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4 raptors in a raid?

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2 Raptor running RAID 1
or 3 Raptors running RAID 5 is enough
Raptors are pretty reliable already with its 5 years warranty you can see.

They are fast but overpriced really...
 
" Buy a tape drive. "
- You have 1k posts, and your suggestion is to buy a tape drive? Mmmhmmm. I would ask for a reason why, but I know there isn't one.
Click to expand...

the op obviously doesn't know much about tape drives.

in his particuclar sistuation he could go refurbed 74GB 10-15kr 1 gen on u320 scsi and buy a used raid card, this would be his best bet. if you came on here for advice and don't take it and have your little heart on 4xraptors and blast everyone on here that are offering better ideas, then why post? is your e-penis that small? i would also spend $100 on a decent psu.
 
"If you really want speed, go for 4 15k RPM SCSI drives in RAID 5. That would give you a much more noticeable performance increase, the most storage space, and redudancy."
- What would this cost? I thought SCSI drives are twice the price of the raptors and only have a slightly better performance.

"the op obviously doesn't know much about tape drives. "
- A tape drive would require me to backup every night, which would not only be a pain in the ass to do, but take a long time. What happens when a drive dies? I have to start all over, then restore the files. That's why it wouldn't work. I thought an "expert" would know that.

"If you came on here for advice and don't take it and have your little heart on 4xraptors and blast everyone on here that are offering better ideas"
- I'm not blasting anyone who is offering a better idea. Just the stupid people that post a few words and leave without making much sense. I hate how the forums here have so many people that do that to get just a few more posts.

"Raptors are pretty reliable already with its 5 years warranty you can see. "
- A longer warranty usually implies they are reliable, but the real case is that if it dies, I will get a replacement. But if it dies I am already out of luck, unless I had them in a raid setup.

"3 Raptors running RAID 5 is enough "
- Raid 5 is where I can remove the dead drive and still have the computer working, correct? If so, I would rather add another 74gb of space, and have 2 drives together with 2 mirrored, resulting in 140gb total space, with the entire setup backed up.

I wasn't looking for suggestions on the hard drives (if there really is something better, I don't mind hearing them though), I know it is the best performance for your money. I have done lots of research the past few weeks on hard drives, and came to the conclusion that the raptors are still up on top. You can bring more suggestions, but so far I have a good reason why the already suggested ones wouldn't be ideal.


My questions were: "The case has somewhere around 6+ fans, will this setup be good enough for the 4 raptors?" So far, nobody mentioned anything about this.

"Any downsides with doing this, other than the price?"
- The only response to this are ones about it being a "waste of money" aka price, which I wasn't asking for.

I commented that I am not sure about the PSU, but linked to the one I wanted. Someone replied saying it is crap, but can't show me one good one that has the covered wires.

Also, before, the person who suggested getting a tape drive, said "what are the odds of 3 raptors dying at once. Come on! " some "expert" eh?

"i would also spend $100 on a decent psu. "
- Ang get which one? I couldn't find any with covered wires from good name brands.
 
Originally posted by: AnnihilatorX
2 Raptor running RAID 1
or 3 Raptors running RAID 5 is enough
Raptors are pretty reliable already with its 5 years warranty you can see.

They are fast but overpriced really...
Click to expand...

That's be my though as well
 
You'd be better off going raid 5 w/ some hot spare's...

Look at the LSI sata controller linked above, you'll need a mobo w/ a 64bit 133mhz slot... I'd recomend the 250g WD SE Raid sata drives..

There is a LSI scsi controller for pci-e, but it's for scsi drives. (you can get 10k 74g scsi hd's for $165 new)

I just would not do Raid 1, you'll loose alot of space. Say you want to go w/ 4 drives (250g WD raid ed.) you'd have close to 700gigs w/ 1 hot spare..

BTW dds4 tape drives are about $200 new..

Regards,
Jose
 
I don't agree with you on the speed of the raptor. I have a single 74gb raptor and the performance gain is not anything special over 7200rpm drives especially some of the new 7200rpm drives.

Honestly, if you set up two computers and put a raptor in one and any brand 7200rpm in the other and let me test both computers equally....I would probably NOT be able to tell you which one had the raptor in it.
 
