RAID-0 Add On Card. Which one is the best?

[Dr. J]

I am very interested in experimenting with a RAID-0 array.
There happens to be very little easily accessible information
on this subject on the Internet. I am not interested in
SATA, and my MOBO does not support this feature natively. I
am just about to purchase 2 identical hard drives. I plan on
a small array, like 2 40 Giggers or perhaps even 2 80
Giggers, assuming the price is right. I am going for drives
that are no less than 7200 RPM and I am looking for cards
with 8mb of cache.

HOWEVER, as far as the controller card, I do not even know
where to begin. There are hardly any reviews. I found in
my local Micro Center an Inland card for $50.00 but I think
that is a little pricey. I saw on Pricewatch that there are
cards selling for $15.00.

As far as pure performance for a simple gamer, which card is
the best?

As far as being a budget conscious buyer, which is the best
value?

Thanx
jacobdrj

 

[kony]

I am very interested in experimenting with a RAID-0 array.
There happens to be very little easily accessible information
on this subject on the Internet. I am not interested in
SATA, and my MOBO does not support this feature natively. I
am just about to purchase 2 identical hard drives. I plan on
a small array, like 2 40 Giggers or perhaps even 2 80
Giggers, assuming the price is right. I am going for drives
that are no less than 7200 RPM and I am looking for cards
with 8mb of cache.

Frankly, you're not going to gain enough to make it worthwhile. Your
array would be running from the PCI bus, which will be suffering througput
issues. You would be just as well off to buy a WD Raptor, or just any
very large drive with 8MB cache. You will not get the kind of results you
hope for with 2 x 40MB drives, unless they happened to actually be 2 x
37GB, Raptors, and still your PCI bus is a real issue.

HOWEVER, as far as the controller card, I do not even know
where to begin. There are hardly any reviews. I found in
my local Micro Center an Inland card for $50.00 but I think
that is a little pricey. I saw on Pricewatch that there are
cards selling for $15.00.

Promise brand is most popular, fair value.

As far as pure performance for a simple gamer, which card is
the best?

Gaming doesn't depend that much on a HDD to begin with except for loading
leveles, and it that case even the larger 8MB cache doesn't help so much.
I would buy the cheapest GB/$ you can find and put the $ savings into a
faster video card, sooner (or CPU, etc, whatever is the next bottleneck in
your system).

As far as being a budget conscious buyer, which is the best
value?

Thanx
jacobdrj

The best value is a single 120GB, 8MB cache, 7200RPM drive.

 

[Dr. J]

FYI, I do plan on doing video editing. That is what finally
prompted me to do this. As far as computer bottlenecks,
these are my 2 systems to give you an idea of what I am
trying to deal with.

System 1:
CPU - Intel Celeron 1.4GHz 100MHZ FSB Overclocked to 1.57GHz
@112MHz FSB
MOBO - Abit BH6 Motherboard
RAM - 512Mb PC133 SDRAM @ 112MHz Cas 3
HDD1 - Western Digital 40GB 7200RPM 2MB Cache
HDD2 - Maxtor 80GB 7200RPM 2MB Cache
Optical 1 - Buslink 16x10x40x CD-RW
Optical 2 - Hi-Val 16x DVD-ROM
3.5" Floppy Drive
Ports - 2 USB 2.0 , 2 FireWire IEEE 1394
VIDEO - ATI RADEON All-In-Wonder 8500DV 64MB
Audio - SoundBlaster PCI64V
Power - Enermax 400W
OS - Windows 98SE

System 2:
CPU - AMD Athlon XP 2600+ 266MHz FSB
MOBO - MSI 745 Ultra
RAM - 512Mb Kingston PC2700 DDR SDRAM @ 333MHz FSB
HDD - Maxtor 8.4GB DiamondMax 5400RPM
Optical - Generic 40x CD-ROM
3.5" Floppy
Ports - 2 USB 2.0
VIDEO - ATI RADEON 9600XT 128MB DDR
Audio - On-board Realtek Audio
Power - Generic 300W
OS - Windows XP Pro

System 1 Proc MAXED OUT
System 2 Proc MAXED OUT

System 1 RAM 2/3 Slots. Windows 98SE Optimized
System 2 RAM 1/3 Slots. Game HALO Optimized


As you can see, both are equipped for some potential editing.
Both are MAXED OUT as far as upgrades go for the processor
and the RAM (I can get more but am told that for my specific
purposes adding more RAM would slow the systems down). The
hard drive on my Athlon is so small that a new hard drive is
imminent. I figured I would use my old drive from System 1
for the Athlon, the gamer, and get a RAID array on my trusty
reliable multimedia PC. Both can play games, and do, and
helping load times can never hurt. As far as getting
Raptors, they are too small and too expensive. As far as
parallel drives go, I just bought 2 80GB 8MB 7200RPM Western
Digital Special Edition hard drives for $45.00 US each.

So, Maximum PC says RAID-0 is a GREAT way to boost speed.
They just neglected to say which off-board controller they
preferred.

Finally, I am a computer technician and experimenting is both my job
and my passion. I just want to make sure that I do not make life too
hard on myself from the get-go by getting a card with known problems.


Promise is reccomended, but they are mucho expenciveo, lolo.

I am still open to other opinions so keep them comming

 

[kony]

So, Maximum PC says RAID-0 is a GREAT way to boost speed.
They just neglected to say which off-board controller they
preferred.

At one point it was, but as PATA drives got faster they are starting to
consume too much PCI throughput, so are either bottlenecked or hurting
other PCI devices' throughput. Ideally a RAID0 these days would be SATA
running from a southbridge-integrated controller, but you already got a
good deal on the drives...

Finally, I am a computer technician and experimenting is both my job
and my passion. I just want to make sure that I do not make life too
hard on myself from the get-go by getting a card with known problems.


Promise is reccomended, but they are mucho expenciveo, lolo.

I am still open to other opinions so keep them comming

I'd go with a Promise or Highpoint, but haven't done enough testing, in
enough platforms, to assure you that there wouldn't be any problems
specific to your particular usage, but odds are either chip will work.
The cards, chips that seem more problematic are those with SIL680 or
CMD649 chips, which of course are usually cheaper.

On the other hand, these days it might be as cost effective to hunt down a
deal on a motherboard with integrated RAID, and have an extra board as a
spare, for a build or to sell.