Can Norton 2001's Speed disk be used to defrag a RAID array? Is it a good/bad idea to defrag an array? Would defragging screw up the striping (mode 0)? Reason I ask is...RAID puposely fragments files to multiple disks, would defragging undo what RAID is accomplishing?
Defragging a RAID array???
- Thread starter andygold
- Start date
hey, i don't have an answer to your question but i do have a question about RAID0. my friends dad has his sys built on a RAID0 with 2 30gig drives. after he set it up he only has 30gig's total. is this right?
i've heard from other people that say each drive has to be on a seperate ribbion cable in order for it to work(both on master of that controller). he's extremely stubern and says that he has it right and you loose the second hd to gain the performance. I say bull crap.
Anyway. can you tell me how excatly you got your setup so i can make him see that he's doing it wrong.
If you would please email me back.
Thanks for the help
i've heard from other people that say each drive has to be on a seperate ribbion cable in order for it to work(both on master of that controller). he's extremely stubern and says that he has it right and you loose the second hd to gain the performance. I say bull crap.
Anyway. can you tell me how excatly you got your setup so i can make him see that he's doing it wrong.
If you would please email me back.
Thanks for the help
Andy- I have a raid 0 array of 2 22gxps on a Promise Fasttrack 66. I have run norton speeddisk on it and I don't see a noticeable improvement on the drive but I do it anyways becasue I want a clean organized drive. Raid only means that certain areas of the drive are reserved for certrain areas. I notice no speed changes with a fragmented / unfragged drive but I do it anyways cause I'm picky.
PC_Freak- My setup is a Raid 0 array of 2 Ibm 22gxp 18 gig each.This array gives me a total of 36 gigs of HD space. It looks like your friends dad has his array in raid 1. this is data mirroring and is useful for backup purposes. If its in raido 0 (striping) it combines the drives into 1 drive. (like mine)
Also if the drives are IDE (like mine again) then its best to have th drives on different chains (so you can move info on each chain at the high speed possible instead of fighting for speed)
you get more speed with double masters. I;m doing double mastered.
Gatsby
PC_Freak- My setup is a Raid 0 array of 2 Ibm 22gxp 18 gig each.This array gives me a total of 36 gigs of HD space. It looks like your friends dad has his array in raid 1. this is data mirroring and is useful for backup purposes. If its in raido 0 (striping) it combines the drives into 1 drive. (like mine)
Also if the drives are IDE (like mine again) then its best to have th drives on different chains (so you can move info on each chain at the high speed possible instead of fighting for speed)
you get more speed with double masters. I;m doing double mastered.
Gatsby
Definitely something wrong with his setup. I have a KT7-RAID, with 2 30Gig IBM's, which show up as one 60Gig drive [C:]. Both are setup as Masters, on individual channels(IDE3 & IDE4),using separate cables.
I'm not exactly sure if they must both be set up as masters, but I know that it is recommended that they be placed on separate channels. Also, as far as I know, ATA66 cables must be installed in a definite way...there is a Master connector(black), and a Slave connector(typically the one in the middle(grey), as well as one connector which is dedicated to be inserted into the Mobo(blue).
I would connect the drives as per above, and then Fdisk/format/Ctrl H(to setup array)/install OS (mind you that he will LOSE ALL DATA). Then when Windows is installed, it should come up as one drive of 60Gig. Run a benchmark to test the drive(s)performance to show him the lousy throughput he is currently getting. This should be enough to convince him that he is not arrayed properly.
It is also possible that he might have set up the array as RAID1(mirroring), and not RAID0(striping). This would only show up as a total of 30Gig, and not 60Gig. As such there would be no improvement in reads, and writes, but his data would be more secure.
I'm not exactly sure if they must both be set up as masters, but I know that it is recommended that they be placed on separate channels. Also, as far as I know, ATA66 cables must be installed in a definite way...there is a Master connector(black), and a Slave connector(typically the one in the middle(grey), as well as one connector which is dedicated to be inserted into the Mobo(blue).
I would connect the drives as per above, and then Fdisk/format/Ctrl H(to setup array)/install OS (mind you that he will LOSE ALL DATA). Then when Windows is installed, it should come up as one drive of 60Gig. Run a benchmark to test the drive(s)performance to show him the lousy throughput he is currently getting. This should be enough to convince him that he is not arrayed properly.