Originally posted by: Mr Bob
"If you really want speed, go for 4 15k RPM SCSI drives in RAID 5. That would give you a much more noticeable performance increase, the most storage space, and redudancy."
- What would this cost? I thought SCSI drives are twice the price of the raptors and only have a slightly better performance.

1. "the op obviously doesn't know much about tape drives. "
- A tape drive would require me to backup every night, which would not only be a pain in the ass to do, but take a long time. What happens when a drive dies? I have to start all over, then restore the files. That's why it wouldn't work. I thought an "expert" would know that.


"If you came on here for advice and don't take it and have your little heart on 4xraptors and blast everyone on here that are offering better ideas"
- I'm not blasting anyone who is offering a better idea. Just the stupid people that post a few words and leave without making much sense. I hate how the forums here have so many people that do that to get just a few more posts.

"Raptors are pretty reliable already with its 5 years warranty you can see. "
- A longer warranty usually implies they are reliable, but the real case is that if it dies, I will get a replacement. But if it dies I am already out of luck, unless I had them in a raid setup.

"3 Raptors running RAID 5 is enough "
- Raid 5 is where I can remove the dead drive and still have the computer working, correct? If so, I would rather add another 74gb of space, and have 2 drives together with 2 mirrored, resulting in 140gb total space, with the entire setup backed up.

2. I wasn't looking for suggestions on the hard drives (if there really is something better, I don't mind hearing them though), I know it is the best performance for your money. I have done lots of research the past few weeks on hard drives, and came to the conclusion that the raptors are still up on top. You can bring more suggestions, but so far I have a good reason why the already suggested ones wouldn't be ideal.



My questions were: "The case has somewhere around 6+ fans, will this setup be good enough for the 4 raptors?" So far, nobody mentioned anything about this.

"Any downsides with doing this, other than the price?"
- The only response to this are ones about it being a "waste of money" aka price, which I wasn't asking for.

I commented that I am not sure about the PSU, but linked to the one I wanted. Someone replied saying it is crap, but can't show me one good one that has the covered wires.

Also, before, the person who suggested getting a tape drive, said "what are the odds of 3 raptors dying at once. Come on! " some "expert" eh?

3. "i would also spend $100 on a decent psu. "
- Ang get which one? I couldn't find any with covered wires from good name brands.
Click to expand...



1. i never claimed to be an expert, but many institutions use some flavor of a tape drive, they are very reliable and you can take them offsite to store, which may or may not be a bonus. and you would not have to backup daily, you could do it whenever you wanted. also your response to "Buy a tape drive." was "You have 1k posts, and your suggestion is to buy a tape drive? Mmmhmmm. I would ask for a reason why, but I know there isn't one.", but there are good reasons

2. i suggested "in his particuclar sistuation he could go refurbed 74GB 10-15kr 1 gen on u320 scsi and buy a used raid card, this would be his best bet." this is what i would do and it would probably be pretty equal in price, plus you have the advantage of a true raid card, but you will have to look around for this, which may not be good for you because you might have to wait and find a deal.

3. you didn't specify you need one with covered wire so my suggestion would be to get a good psu and then buy some type of wire cover and put it on. something like a fotron, pc&p, enermax, seasonic, antec in the 450-550W range with 2x12v lines.
 
get this instead:

Adaptec SCSI RAID Controller 2200S ? $700
8x Seagate Cheetah 15K.4 146GB (ST3146854LW) ? $11,000

that oughta do it.
 
"use some flavor of a tape drive, they are very reliable and you can take them offsite to store, which may or may not be a bonus."
- That is not a bonus, but I understand how they will work for other situations. A tape drive might be perfect for someone who is just doing a daily backup, but that's not what I need.

"and you would not have to backup daily, you could do it whenever you wanted"
- Every 30 minutes would be best, but I know a tape drive wouldn't be able to do this.

"in his particuclar sistuation he could go refurbed 74GB 10-15kr 1 gen on u320 scsi and buy a used raid card, this would be his best bet."
- But this would cost around twice as much, right? $500 for the card, and another $800 or so for the drives?

"you didn't specify you need one with covered wire so my suggestion would be to get a good psu and then buy some type of wire cover and put it on. something like a fotron, pc&p, enermax, seasonic, antec in the 450-550W range with 2x12v lines."
- I have a friend who spent a lot of time trying to cover the wires, I would much rather have one already done. I my third reply, I said: "I need a PSU that have covered wires (like the one I linked to), can you find a non crappy one with a covered wires?".

