Trying to decide... Raid 0 setup

[Zumbador]

I've got four WD6400AAKS drives coming in. I was originally planning to setup two RAID 0s with two discs each (video editing setup), but am wondering if I should set up a single 4 disc RAID 0 instead. Pros/Cons? Thanks.

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

Is this your only machine and only storage config on the box? Or do you have another system that you will be storing the video on? Also, what are the specs of the rest of the machine, and what controller are you going to be using for this RAID array?

 

[MerlinRML]

Originally posted by: Zumbador
I've got four WD6400AAKS drives coming in. I was originally planning to setup two RAID 0s with two discs each (video editing setup), but am wondering if I should set up a single 4 disc RAID 0 instead. Pros/Cons? Thanks.

4 640GB in RAID 0 will be roughly 2.4TB. Windows XP 32-bit cannot access more than 2TB of a single array, so if that's your OS of choice you will lose a decent chunk of space with one 4 drive array.

In terms of performance characteristics, random access of a 4 drive RAID 0 is similar to a 2 drive RAID 0. Sustained transfer rate will basically increase with each disk you add, so the 4 drive RAID 0 will approximately double the STR of the 2 drive RAID 0.

In terms of failure, any drive failure will result in data loss. If you use a 4 drive array, one failure will lose all data. If you have 2 separate arrays, you will only lose the data on one array and still have one functioning array. If uptime is more important than data protection, you will still be functional with 1 array in the event of a single failure.

 

[Nothinman]

4 640GB in RAID 0 will be roughly 2.4TB. Windows XP 32-bit cannot access more than 2TB of a single array, so if that's your OS of choice you will lose a decent chunk of space with one 4 drive array.

I'd be highly surprised if that were true. Sure you need to use a GUID partition table to make a single volume >2TB because PC BIOS partition tables can't address that much space but that's it.

 

[BoboKatt]

I have always believed in 2 personally. One that you read from and one that you write to... this to ensure you don't have the same drive/array reading and writing at the same time which kills performance. Unless you have a separate HD for your OS and there you also keep your raw files that require editing and from there you do the eventual edited result to the array.

 

[MerlinRML]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

4 640GB in RAID 0 will be roughly 2.4TB. Windows XP 32-bit cannot access more than 2TB of a single array, so if that's your OS of choice you will lose a decent chunk of space with one 4 drive array.

I'd be highly surprised if that were true. Sure you need to use a GUID partition table to make a single volume >2TB because PC BIOS partition tables can't address that much space but that's it.

Windows XP 32-bit does not support GPT disks. As such, it does not support greater than 2TB disk. Windows XP 64-bit, Vista, Server 2003 (with SP1), and Server 2008 all support GPT disks and can access the space over 2TB. I will note that I have not run with XP SP3 yet, so there's a slight chance that Microsoft added GPT support to it, but I've seen no mention of it.

Windows XP can support dynamic disks and stripe across multiple 2TB disks, but the problem is that the space above 2TB on a single disk cannot be used.

You should feel free to doubt, and I highly encourage you to try it for yourself. If you have a contradictory experience, I would very much like to know how you were able to get it working.

 

[Nothinman]

Windows XP 32-bit does not support GPT disks.

That's pretty retarded considering that XP64 can read them fine so the code is obviously there. I guess this is just one more thing to add to my list of reasons why I'm glad I don't run Windows any more.