It is also possible that he might have set up the array as RAID1(mirroring), and not RAID0(striping). This would only show up as a total of 30Gig, and not 60Gig. As such there would be no improvement in reads, and writes, but his data would be more secure.
please go read the raid write-ups at arstechnica and tomshardware.
yes, you can defrag. NO it does not undo what RAID accomplishes. you have to realize that to the OS, for the most part, the array is ONE real drive. and you CAN defrag, and it DOES help.
for those of you who don't know what raid is EXACTLY, you can't comment, you can only make yourself foolish, and me frown... like i made myself foolish and made others frown so many years ago ;-)
yes, you can defrag. NO it does not undo what RAID accomplishes. you have to realize that to the OS, for the most part, the array is ONE real drive. and you CAN defrag, and it DOES help.
for those of you who don't know what raid is EXACTLY, you can't comment, you can only make yourself foolish, and me frown... like i made myself foolish and made others frown so many years ago ;-)
Pc Freak, Andy Gold. That stubborn guy is right and you guys better do some research, stripping doubles the performance, mirroring does not, imagine this, you have 1 hand, then you're supposed to write from 1 to 10, now imagine using both hands, the other writing the odd no., the other hand writing the even no. You get the idea? If you want to know more about Raid, read Maximum PC, they'll explain everything you know about raid, i'm surprised people give wrong informations. The purpose of Raid (Redundant Arrays of Inexpensive Drives) is to speed things up and not to add drives for more storage space, thus a 2 30gibabyte drives only has a 30 giga capacity since both drives are stripped w/ data,thus they're called stripping. If you have 60 and not 30 as a total then that wouldn't be a RAID setup, just 2 drives each having 30 gigabyte capacity.
Hey PC freak, check your setup, I don't think you know what you're talking about. Read more about RAID.
Anyways, here's a link to explain how RAID Array works.
http://discussions.hardwarecentral.com/Forum4/HTML/003866.html
http://discussions.hardwarecentral.com/Forum4/HTML/003866.html
Amaretto: I beg to differ....In RAID0, 2 30Gigs equals 1 very fast 60 Gig drive. In RAID1, 2 30Gigs equals a total of 30Gigs with each drive having identical data, giving you more security. Yes, I agree, research is a good thing 
I ask you to read an article written by Anand. Look at page 2, and you will see the error of your ways. It says something like(I do not want to plagiarize); a RAID array is made up of at least 2 drives, preferably identical drives, where the total drive space is the capacity of the smallest drive in the array(that's why identical is preferred), multiplied by the total number of drives. If you had 4 drives, 3 of them 20's, and one of them a 10Gig for example, then you would take the smallest capacity (10), and multiply it by 4, giving you a total of 40Gig.
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.html?i=913&p=1
I ask you to read an article written by Anand. Look at page 2, and you will see the error of your ways. It says something like(I do not want to plagiarize); a RAID array is made up of at least 2 drives, preferably identical drives, where the total drive space is the capacity of the smallest drive in the array(that's why identical is preferred), multiplied by the total number of drives. If you had 4 drives, 3 of them 20's, and one of them a 10Gig for example, then you would take the smallest capacity (10), and multiply it by 4, giving you a total of 40Gig.
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.html?i=913&p=1
Amarreto... (rebuttals)
That stubborn guy is right and you guys better do some research, stripping doubles the performance, mirroring does not,
striping does not *double* performance per se. It does increase it dramatically. It might double but thats hte best case scenario I believe.
The purpose of Raid (Redundant Arrays of Inexpensive Drives) is to speed things up and not to add drives for more storage space, thus a 2 30gibabyte drives only has a 30 giga capacity since both drives are stripped w/ data,thus they're called stripping. If you have 60 and not 30 as a total then that wouldn't be a RAID setup, just 2 drives each having 30 gigabyte capacity.
This is incorrect. You are just focusing on maxpc's goal of striping only. If you go to higher levels of raid ie raid 1 there is no speed difference and might actually by a speed reduction but the point of raid 1 is to mirror all data in and out so if somethung breaks you can restore instantly. no down time
Raid 5 is when you have 4 drives. 1 stripped drive and 1 mirror drive. The goal of this is for speed and redundcany. It makes sure that you have a stripped array and a mirror for it. For instance. if a stripped drive goes down then you can swap to the mirrored array and its still safe.
Although you do focus a lot on stripped arrays, mirrored arrays are what people do use raid for. It saves the time and hassle of backups.
And this experience I have is from personal experience. I did hvae a mirroed array ofr a small but.. Till I decided I don't need data security.. I got a burner.. and went for speed. If i had more drives I'd do a bigger array but.. no cash.
Gatsby
That stubborn guy is right and you guys better do some research, stripping doubles the performance, mirroring does not,
striping does not *double* performance per se. It does increase it dramatically. It might double but thats hte best case scenario I believe.
