RAID suggestions?

[Noozer]

Looking to build a small->mid sized storage server and I'm looking for a
couple suggestions...

Going to be using eight 250gig SATA drives in a RAID 5 (?) configuration and
was wondering what I should consider for a controller. Are there any
mainboards that would support this configuration? Add on controller cards?

We don't want to lose data on these drives (there will be a separate drive
for the C:/ System files) as well as get the best performance possible.

The reason I'm considering onboard is that performance could be better if we
can avoid using the PCI bus for the controller.

Thx!

 

[Pen]

Take a look here for cards and reviews;
http://www.3ware.com/products/serial_ata.asp
http://www.promise.com/
http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20040625/

I've haven't heard of a mobo supporting Raid5, just 0 and/or 1.
2 cards/arrays with 4 drives each would give you 1500GB (750GB each
array)
of storage.

 

[kony]

Looking to build a small->mid sized storage server and I'm looking for a
couple suggestions...

Going to be using eight 250gig SATA drives in a RAID 5 (?) configuration and
was wondering what I should consider for a controller. Are there any
mainboards that would support this configuration? Add on controller cards?

We don't want to lose data on these drives (there will be a separate drive
for the C:/ System files) as well as get the best performance possible.

The reason I'm considering onboard is that performance could be better if we
can avoid using the PCI bus for the controller.

Thx!

I don't have any suggestions but just a few comments.

Unless you're using GbE network connections to the clients, the
bottleneck (on anything but a very busy fileserver) will be the
network, not the drives. Without GbE you don't need high
performance drives/configurations.

Onboard controllers which use their own chip, not a southbridge
integral feature, ARE on the PCI bus. There is no gain to having
such an integral chip rather than it sitting on a PCI card. It
is exactly the same situation if it were placed in same PCI slot
such that it had same IRQ.

 

[Noozer]

I don't have any suggestions but just a few comments.

Unless you're using GbE network connections to the clients, the
bottleneck (on anything but a very busy fileserver) will be the
network, not the drives. Without GbE you don't need high
performance drives/configurations.

System will have GBit ethernet for sure.

Onboard controllers which use their own chip, not a southbridge
integral feature, ARE on the PCI bus. There is no gain to having
such an integral chip rather than it sitting on a PCI card. It
is exactly the same situation if it were placed in same PCI slot
such that it had same IRQ.

My Asus P4C800E has the Intel Raid controller (as well as a Promise
controller) and the Intel part doesn't utilize the PCI bus. I was hoping
another higher end board might have taken this farther.

What I'm looking at now is: http://www.raidcore.net/RC4000DataSheet_2.pdf

In this Lian Li chassis....
http://www.lian-li.com/product.php?action=viewPD&prdid=1210


....assuming I can find suppliers for them.

 

[Noozer]

Looking to build a small->mid sized storage server and I'm looking for
a

configuration if

System will have GBit ethernet for sure.


My Asus P4C800E has the Intel Raid controller (as well as a Promise
controller) and the Intel part doesn't utilize the PCI bus. I was hoping
another higher end board might have taken this farther.

What I'm looking at now is: http://www.raidcore.net/RC4000DataSheet_2.pdf

In this Lian Li chassis....
http://www.lian-li.com/product.php?action=viewPD&prdid=1210

...and I almost forget. This will most likely be an Athlon64 system (unless
you can convince me otherwise)

: )

 

[kony]

System will have GBit ethernet for sure.


My Asus P4C800E has the Intel Raid controller (as well as a Promise
controller) and the Intel part doesn't utilize the PCI bus. I was hoping
another higher end board might have taken this farther.

What I'm looking at now is: http://www.raidcore.net/RC4000DataSheet_2.pdf

In this Lian Li chassis....
http://www.lian-li.com/product.php?action=viewPD&prdid=1210


...assuming I can find suppliers for them.

Intel does have southbridge raid, but never RAID5 AFAIK. It
would seem you are forced to use a PCI bus based solution, as
with what you linked. It is PCI-X though, you didn't distinguish
what mainboard you're looking to use, nor the budget. I deal
primarily with PCs also, am certainly not the best person to
advise on RAID5.