que3jxp 0 Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 A question and a comment Dave... Question - Where I have not yet bothered to play with WHS2011, I am unaware of what has happened since the demise of DE and when you add a logical disk drive as a storage area for WHS2011 to use. I know that in the beta and in the old v1 server, the data on the drive is toast when you add the drive. What happens now? Comment - Based on where TechMule is headed in his thinking and with the work of PCDoc on expanding arrays, I would like to really further the whole debate on the choice of RAID array. From all the thinking and listening (I subscribe to both HSS and BYOB let alone all of the TWiT shows like WW), the one real solid conclusion that it and all my years working with mid to high end HP servers has led me to is: Do not skimp on the RAID card at all. To elaborate, I am advocating that we all seriously look at either $300+ range 4 port cards or the $500 range 8 port cards. These cards not only offer a lot of drives at once, they also offer caching, battery backup on the cards and most importantly, far enhanced performance from the $100-$200 cards that many are looking at. This is usually because there is a powerful dedicated processor on these more expensive cards. I know that this is a lot of $$$ but after reading up on the real world performance and reliability of a Drobo of ANY version, the price/performance for one of these RAID cards is FAR better and delivers more drive handling and only a modest complication vs. BeyondRaid when it is time to expand or modify an existing array. Link to post Share on other sites
ikon 439 Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 A question and a comment Dave... Question - Where I have not yet bothered to play with WHS2011, I am unaware of what has happened since the demise of DE and when you add a logical disk drive as a storage area for WHS2011 to use. I know that in the beta and in the old v1 server, the data on the drive is toast when you add the drive. What happens now? Comment - Based on where TechMule is headed in his thinking and with the work of PCDoc on expanding arrays, I would like to really further the whole debate on the choice of RAID array. From all the thinking and listening (I subscribe to both HSS and BYOB let alone all of the TWiT shows like WW), the one real solid conclusion that it and all my years working with mid to high end HP servers has led me to is: Do not skimp on the RAID card at all. To elaborate, I am advocating that we all seriously look at either $300+ range 4 port cards or the $500 range 8 port cards. These cards not only offer a lot of drives at once, they also offer caching, battery backup on the cards and most importantly, far enhanced performance from the $100-$200 cards that many are looking at. This is usually because there is a powerful dedicated processor on these more expensive cards. I know that this is a lot of $$ but after reading up on the real world performance and reliability of a Drobo of ANY version, the price/performance for one of these RAID cards is FAR better and delivers more drive handling and only a modest complication vs. BeyondRaid when it is time to expand or modify an existing array. Hmmm, I thought PCdoc tried 1 or 2 high end RAID cards and concluded that the performance difference didn't warrant the higher cost. Link to post Share on other sites
que3jxp 0 Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 Hmmm, I thought PCdoc tried 1 or 2 high end RAID cards and concluded that the performance difference didn't warrant the higher cost. If that is the case, then my mistake for missing that. I would agree that there is no need for the higher IOPS that the more expensive card would provide but that higher performance would come into play when expanding an array or when replacing a failed drive. Also, having the battery backup on the card itself is really attractive. Link to post Share on other sites
ikon 439 Posted July 17, 2011 Share Posted July 17, 2011 If that is the case, then my mistake for missing that. I would agree that there is no need for the higher IOPS that the more expensive card would provide but that higher performance would come into play when expanding an array or when replacing a failed drive. Also, having the battery backup on the card itself is really attractive. the higher performance for expansion/rebuild would certainly be nice, but not sure if it's worth that much extra. Individual choice of course, as always. Link to post Share on other sites
Joe_Miner 254 Posted July 17, 2011 Share Posted July 17, 2011 the higher performance for expansion/rebuild would certainly be nice, but not sure if it's worth that much extra. Individual choice of course, as always. I think a big part of the "fun", at least in my view, is building a reliable high performance system on a relative shoestring (i.e. real world & wife approved) budget. Sort of a McGiver approach to design & building a system. I've been very impressed by people's builds that squeeze the most out of a system design while minimizing the VA's drawn from the wall socket. Link to post Share on other sites
que3jxp 0 Posted July 17, 2011 Share Posted July 17, 2011 No question that us the most fun. I work for a fortune 50 company that is cash rich and as squeaky as an old gate hinge. I have had a lot of experience having to do IT projects on the least amount of money that is safe. I have carried this same strategy over to home but with the loss of DE, it has made me reconsider just how cheaply I do my build for 2011. I think if you are building from scratch and you have the extra $$$ to spare on storage components instead of processor or RAM, it is better money spent. You can always get a mobo that allows for decent CPU and RAM options for later. Just spend as little as possible on that aspect. Even so called "slow" AMD processors are far faster than the average person needs for home. Link to post Share on other sites
tojoski 3 Posted July 17, 2011 Share Posted July 17, 2011 I really like the Areca Raid cards and have used several in servers I have built for businesses. I built one with the ARC-1222 with a 1.5TB Raid5 + Hotspare Array and put the OS on the array, I also built a 5TB Raid6 + Hotspare on an ARC-1880i with battery backup. Areca has an EFI bios for the cards so with an EFI server board I was able to install Server 08R2 directly on the 5TB partition. Another great thing about those cards is the ethernet port right on the card that is dedicated for the management. So regardless of what state the server is in, you can connect to the web interface and see whats going on. Yes these are very much out of budget for home use.. I'm running an older generation Intel SRCSAS18e raid card in my home server, with battery backup.. got it on ebay for about $100 Link to post Share on other sites
The Jason 0 Posted July 20, 2011 Share Posted July 20, 2011 Ok, HighPoint. I had a duh moment there. It's a matter of cost right now. I have zero server fundage left and these are the parts I have. You could sell the car.... I'm also running RAID 5 off my motherboard and the write performance is not acceptable (read performance is good, but not great). If I'm streaming a video to the TV and then someone tries to copy a file to that array, the video stutters and even pauses. I was getting about 5 MB/s in RichCopy when I did my migration to this array. I'm about to order a HP2720SGL to correct this. This will be a pain, but if you are having slow writes it would seem more logical to have the RAID 5 on the 620 and the RAID 1 on the motherboard where performance shouldn't be a problem. jO Link to post Share on other sites
ikon 439 Posted July 20, 2011 Share Posted July 20, 2011 (edited) what do people think of Mylex cards?Does anyone know if they're still around? And while I'm asking, what about AMCC cards? I know they're still around. Edited July 20, 2011 by ikon Link to post Share on other sites
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