[Preference?] Two 60GB in RAID 0 or one 40GB program disk, one 80GB storage disk (IDE)?

[StattlichPassat]

These days we here a lot of hype about RAID and its many benefits and few downfalls, but it is right for everyone? I've also heard that RAID can sometimes be unreliable, and I wonder if it's really just a hobbyist/power user's storage medium. Is it stable and secure enough for a mission critical corporate work enviroment, or is sticking to traditional tried-and-true single IDE drives still the most legit way to go?

In your experience and preference, what storage setup would you rather recommend to a corporation looking for high-end, 3D number crunching, 2GHz+, mission critical, 24x7 computer systems for their senior engineers?

A.) Dual 60GB IDE setup striped under RAID 0
B.) One 40GB IDE program disk (Windows XP, AutoCAD, etc) and one 80GB IDE storage disk (AutoCAD projects, MP3s, video files, et al)

-Chris

 

[Demonicon]

B

Mission critical and Raid 0 don't belong in the same sentence 🙂

I love my Raid setup, but unlike most users, I backup data I don't want to lose 😀

 

[StattlichPassat]

That's what I was having a feeling on as well- thanks for your post!

 

[Maggotry]

<< B

Mission critical and Raid 0 don't belong in the same sentence 🙂 >>


Damn straight.



<< I backup data I don't want to lose 😀 >>


Damn straight (again).

 

[StattlichPassat]

I design workstations that should be able to withstand being left on 24x7 for years at a time and abuse everyday, so every single aspect must be certified to provide bulletproof reliability. I've heard a lot about the awesome speeds you can get with RAID, but I wasn't sure about its dependability in starting to offer this storage medium to my clients.

I think this the overall consensus. Anyone else?

 

[NeonFlak]

I have never had a raid 0 setup fail by it's own means. I have however had them fail because dieing harddrives. However, if this is a big corporation and you do decide to go raid 0, I would plan on setting up some type of back-up system. I work for a major technology and finicial firm. And let me just say that no matter how good the hardware is somehow some of these users find ways to break their computers once a week. The raid setup may increase productivity, but I would setup some type of back-up system just for piece of mind.

 

[StattlichPassat]

...like RAID 1? Doesn't that create a redundant drive in case one fails? What kinds of drives are you using that fail?

 

[N11]

All depends on whether you want to give up a little speed in the process of creating your redundancy.

If you're looking for 365x24x7 uptime and hardcore reliablity then I would suggest no less than RAID 5.

Four 36GB 15ks in RAID 5. That should do the trick on those workstations.

I'm not sure I really understand the purpose of hte enterprise server level mission critical status on these workstatations. What kind of workstations are these?

 

[StattlichPassat]

Well, my systems are *designed* for this kind of work enviroment- they probably will not always be operating like this. In my situation, I think RAID 5 is actually overkill. The workstations are high-end AMD Athlon XP rigs and Athlon MP systems for the most part right now. Might be doing Xeons later, but it's just AMDs best for now.

 

[ObiDon]

The ONLY thing I use my Raid 0 for is raw video capturing and since I don't think senior engineers will be doing any of that, I vote for B 🙂

Also, if there is going to be a lot of HUGE file copying or moving, your drive-to-drive performance (with the 40GB+80GB setup) will probably save a lot of time versus partition-to-partition copying on the Raid 0 setup.
If you will be making system backups with something like Ghost, it will also be a LOT faster to backup the 40GB into a file on the 80GB drive (instead of partition-to-partition) which you could then put onto your favorite media...assuming you're not going with some sort of tape backup system.

 

[StattlichPassat]

Ok cool. Yeah, I was thinking of making an image of the 40GB onto the 80GB, and still have at least 40GB left on the 80GB drive for storage still.