard drives operational, as well as having a DVD drive and CDRW... at one point I also had a separate PCI IDE controller.... so I could have upto 12 IDE devices installed at one time Then I thought to myself... why dont I build a linux box with one of the drives..... so I did
Biggie LOL luckly I didn't put my hdd in my friends mobo(fixing his pc) with raid or i'll be like --->:rofl: hahaha 12 nice one
You can kinda dismount a RAID1, but not a RAID 0, if you dismount a RAID 1, ie take one of the drives out to save another PC, then you have to re-mirror the drive when you return it into the RAID array... RAID 0 however, destroys the data as soon as you put it in another machine, as one disk alone makes no sense, as the data is split in half, so when it tries to load windows from a single drive out of a RAID 0, it would simply not work... and you would lose all of the data
looking at your PC I would throw $$ at CPU/mobo first, then worry about RAID. Course, if you can get it on a new mobo go for it... I am selecting parts for a new system and I was seriously considering a WD1000BB-SE (w/ the 8MB buffer ) but then I realized "will that $$ be better spent on something else??" This is the thing: yes, while HDD *can* be a serious bottleneck, it depends on what you do. If you do a lot of disk-intensive stuff like video editing, etc, well SCSI would really be better anyway, hehe. But seriously, I realized I would rather spend the extra $$ on a new vid card or something b4 gaining a slight edge in HDD performance. Why? because most of the "intensive" stuff I do (gaming is most system-straining) it is CPU/Vid card/Memory that is bottleneck, not HDD. Sure, RtCW would load 10 secs faster, but you only *load* a program once, but play it for a lot longer. In the end I have decided I will spend extra on more RAM before a "killer" HDD sub-system. Just my $.02 tho.
Can you hook up hard drives to the RAID channels without using the actual RAID and just have the drives being used as normal?
Yes. You will often find, however, that a RAID controller will only work for hard disks, and not for ATAPI devices, such as CD-ROM, CD-RW, DVD-ROM, Zip, LS-120, etc, etc.
ive read that RAID striping will give you little or no performance increase using windows XP for some reason or another. anyone else head about this?
you can you can use the raid connector for cd/dvd drives RAID controllers coming out now are ATA/RAID my mobo has it, so you can have it for pretty much and IDE device. but you lose you on the benefits from having the drives set up in an RAID array. And you can also have the drives set up so they aren't in an RAID array. however XP doesn't like installing on a HDD connected to a RAID chipset as i found out this weekend, 3 days to install XP if you're getting a new mobo get the ABIT KR7 RAID the nuts. chech out abit.com.tw
Just don't forget! Adding another couple of hard drives (or any drive for that matter) - will suck away all your power - so you would need another PSU (if you got a big full size case - no probs - if you dont - get out your juniour hacksaw - j/k ), or a beefier one. The standard PSU is 300w, some people have 2x 300W or just one 550watt - anyway enough of my babbling - get on with your RAID! Good luck
This is very true, I have done it myself for no avail... first thing I did after I benchmarked, was deleted the RAID, and reinstalled windows, now Ive got a second drive, that is dedicated to holding music, and other important stuff (like work!)
