RAID 0 is usually a foolish choice for desktops

If more proof of this old contention is needed, there's a cutting-edge
review by Anand Shimpi on AnandTech.com:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101

As always in these tests, the real-world improvement achieved with
RAID 0 varies between 0 and 4%, which is simply imperceptible. The
price that's paid is two-fold: (1) the difference between the RAID
and a single drive of the same capacity, and (2) the DOUBLING of the
chance of a hard-drive failure.

For the life of me, I can't understand why so many users decide to
install RAID 0 on desktops.

RAID 1 is another matter entirely, but, as Anand says, "If you haven't
gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place,
and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer. The real world
performance increases are negligible at best and the reduction in
reliability, thanks to a halving of the mean time between failure,
makes RAID-0 far from worth it on the desktop."


Ron

"Leythos" wrote in message
...
In article , millerdot90
@SPAMlessosu.edu says...
For the life of me, I can't understand why so many users decide to
install RAID 0 on desktops.

I strongly agree with you as long as we further qualify it to mean home
user desktops or systems that don't contain high-performance RAID
controllers.

In real-world testing of quality RAID systems, RAID-0 can have up to 20%
performance increase, but there isn't a single motherboard with built-in
RAID controller, and not one cheap (non-scsi) RAID controller that will
let users see this performance.

But, as I said above, with the qualification of quality, I completely
agree with you and have maintained the same stance for years.

--
--

(Remove 999 to reply to me)

I would broadly agree. I have been using 2 x 74Gb Raptors in a RAID0 array
for several weeks. There is a noticeable improvement in performance,
especially video editing.

I was aware of the potential drive failure aspect - but I am not too
bothered about that, as my critical data is not the RAID drives, and I have
backups of my OS and apps on other drives.

As already said, probably not worth the money for your average desktop.
--
Doug Ramage

[watch spam trap]

Agree 100%. It's a good article. SCSI is still smoother esp with a dual CPU
system. Perhaps the NCQ drives will help iron things out, then dual core
opterons will bring a smile to everones faces.

- Tim

"Milleron" wrote in message
...
If more proof of this old contention is needed, there's a cutting-edge
review by Anand Shimpi on AnandTech.com:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101

As always in these tests, the real-world improvement achieved with
RAID 0 varies between 0 and 4%, which is simply imperceptible. The
price that's paid is two-fold: (1) the difference between the RAID
and a single drive of the same capacity, and (2) the DOUBLING of the
chance of a hard-drive failure.

For the life of me, I can't understand why so many users decide to
install RAID 0 on desktops.

RAID 1 is another matter entirely, but, as Anand says, "If you haven't
gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place,
and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer. The real world
performance increases are negligible at best and the reduction in
reliability, thanks to a halving of the mean time between failure,
makes RAID-0 far from worth it on the desktop."


Ron

Yes, I have a dual Pentium III system with 2 x 36Gb SCSI drives - pretty
quick in its day.
--
Doug Ramage

[watch spam trap]

"Tim" wrote in message ...
Agree 100%. It's a good article. SCSI is still smoother esp with a dual
CPU
system. Perhaps the NCQ drives will help iron things out, then dual core
opterons will bring a smile to everones faces.

- Tim

"Milleron" wrote in message
...
If more proof of this old contention is needed, there's a cutting-edge
review by Anand Shimpi on AnandTech.com:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101

As always in these tests, the real-world improvement achieved with
RAID 0 varies between 0 and 4%, which is simply imperceptible. The
price that's paid is two-fold: (1) the difference between the RAID
and a single drive of the same capacity, and (2) the DOUBLING of the
chance of a hard-drive failure.

For the life of me, I can't understand why so many users decide to
install RAID 0 on desktops.

RAID 1 is another matter entirely, but, as Anand says, "If you haven't
gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place,
and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer. The real world
performance increases are negligible at best and the reduction in
reliability, thanks to a halving of the mean time between failure,
makes RAID-0 far from worth it on the desktop."


Ron

Il Thu, 01 Jul 2004 23:45:07 +0000, Milleron ha scritto:

If more proof of this old contention is needed, there's a cutting-edge
review by Anand Shimpi on AnandTech.com:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101

As always in these tests, the real-world improvement achieved with
RAID 0 varies between 0 and 4%, which is simply imperceptible. The
price that's paid is two-fold: (1) the difference between the RAID
and a single drive of the same capacity, and (2) the DOUBLING of the
chance of a hard-drive failure.

It's pretty much three years I run Raid 0 now with various chipsets and
configurations (3ware, promise, high point and now SI) without any failure
problem.

BTW, become I do care about my data, I do backups often. For now I never
had to use my backups.

For the life of me, I can't understand why so many users decide to
install RAID 0 on desktops.

Becouse of improvements in performance?

RAID 1 is another matter entirely, but, as Anand says, "If you haven't
gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place,
and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer.

Anand need to do some real life computer: tests are not enough.

On Fri, 2 Jul 2004 22:46:34 +1200, "Tim" wrote:

Agree 100%. It's a good article. SCSI is still smoother esp with a dual CPU
system. Perhaps the NCQ drives will help iron things out, then dual core
opterons will bring a smile to everones faces.

What are NCQ drives?