The purpose of Raid (Redundant Arrays of Inexpensive Drives) is to speed things up and not to add drives for more storage space, thus a 2 30gibabyte drives only has a 30 giga capacity since both drives are stripped w/ data,thus they're called stripping. If you have 60 and not 30 as a total then that wouldn't be a RAID setup, just 2 drives each having 30 gigabyte capacity.
This is incorrect. You are just focusing on maxpc's goal of striping only. If you go to higher levels of raid ie raid 1 there is no speed difference and might actually by a speed reduction but the point of raid 1 is to mirror all data in and out so if somethung breaks you can restore instantly. no down time
Raid 5 is when you have 4 drives. 1 stripped drive and 1 mirror drive. The goal of this is for speed and redundcany. It makes sure that you have a stripped array and a mirror for it. For instance. if a stripped drive goes down then you can swap to the mirrored array and its still safe.
Although you do focus a lot on stripped arrays, mirrored arrays are what people do use raid for. It saves the time and hassle of backups.
And this experience I have is from personal experience. I did hvae a mirroed array ofr a small but.. Till I decided I don't need data security.. I got a burner.. and went for speed. If i had more drives I'd do a bigger array but.. no cash.
Gatsby
Tell you what, look at what PC freak wrote and Andy gold and just read the link I provided, geez, I dont have the whole thing written on my head so just read the article. Those guys were way,way off more than me and I'm the one who gets the spankin, like I said, read the link I provided.
Amaretto: I did read the link. I've learned not to believe everything I see in print(from only one source that is). As to a spankin, not from me...just trying to help PC_FREAK's friend's DAD with his problem. Hey, if nothing else, maybe we both learned something today from this forum. Stay cool
Forums are for the exchange of ideas, as well as asking questions, and gaining knowledge. I started this thread because I was unsure about defragging an array. I learned something from someone who had more knowledge than me. If you disagree with something you find here, at least that gives you the incentive to look elsewhere to back up your claims, or to verify the claims of others. No offense taken, and hopefully no offense offered by me either
But you gotta admit, those people at Max PC knows their stuff, I'd still believe what they say over what other people say. So if they said Raid0 blah,blah,blah, and another person post otherwise, which would you believe? There's a reason they work for Maximum PC, or any other magazine that caters to Computer freaks. THEY KNOW THEIR STUFF!!!
AndyGold, my mistake, I just read the thread again, it's not you I'm referring to, it's Gatsby and PC Freak, I'm a speed reader that's why. It's their opinion that I'm contradicting, it doesn't even have anything to do w/ your question. Sorry bout that.
It was Gatsby who mentioned mirrored drives, unlike you Pc freak I don't read this threat over and over, I just browse through it.
Since i just got back from class..
Amaretto... Could you please clarify your problem with what I said.. I want to know why you are saying I'm wrong.. maybe I am.. maybe I'm not.. but.. we'll find out.
Gatsby
Amaretto... Could you please clarify your problem with what I said.. I want to know why you are saying I'm wrong.. maybe I am.. maybe I'm not.. but.. we'll find out.
Gatsby
Kappo
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- Aug 18, 2000
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gatsby:
dood you are correct on the raid setups...EVERY SINGLE one of our workstations here at work use some sort of RAID setup...
Raid0 is striping - striping is (2)30 gig HD's that have data spread over BOTH drives for a total of 60 gig...faster performance but zero fault tolerance
Raid1 is mirroring - mirroring is (2) 30 gid HD's that have identical data on both for a total storage capacity of 30gig (1 for use and 1 for the mirror)...acually slows performance in my expirence but hey...if your HD goes out you got another one, right?
dood you are correct on the raid setups...EVERY SINGLE one of our workstations here at work use some sort of RAID setup...
Raid0 is striping - striping is (2)30 gig HD's that have data spread over BOTH drives for a total of 60 gig...faster performance but zero fault tolerance
Raid1 is mirroring - mirroring is (2) 30 gid HD's that have identical data on both for a total storage capacity of 30gig (1 for use and 1 for the mirror)...acually slows performance in my expirence but hey...if your HD goes out you got another one, right?
Kappo..
I believe Raid 1 does allow an instant swap if somethinf craps out. its never happened to me so I would not know definetively.
Gatsby
I believe Raid 1 does allow an instant swap if somethinf craps out. its never happened to me so I would not know definetively.
Gatsby
I dont think hotswapping is dependant on a RAID configuration, I believe it has to be an 80 pin SCA drive to be hotswapable.
UPDATE : or not, I'm still looking into that.
UPDATE : or not, I'm still looking into that.
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