3 X Raptor 150 on Intels Matrix Raid 0

Well, I must say I am happy with my results but we have hit a new conclusion and discovery with Intels Matrix Raid 0. We all assumed that with increasing the capacity by adding more drives, while at the same time keeping a SMALL boot slice in Raid 0, the matrix would continue to decrease access time and increase sustained read. For the Raptors I went from an 8.5ms access time in single drive configuration to a 6.2ms Matrix Raid 0 access time. We all though by adding another drive we would theoretically continue to decrease access time. This assumption is false. My access time remained exactly the same and for this benchmark, even increased .1ms.

My older Raid 0 Matrix benchmarks had my 2 X Raptor 150's HDTached at:
175.5 Sustained Read and 6.2ms access time.

My newer Raid 0 Matrix benchmarks of 3 X Raptor 150's are HDTached at:
260 Sustained Read and 6.3ms access time.

http://strippoli.com/raid3drive.JPG

So, that equates to an increase of 85 MB/s transfer and a mild increase (not decrease) of .1 ms access time. I must say, I am happy but I truly believed like everyone else that access time would drop below 6.0.

Also, anyone new to Matrix Raid I would highly recommend reading Bings thread here:http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=467848

To anyone interested in Matrix raid, I recently answered a Private Message question that another OCForums member asked me. Here was my response:

THE MATRIX
Its called Matrix Raid and its quite awesome actually. It lets you physically create slices (not partitions) out of your drives which forces the system to read/write from the fastest portion of the platters. In a sense faking creation of a physical drive smaller than it actually is. You really have to try it out for yourself to actually look and decipher the difference between a slice and a partition. A slice would not allow the outer portions past the drives max capacity to be read in HDTach or other benchmarks where as a partition would still technically include the entire hard disks capacitys.

In my case, I am using 3X 150 gig Raptor X's with a total capacity of 450 GB in Raid 0. I will be setting up my rig with 2 slices, which tells the system they are 2 seperate HDD's.

Slice #1 = 20 GB Total (6.6 GB's each drive) Raid 0
Slice #2 = 430 GB Total (143.3 GB's each drive) Raid 0

Since Slice #1 is only using the first 6.6GB's of each drive to create a 20GB boot drive, each platter gives you incredible sustained read/write transfer rates and should theoretically drop random access time significantly for me with the speedy Raptors. (Please note: Random Access time stock is 8.5ms on the Raptors) It puts the old NVRaid AMD Raid Controller to shame.

As far as real world performance, the gain is very noticeable. With the introduction of Matrix raid and HDD slicing it is even more apparent.

Slice #2 implements the rest of the 430GB Capacity into a humongous Raid 0 disk with a very good STR and access time, but no where near as fast as the first boot slice. I will be using the 2nd 430GB slice for data/software/music/etc.

Our super speedy Slice#1 will be used for windows xp boot, benchmarking, gaming, and heavily accessed main applications.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deathman20

Wow... Suprisingly my drives keep up quiet well.

I hit 232MB/s and have seeks of ~9.5ms Not bad for 3x 320gigs with a 150Gig Partition hehe.

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Its the seek time that I am really after, not so much the STR. A seek of 6.3ms is very quick and definitely the first thing you notice with the raptor raid setup. First you start out with a single Raptor 150 with an average seek between 8.1 and 8.5. Putting that into a 2,3, or 4 drive matrix config cuts the seek time down completely by 2ms. That is very substantial. Heck anything at or below 9.5ms is noticeably faster than the 11,12,13,14 ms HDD's. But, your setup is killer. Especially for the pricetag and cutting down the seek to 9.5ms is a definite noticeable difference in performance. I have almost come to the conclusion that when using Raptors, unless you are after video editing or server level I/O's, a 2 X 150 Raptor setup may be the best config in the high end price/performance category versus more of them. It seems that anything after 2 drives actually may increase the seek time, when our theorys think otherwise. I am a gamer and benchmarker so I am fully after dropping seek time. Those STR's dont really mean that much to me although its nice to have close to 300 MB/s on 3 drives. I would think a 3 or 4 drive Raptor Matrix setup would be absolutely killer for a hardcore video editor. For a hardcore gamer, 2 drives is looking like the hot ticket.

I may even downgrade to 2 drives again because I was hoping for a sub 6ms seek time. And I dont think purchasing another 150 will help my config, or my wallet. lol

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deathman20

Wahoo quoted :) Hehe

Well isn't it suppose to increase times when you add raid just due to the controllers latencey and communicating back and forth?

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Yes, but..... lol
And the but is the cool part. With the Matrix and the ability to continue slicing down drives it should decrease, at least by theory. Example:

Single Raptor(non raid) - 1 Drive, 150GB single drive partition = 8.1 to 8.5ms
2 X Raptor 150 - 2 Drives, 10GB each drive, 1 slice = 6.2ms
3 X Raptor 150 - 3 Drives, 6.6GB each drive, 1 slice = 6.3ms

Our theory was that once we actually reach the third drive and continuously decrease the used capacity of each drive that the readable portion of each platter would shrink, and continue to decrease access time because the drive would have less of a distance to tinker on the platter. As you can see in a 2 drive configuration, that theory holds true. But it looks as though after 2 drives on the matrix, we have something else impacting seek times as you stated such as controller, and latency, or perhaps the actual lowest physical seek time on the disk. If that makes any sense. Technically by looking at that data you would think that 6.6GB readable portion per drive would seek better than 10GB per drive on the platter. Maybe anything 10GB and under produces exactly the same results? I will need to do some more research. I was truly hoping to prove myself wrong and get those killer sub 6ms seek times.
Cheers. :beer:

Man, that's definitely something....wish they had a PCI/PCIe card for that....having more than 4 drives in various configs would be sweeeeet.