Glad you still like SCSI. If you look at the pricing for some of
the high-perf 73 GB ATA drives, you're going to pay about what the
same drives cost in SCSI-land.

--W--


- Tim

"Milleron" wrote in message
.. .
If more proof of this old contention is needed, there's a cutting-edge
review by Anand Shimpi on AnandTech.com:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101

As always in these tests, the real-world improvement achieved with
RAID 0 varies between 0 and 4%, which is simply imperceptible. The
price that's paid is two-fold: (1) the difference between the RAID
and a single drive of the same capacity, and (2) the DOUBLING of the
chance of a hard-drive failure.

For the life of me, I can't understand why so many users decide to
install RAID 0 on desktops.

RAID 1 is another matter entirely, but, as Anand says, "If you haven't
gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place,
and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer. The real world
performance increases are negligible at best and the reduction in
reliability, thanks to a halving of the mean time between failure,
makes RAID-0 far from worth it on the desktop."


Ron

Good points. The only thing I use RAID for is to kill bugs.


"Milleron" wrote in message
...
If more proof of this old contention is needed, there's a cutting-edge
review by Anand Shimpi on AnandTech.com:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101

As always in these tests, the real-world improvement achieved with
RAID 0 varies between 0 and 4%, which is simply imperceptible. The
price that's paid is two-fold: (1) the difference between the RAID
and a single drive of the same capacity, and (2) the DOUBLING of the
chance of a hard-drive failure.

For the life of me, I can't understand why so many users decide to
install RAID 0 on desktops.

RAID 1 is another matter entirely, but, as Anand says, "If you haven't
gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place,
and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer. The real world
performance increases are negligible at best and the reduction in
reliability, thanks to a halving of the mean time between failure,
makes RAID-0 far from worth it on the desktop."


Ron

On Fri, 02 Jul 2004 13:23:11 +0200, _P_e_ar_lALegend
wrote:

Il Thu, 01 Jul 2004 23:45:07 +0000, Milleron ha scritto:

If more proof of this old contention is needed, there's a cutting-edge
review by Anand Shimpi on AnandTech.com:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101

As always in these tests, the real-world improvement achieved with
RAID 0 varies between 0 and 4%, which is simply imperceptible. The
price that's paid is two-fold: (1) the difference between the RAID
and a single drive of the same capacity, and (2) the DOUBLING of the
chance of a hard-drive failure.

It's pretty much three years I run Raid 0 now with various chipsets and
configurations (3ware, promise, high point and now SI) without any failure
problem.
And every minute of every hour of every day that you operate this
RAID, you STILL have TWICE the chance of a HD failure that you would
have without it. Have you heard about the guy who jumped off the top
of a fifty-story building? As he passed the third floor, someone in a
window yelled "how you doing." The jumper yelled back "OK, so far."

BTW, become I do care about my data, I do backups often. For now I never
had to use my backups.
Keep making those backups!

For the life of me, I can't understand why so many users decide to
install RAID 0 on desktops.

Becouse of improvements in performance?
Didn't you read the article??? There are NO significant improvements
in performance.

RAID 1 is another matter entirely, but, as Anand says, "If you haven't
gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place,
and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer.

Anand need to do some real life computer: tests are not enough.

I disagree strongly on two counts:
1) Your so-called "real-life computer tests" are not tests at all.
They're nothing more than SUBJECTIVE impressions of performance,
strongly biased by the money and time you spent on the RAID, and they
mean absolutely nothing in the face of true OBJECTIVE tests.
2) AnandTech's benchmarks DID include "real-world" content-creation
benchmarks, and the results speak for themselves. There is NO
PERCEPTIBLE improvement in real-world applications with RAID 0.

Ron

For the life of me, I can't understand why so many users decide to
install RAID 0 on desktops.

You're overlooking the key element here Ron.

The GEEK factor )

Lorenzo


"Milleron" wrote in message
...
If more proof of this old contention is needed, there's a cutting-edge
review by Anand Shimpi on AnandTech.com:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101

As always in these tests, the real-world improvement achieved with
RAID 0 varies between 0 and 4%, which is simply imperceptible. The
price that's paid is two-fold: (1) the difference between the RAID
and a single drive of the same capacity, and (2) the DOUBLING of the
chance of a hard-drive failure.

....

RAID 1 is another matter entirely, but, as Anand says, "If you haven't
gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place,
and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer. The real world
performance increases are negligible at best and the reduction in
reliability, thanks to a halving of the mean time between failure,
makes RAID-0 far from worth it on the desktop."


Ron

Just ran Norton Performance Test on my Asus P4PE system which has RAID-0:

Disk: C: (Seagate 80GB 7200rpm)
Disk Size: 80.0 GBytes
Free space: 61.5 GBytes
Cluster Size: 4 KBytes
File System: NTFS
2xIntel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.06GHz
Ave. read speed: 21.3 MB/Sec.
Ave. write speed: 15.8 MB/Sec.

Disk: F: RAID-0 (2 x SATA western digital 60GB 7200rpm)
Disk Size: 120.0 GBytes
Free space: 119.4 GBytes
Cluster Size: 4 KBytes
File System: NTFS
2xIntel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.06GHz
Ave. speed: 66.6 MB/Sec.
Ave. speed: 62.0 MB/Sec.