#242615 - 26/11/2004 00:15
Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 21/05/1999
Posts: 5335
Loc: Cambridge UK
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Does anyone know whether the SATA RAID feature on this motherboard is hardware or software? I want to fit two 10,000rpm SATA disks as a RAID0 and have them perform as the boot disk for a Linux (Debian sarge) installation. If it is hardware, is the RAID configured in the BIOS setup?
I've only used dedicated RAID controller cards in the past so have no idea how this stuff works, and the Asus site isn't that forthcoming on the details. If I can get this to work then the machine should be killer, with an Athlon 64 3700 1MB L2 and 2GB DDR400. Its purpose in life will be running GCC and other build tools, hence the wish for very fast disk access.
Thanks
Rob
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#242616 - 26/11/2004 05:43
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: rob]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 20/12/1999
Posts: 31578
Loc: Seattle, WA
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My recent experiences with RAID have been unhappy ones...
I'm trying to remember what all the RAID numbers mean, I always get them mixed up. Is RAID 0 the one where it's merely striped and not mirrored? As in, that's the one that's not redundant? As in, you're doing that to get speed and space rather than to get redundancy?
If so, I recommend highly against it. By having two non-redundant disks, you're DOUBLING your chances of a failure. I've had that actually HAPPEN to me in one of my servers, so I speak from experience.
Even if RAID 0 is the one that's mirrored drives, I'd almost say forget it anyway, after seeing all the problems my friend Tod had with all of his RAIDed systems. He's lost data because of a controller failure, where plugging the drives into another controller, even of the same brand, did not recover the information.
If you do decide to go ahead with RAID, make sure you've got the data backed up somewhere nightly.
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#242617 - 26/11/2004 06:24
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: rob]
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veteran
Registered: 19/06/2000
Posts: 1495
Loc: US: CA
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It's hardware, and yes, the setup for it is in the BIOS of the controller.
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#242618 - 26/11/2004 06:32
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: tfabris]
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veteran
Registered: 19/06/2000
Posts: 1495
Loc: US: CA
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Quote:
Is RAID 0 the one where it's merely striped and not mirrored? As in, that's the one that's not redundant? As in, you're doing that to get speed and space rather than to get redundancy?
RAID 0 is striped, yes. RAID 1 is mirrored.
Linky
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#242619 - 26/11/2004 16:03
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: tfabris]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 21/05/1999
Posts: 5335
Loc: Cambridge UK
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Quote:
If so, I recommend highly against it. By having two non-redundant disks, you're DOUBLING your chances of a failure. I've had that actually HAPPEN to me in one of my servers, so I speak from experience.
Yes, RAID0 is striped - all I'm interested in is performance. These machines will be used to compile, but the code repository will be elsewhere. The workstations can (and will) get ghosted clean from time to time anyway.
Quote:
Even if RAID 0 is the one that's mirrored drives, I'd almost say forget it anyway, after seeing all the problems my friend Tod had with all of his RAIDed systems. He's lost data because of a controller failure, where plugging the drives into another controller, even of the same brand, did not recover the information.
The servers use Intel zero channel controllers in RAID5 mode, with a hot spare so a drive can fail and the array can rebuild itself all without any down time. Controller availability/compatibility is guaranteed by Intel for some period of years, although I'm thinking of buying a cold spare controller anyway.
Quote:
If you do decide to go ahead with RAID, make sure you've got the data backed up somewhere nightly.
Damn right - the fire safe is on order! I'm still trying to work out the most cost effective way of backing up 200GB every night. DAT is too small, and DLT robots cost a fortune. I'm considering using firewire connected hard drives for the nightly cycle but I'll still need tape for monthly "keepers" (or maybe a DVD-RW robot).
Rob
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#242620 - 26/11/2004 16:04
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: ricin]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 21/05/1999
Posts: 5335
Loc: Cambridge UK
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Quote:
It's hardware, and yes, the setup for it is in the BIOS of the controller.
Great, thanks!
Rob
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#242621 - 26/11/2004 16:59
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: rob]
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member
Registered: 19/03/2002
Posts: 144
Loc: Florida, USA
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From my experience the RAID chips on Asus are horrible.. the one my A7N8X had required drivers, and it turns out everthing runs software. you'd be better off using MD with or w/o LVM on Linux.. dont know about software RAID on Windows though if that's what you run. I can't remember the OEM of the chip but I could find out. it was a pain.. MD has been beautiful, though! 
I've got mythtv, news servers and web servers running off of MD RAID. it's sweet when you drop LVM into the mix- you can manipulate volumes as needbe.
Edited by shadow45 (26/11/2004 17:16)
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::: shadow45
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#242622 - 26/11/2004 17:22
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: shadow45]
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veteran
Registered: 19/06/2000
Posts: 1495
Loc: US: CA
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Hmm... Yeah, it does require a driver, forgot to mention that. I'm not so sure about the hardware/software thing, it might not be true hardware; might be a mixture of both. All I know for sure is that it has been working fine for me on my gaming machine. Either way, the best (and obvious) thing to do would be to get a dedicated, hardware based RAID card, which I'm sure Rob has already considered.
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Donato MkII/080000565 MkIIa/010101253 ricin.us
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#242623 - 27/11/2004 06:35
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: rob]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 18/01/2000
Posts: 5682
Loc: London, UK
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Quote:
I'm considering using firewire connected hard drives for the nightly cycle but I'll still need tape for monthly "keepers" (or maybe a DVD-RW robot).
At my new place, we use hard disk backups. I'm not sure if they're firewire or what, but they're in removable caddies, and someone just takes them home for safe-keeping.
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-- roger
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#242624 - 27/11/2004 07:36
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: Roger]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 10/06/1999
Posts: 5914
Loc: Wivenhoe, Essex, UK
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Quote:
At my new place, we use hard disk backups. I'm not sure if they're firewire or what, but they're in removable caddies, and someone just takes them home for safe-keeping.
Unbelievably hard drives are very nearly as cheap as DLT tapes. From www.scan.co.uk :
160GB DLT tape is £33.71
160GB ATA-100 disk is £48.55
and guess which one will last longer ?
It makes you wonder why anyone still uses tapes (ok, I guess tapes are more portable).
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#242625 - 27/11/2004 09:18
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: andy]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 21/05/1999
Posts: 5335
Loc: Cambridge UK
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Quote:
160GB DLT tape is £33.71
160GB ATA-100 disk is £48.55
Good point.. and when you factor in the 1500 quid for the DLT drive I guess my permanent monthly backups could also be HDD. A tapeless office, how cool!
Rob
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#242626 - 27/11/2004 11:01
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: rob]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 10/06/1999
Posts: 5914
Loc: Wivenhoe, Essex, UK
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Don't forget the possibility of daily incremental off-site network backups, with an ADSL line and something like rsync. Only workable if you are not creating gigabytes of data a day though.
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Remind me to change my signature to something more interesting someday
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#242627 - 27/11/2004 17:42
Re: Motherboard RAID on Asus K8N-E
[Re: andy]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/06/1999
Posts: 7868
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Quote:
Don't forget the possibility of daily incremental off-site network backups, with an ADSL line and something like rsync.
Any good howto documents out there that you have come across for implementing backups like this? This is my one weakness on my mailserver, and I'd like to take advantage of my one megabit upstream to ensure an onsite disaster doesn't blow things away.
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