ssd/hdd on hybrid raid 1 vs. hybrid drives on raid10

[dogdaynoon]

Hello all,
I was wondering if anyone had any feedback on the following configurations and what would be a better scenario for speed.

OS is windows 7 pro 64 bit - Processor i7 4930k on supermicro board X9SRA

the two options i was thinking about are as follows:
Using an Adaptec 6405 controller with 2x 450GB crucial SSD and 2x 500GB WD Black spinners set up in a hybrid array as RAID 1.

next:
no controller card and use 4x 500GB Seagate Hybrid Drives in a RAID 10 setup.

I have heard good things about he adaptec card and hybrid arrays but i have not tried it. I am curious though.


Thanks for your input,
dogdaynoon

 

[Scarpozzi]

Your better scenario for speed is to go with a few of the 450GB SSDs as a system/boot partition in RAID1 or 4 of them in a RAID10.... Then setup a slower partition on D: for programs and files that you don't need to run so fast.

The 6405 is fine. Consider a backup battery if you have the budget. It'll hold your memory if the power goes out when your write-cache is in use (if enabled) Otherwise, consider disabling it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...tem=16-103-225

Hybrid arrays are all about businesses that can't afford to buy a shelf SSD because EMC and other mainstream storage vendors charge an arm and a leg for supported drives. I don't know what they are these days, but they used to be $2k a disk where a SAS or SATA attached SSD could be had for far less at BestBuy.

These prices have come down a lot, but most of the hybrid technology is all being handled either internally like with the Seagates or with block-level tiering (EMC, Compellent and others are doing similar things to move data to faster storage as it's accessed more fequently)

For a Windows 7 Pro system, that's way overkill because the management layer would be too much of a cost (configuration and design).

You could do your option 2, but I don't trust those drives until I know how they handle failures...I feel like SSD + hard drive in one case = 2 failure points with a higher replacement cost

Going the traditional route of a split array system will give you the most bang for your buck in Speed and Storage. 480-500GB SSDs are $230-250 a piece on sale....Add that to some WD Reds, or Blacks in a RAID1 @ 1-3TB each and you'll have speed and capacity. They all have decent seek time.

 

[dogdaynoon]

thanks for the detailed response.

I feel the adaptec would be overkill as well but was thinking it would be a good option to keep in mind for a workstation. Storage isn't a necessity as this will be a workstation with storage out on a network.

I think that 2 or 4 X 500GB ssd on a raid 1 or 10 would probably suffice very well.

but you have raised a new question for me.
Say I put OS and software on an ssd array and storage on a spinning hybrid drive array.

How bad might work flow be affected if i needed to access files from the storage array? Like for video processing or editing? Could this potentially cause freeze ups if program is installed on C and files on slower D?