It seems like there are none already done for you, if you decide to get a decent PSU.

This is the type of idiot I am talking about who just say the useless things, that don't even address my question:
from "theman"
get this instead:

Adaptec SCSI RAID Controller 2200S ? $700
8x Seagate Cheetah 15K.4 146GB (ST3146854LW) ? $11,000

that oughta do it.
Click to expand...
 
sorry, i was just kinda bored....

to answer your question. first of all, i think that kind of hdd setup is a total waste. especially if you put it with that rig. unless you really really need to have the extra speed, dont do it. thats so much money and you wont get a performance gain worthy of it. for the heat issue, it really depends, on the temperature in your room, the temp of your cpu, and other things. stick a thermometer in there and see how hot it is now, and expect it to be a lot hotter when you put all those drives in there. i doubt the psu will be enough. there is only 13a on the 12v rail. you need at least 30a.
 
" sorry, i was just kinda bored.... "
- Well when you get tons of people who are just bored, the entire thread is full with crap and useless ideas.

"to answer your question. "
- Wow, I am actually going to get an answer!

"i think that kind of hdd setup is a total waste."
- Why?

"unless you really really need to have the extra speed"
- I've switched from a seagate to a single raptor, and can't believe how much faster everything is.

"thats so much money and you wont get a performance gain worthy of it."
- Its an extra $460 I think to do it, and the performance gain is pretty substantial.

"it really depends, on the temperature in your room, the temp of your cpu, and other things."
- My room actually gets fairly cold. My guess is around 75 or so.

"i doubt the psu will be enough. there is only 13a on the 12v rail. you need at least 30a. "
- Other people are saying the CPU is crap, but I just can't find a good one with covered wires 🙁 I'll take a look for one with 30a, hopefully I will find one that works. Also, most PSUs only have 4 sata power cables, I would have to get a splitter to use more, correct? Would I be better off just buying a PSU that already has enough for the sata power connectors?
 
so, what type of IMPORTANT data do you have that warrants you to get mirroring raid? I think 4 Raptors is a total waste of money. You could upgrade the rest of your system instead.

if you are really that cynical about drive reliability, get SCSI.
 
Alright well to start you should kinda stop saying how stupid everyone's ideas are. I'm not saying that they aren't reading through this and aren't making stupid comments but still say if you don't like their suggestion and leave it at that.
And what do you think about this PSU?
http://www.xoxide.com/coolmax-600w-ez-wires-modular-power-supply.html
I have no idea about the brand or anything but it has more amperage, its only about $30 cheaper and the wires look to be covered for you.
I hope I was some help...
 
Originally posted by: Mr Bob
"use some flavor of a tape drive, they are very reliable and you can take them offsite to store, which may or may not be a bonus."
- That is not a bonus, but I understand how they will work for other situations. A tape drive might be perfect for someone who is just doing a daily backup, but that's not what I need.

"and you would not have to backup daily, you could do it whenever you wanted"
- Every 30 minutes would be best, but I know a tape drive wouldn't be able to do this.

"1. in his particuclar sistuation he could go refurbed 74GB 10-15kr 1 gen on u320 scsi and buy a used raid card, this would be his best bet."
- But this would cost around twice as much, right? $500 for the card, and another $800 or so for the drives?

"2. you didn't specify you need one with covered wire so my suggestion would be to get a good psu and then buy some type of wire cover and put it on. something like a fotron, pc&p, enermax, seasonic, antec in the 450-550W range with 2x12v lines."
- I have a friend who spent a lot of time trying to cover the wires, I would much rather have one already done. I my third reply, I said: "I need a PSU that have covered wires (like the one I linked to), can you find a non crappy one with a covered wires?".

It seems like there are none already done for you, if you decide to get a decent PSU.

This is the type of idiot I am talking about who just say the useless things, that don't even address my question:
from "theman"
get this instead:

Adaptec SCSI RAID Controller 2200S ? $700
8x Seagate Cheetah 15K.4 146GB (ST3146854LW) ? $11,000

that oughta do it.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...


