Cheap RAID for BSD?

[groovin]

im looking for some cheap ATA RAID 1 cards for FreeBSD ( OpenBSD too, but right now more for Free ).

anyone use anything? when i mean cheap, I mean less than 100.

 

[cmetz]

Use the RaidFrame software RAID code.

 

[groovin]

raidframe? not familar with it... googling it now....

 

[cleverhandle]

On OpenBSD at least, RaidFrame is your only option at that price point. The absolute cheapest hardware card supported is 3ware, and that's neither cheap nor supported all that well.

And why is this in Networking?

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

Originally posted by: cleverhandle
On OpenBSD at least, RaidFrame is your only option at that price point. The absolute cheapest hardware card supported is 3ware, and that's neither cheap nor supported all that well.

And why is this in Networking?

You're kinda networking the drives together 😉

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: cleverhandle
On OpenBSD at least, RaidFrame is your only option at that price point. The absolute cheapest hardware card supported is 3ware, and that's neither cheap nor supported all that well.

And why is this in Networking?

ebay has some decent deals on 3ware stuff (2 second check). 😉

 

[cleverhandle]

Good point - those are indeed some pretty sweet deals. Better than the usual savings, it seems. For FreeBSD, that might be a good option. But be warned that on OpenBSD, you can only rebuild arrays from the BIOS, not from within the OS. So if you're shooting for fairly high availability, that may not be the best option.

 

[cmetz]

The problem here is that groovin set a price point that precludes a good solution to the problem. You want high availability, you've gotta pay for it. If you're just looking to be able to survive a hard drive failure (and who isn't, with IDE drives these days!) then software RAID is the best bang for the buck.

 

[Nothinman]

Why not use software mirroring? I know FreeBSD has vinum and some other softraid driver, not sure about OpenBSD though.

 

[groovin]

i accidentally dropped this in networking.

the 3ware 7000 series are supported by FreeBSD and I can find them on pricewatch for around 110+shipping... i think that would be a good bet...

you guys got me curious about software RAID though, i dont know much about it. can someone explain it to me a bit?

thanks again guys!

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: groovin
i accidentally dropped this in networking.

the 3ware 7000 series are supported by FreeBSD and I can find them on pricewatch for around 110+shipping... i think that would be a good bet...

you guys got me curious about software RAID though, i dont know much about it. can someone explain it to me a bit?

thanks again guys!

You know what RAID is. In this case software handles the RAID instead of hardware. Much like Promise ATA RAID cards and whatnot. Do a search on misc@ for raid and you will get information on OpenBSD and software raid.

 

[groovin]

im going to experiment with it a bit...

im going to grab a 3ware card in the meantime. has anyone worked with 3ware on FreeBSD? just wondering how well they work together.

 

[Soybomb]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Why not use software mirroring? I know FreeBSD has vinum and some other softraid driver, not sure about OpenBSD though.

Perhaps its just me but I HATED vinum and will not touch it again 😀

 

[cleverhandle]

I use RaidFrame on an OpenBSD box and am quite happy with it. Like any software RAID solution, the pitfall is that, if/when disaster strikes, you really need to know the right commands to rebuild everything properly. When you're sitting there with important data on the single functional disk of a two disk mirror, you can't afford a typo. Hardware solutions are generally a lot simpler to deal with. I would say that if you're deploying several machines software RAID becomes a better solution, both because the cost savings add up and because you're getting more familiar with the commands and tools. For a single machine that won't be maintained very often, especially if someone else will be maintaining it, a hardware solution would be well worth the money even for a simple two disk mirror.

 

[Nothinman]

Perhaps its just me but I HATED vinum and will not touch it again

I never used vinum, I just know it exists =) I've only really had experience with md and lvm on Linux, both of which work really well.

 

[groovin]

i was already expecting to buy new HDs for these gateways ... theyre cheap. and now, looking at ebay and pricewatch, 100-something for 2 new 3ware Escalades doesnt look bad at all. im only making 4 of these gateways... and i already have the rest of the hardware so 100something+cost of HD's is nothing compared to new appliance solutions.