1. as far as the scsi card, i must stres the used part, sure you are going to shell out that much for new stuff, but used scsi stuff is still good because it is built to be enterprise level. i have seen dual channel lsi (0,1) raid cards for $100 used, and 74GB hdds (10-15krpm u320, 1gen old) for ~$100/ea. brand new is a different story.

my opinion is that if my data was that important and my only means of backup was through mirroring hdds, i would go scsi, even if was a little bit more money.

2. as far as psu, take a look at these - Forton, or this OCZ model. either one should be good for you.
 
Why aren't you listening to everyone's suggestions and just shooting them down? They are MUCH better solutions than your's. :shocked:
 
"The raptors put off a lot of heat, and I will need adequate cooling and power for them. I was thinking about using the Thermaltake Kandolf Aluminum case and using this PSU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817101205"

-yes they do, that case looks like the best one on the market. That power supply is real nice, especially with the sleeved cables, it will make a total difference compared to a better one without sleeves since you case has a window and you'll probably be looking in it a lot.

"The case has somewhere around 6+ fans, will this setup be good enough for the 4 raptors?"

- You bet it will be good enough, I would suggest replacing the fans with 4 vantec tornados.

"Any downsides with doing this, other than the price? I already have one raptor, and I can pickup three more for only $480"

- There are no downsides to doing this.

The bottom line is everyone will approach your situation differently, so just go with what you decided. You don't need to convince us with what you are going to do with your own computer. Nobody on this board will provide you a better solution for what you want than yourself.

You keep saying its only $480, but when somebody mentions a SCSI solution you say well that's waayyy too much. If 480 is nothing, how is 1000 something? If your career really depends on how secure your data is I'm sure you could justify spending 10k on a computer to provide yourself with a living. I know graphic designers and video editors that spend over 5k on Mac setups every couple years.
 
" I say get 5 200GB hard drives and set them up in a RAID 5 array. "
- And this addresses my question how?

"You would get much more of a performance increase if you upgraded your CPU or something than if you bought 3 more Raptors... "
- I wanted the additional drives for security.

" Alright well to start you should kinda stop saying how stupid everyone's ideas are. "
- I'm getting tired of all these threads with STUPID comments. Look 2 posts up where someone doesn't even respond to my question.

"still say if you don't like their suggestion and leave it at that. "
- Nah, after awhile people will get upset that they are being treated as they are stupid, and either not reply with stupid comments, or learn from their mistakes.

"its only about $30 cheaper and the wires look to be covered for you"
- Its $25 more expensive, and I was going to cap off my limit at $100. But if this is the only one found, and the others who said my previous choice was crappy, think this one would work great, then I will just settle for paying an extra $25. I would prefer colored covers, but that isn't too bad.

"I hope I was some help..."
- Yup 🙂

"2. as far as psu, take a look at these - Forton, or this OCZ model. either one should be good for you. "
- The Fortron looks great. I don't know why it didn't come up when I was searching it over at Newegg 🙁

" i have seen dual channel lsi (0,1) raid cards for $100 used, and 74GB hdds (10-15krpm u320, 1gen old) for ~$100/ea. "
- I'll have to do some reasearch about used SCSI drives, I already feel a bit weird about using used drives/cpus.

"as far as the scsi card"
- What about if I get an SATA card,that should bring that 15% increase, correct? It would take a load off the cpu from what I understand.

" Why aren't you listening to everyone's suggestions and just shooting them down?"
- I ignored the stupid ones, people who are actually taking the time to give a solution and explain why, I am returning with questions. What reasonable suggestion did I just shoot down?

WOW OSUBeaver is another who actually read my question. Thanks.

"yes they do, that case looks like the best one on the market."
- I was thinking the case, along with the 6 fans, would be enough for the raptors.

"That power supply is real nice, especially with the sleeved cables, it will make a total difference compared to a better one without sleeves since you case has a window and you'll probably be looking in it a lot. "
- A few "experts" on here think otherwise, they say the PSU is a piece of crap. bob4432 linked over to the Fortran PSU which has the sleeved cable, for a similar price, I see no reason why I would NOT take his suggestion. Seems like the Fortran one would be best, it has the cool look, covered wires, decent price, and a good name.

"You bet it will be good enough, I would suggest replacing the fans with 4 vantec tornados. "
- Would I want the 80mm or the 92mm? If budget allows, I might replace my fans with those. Most likely, I will have a 6600gt, 2 dvd drives, a floppy, and a fan controller. So there will be quite a bit of heat.

"The bottom line is everyone will approach your situation differently, so just go with what you decided. You don't need to convince us with what you are going to do with your own computer. Nobody on this board will provide you a better solution for what you want than yourself. "
- Well, I am not an expert, and I need to know what exactly I need to do for having something like what I was thinking would be best. But you are right, I know what I need the end result to be, but it is kind of hard to explain it to some people.

"You keep saying its only $480, but when somebody mentions a SCSI solution you say well that's waayyy too much. If 480 is nothing, how is 1000 something?"
- I did a quick calculation on what it would cost to get the same performance of the raptors, and it came out to be around $1400.

"If your career really depends on how secure your data is I'm sure you could justify spending 10k on a computer to provide yourself with a living"
- I have too many other expenses right now to spend 10k.

"I know graphic designers and video editors that spend over 5k on Mac setups every couple years. "
- My friend just spent 5k on the new G series. The dual processor one, with like 4gb of ram. Makes my setup look like a piece of crap. The nice thing too, is that there were benchmarks showing how the mac dominated other cpus.

BTW, you are the only other person I know (besides myself), that uses quotes instead of [ q ] to quote someone 🙂
 
Mr. Bob sorry to burst your bubble, but if you noticed, I replied earlier with my real thoughts and you got dfensive and shot them down. I was just showing you what you WANTED to hear. Just get what you want and be happy
 
I didn't shoot down you answer. I responded to it saying why it wouldn't work, and asked about the raid. Re-read what I said.

My question was in regards to cooling, and you brought up an idea about burning stuff to CDs.

Btw, thx for reading my question, although it only took you two replies to figure it out, you still did a wonderful job.

Look at my initial post, and read your response.
 
I had 12 WD740GDs in various RAID configurations. Go RAID5 or don't bother.

If you already have a water cooling setup, you can always just add your hard drives to it.

That's a nice case, but there are server cases twice the size for half the cost. I'd look for a PSU with 120mm fan as well for high airflow low noise. this one that is sleeved just like you want.


 
Why would I do a raid 5?

"If you already have a water cooling setup, you can always just add your hard drives to it. "
- No I don't have one already setup.

"That's a nice case, but there are server cases twice the size for half the cost"
- I was looking at either this one, or the Lian Li that was around $300.

"I'd look for a PSU with 120mm fan as well for high airflow low noise. this one that is sleeved just like you want. "
- Someone else suggested this same PSU, however there was a Fortron earlier that looked a bit better. (link:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817104934)
 
RAID 5 is much better than RAID 0, RAID 1, or RAID 1+0... It gives you redundancy, but you only lose 1 drive's worth of storage. You'll save a bunch of money with RAID 5...

If you really want security, go with RAID 5. Also, a Raptor really doesn't yield that much of a performance increase. Anandtech's benchmarks reported them loading apps like ~5 seconds faster... Do you really want to spend an extra $130 on each drive just so you can load things about 5 seconds faster? You can get a new Athlon 64 and motherboard for like $250, then use the remaining $230 to buy a couple big drives and RAID them for data security. Then, you can just use your Raptor as a system/apps drive. That would be just as fast or faster than the setup you were planning, and you get more storage space too.
 
"Do you really want to spend an extra $130 on each drive just so you can load things about 5 seconds faster?"
- Extra 130? The raptors are only $162 shipped.

"Then, you can just use your Raptor as a system/apps drive"
- But that must be mirrored, that way I don't have to spend all the time trying to put the programms and stuff back on my drive.

" RAID 5 is much better than RAID 0, RAID 1, or RAID 1+0"
- I thought raid 5 is just like what I am doing (0+1 i think?), except if a drive dies, my computer still stays on, whereas if I am doing what I was talking about in my first post, I would have to remove the raid, and just use the 2 working drives, while the 3rd one wait until I can find a replacement. Basically, raid 5 makes it so your computer doesnt shut off if just a single drive died. Is that correct?

"You can get a new Athlon 64 and motherboard for like $250"
- I picked out the x2 3800+ with an MSI MB.
 
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