EDIT: and the slices....are just great :) If you had 2 drives, you could do RAID-1 on the remaining chunk as well....lotsa options :)

I thought matrix raid was a 2 drive only deal and it was a combo of raid 0 and raid 1 across both drives.

Nice results.. I do have two quick question.

1. In SATA, Raid is just MIrror and Stripe. And AHCI is for matrix.. is that right?

2. With the same 3 HD, would Raid 0 be faster on RAID 0 or Raid 0 via AHCI?

SAD

I do have one question - how fast do you copy from/to the same slice?
Take Total Commander or anything that allows non-cached copy (set it via preferences->Copy/Move), and copy a large file to the same slice (say a GB big).

I found nvRaid to have great STR, but worthless copy speeds compared to EX8350, which is the only reason I am using this crap of a 300MB/s top STR card :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Speederlander

I thought matrix raid was a 2 drive only deal and it was a combo of raid 0 and raid 1 across both drives.

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You are wrong and right at the same time. Thats whats so great about Intels Matrix. You can actually use from 2 to 4 drives and create as many slices as the capacity allows. You could theoretically have a 20GB Raid 0, a 60GB Raid0, a 50 GB Raid1.. Anything that you need is created when you first setup the array. You can use multiple combinations of Raid slices because it technically creates fake physical drives. This matrix boot rom will not allow you to create the array until you finalize your setup at the beginning and use all of the drives combined capacity to create slice preferences.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SuAsDu

Nice results.. I do have two quick question.

1. In SATA, Raid is just MIrror and Stripe. And AHCI is for matrix.. is that right?

2. With the same 3 HD, would Raid 0 be faster on RAID 0 or Raid 0 via AHCI?

SAD

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1-For SATA, Raid is Matrix and so is AHCI.....
2-I only have experience with Raid 0 on SATA Matrix config, not AHCI so I have no data or examples for you. I apologize.

Thanks for the comments.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deathman20

Wow... Suprisingly my drives keep up quiet well.

I hit 232MB/s and have seeks of ~9.5ms Not bad for 3x 320gigs with a 150Gig Partition hehe.

---

Its the seek time that I am really after, not so much the STR. A seek of 6.3ms is very quick and definitely the first thing you notice with the raptor raid setup. First you start out with a single Raptor 150 with an average seek between 8.1 and 8.5. Putting that into a 2,3, or 4 drive matrix config cuts the seek time down completely by 2ms. That is very substantial. Heck anything at or below 9.5ms is noticeably faster than the 11,12,13,14 ms HDD's. But, your setup is killer. Especially for the pricetag and cutting down the seek to 9.5ms is a definite noticeable difference in performance. I have almost come to the conclusion that when using Raptors, unless you are after video editing or server level I/O's, a 2 X 150 Raptor setup may be the best config in the high end price/performance category versus more of them. It seems that anything after 2 drives actually may increase the seek time, when our theorys think otherwise. I am a gamer and benchmarker so I am fully after dropping seek time. Those STR's dont really mean that much to me although its nice to have close to 300 MB/s on 3 drives. I would think a 3 or 4 drive Raptor Matrix setup would be absolutely killer for a hardcore video editor. For a hardcore gamer, 2 drives is looking like the hot ticket.

I may even downgrade to 2 drives again because I was hoping for a sub 6ms seek time. And I dont think purchasing another 150 will help my config, or my wallet. lol

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vapor

Man, that's definitely something....wish they had a PCI/PCIe card for that....having more than 4 drives in various configs would be sweeeeet.

EDIT: and the slices....are just great :) If you had 2 drives, you could do RAID-1 on the remaining chunk as well....lotsa options :)

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Thanks for the props Vapor.
That is correct you could theoretically create 2 or more physical drives at the same time for performance and for safety/security.
Example: Drive 1- 20GB boot slice in Raid 0
Drive 2 - Remaining 430GB's broken down into a single 143GB, 3 ways to create a Raid 1.

Its a great system. I am glad I made the move to Conroe. It seems all the technology is currently with Intel.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by deathman20

Wahoo quoted :) Hehe

Well isn't it suppose to increase times when you add raid just due to the controllers latencey and communicating back and forth?

---

Yes, but..... lol
And the but is the cool part. With the Matrix and the ability to continue slicing down drives it should decrease, at least by theory. Example:

Single Raptor(non raid) - 1 Drive, 150GB single drive partition = 8.1 to 8.5ms
2 X Raptor 150 - 2 Drives, 10GB each drive, 1 slice = 6.2ms
3 X Raptor 150 - 3 Drives, 6.6GB each drive, 1 slice = 6.3ms

Our theory was that once we actually reach the third drive and continuously decrease the used capacity of each drive that the readable portion of each platter would shrink, and continue to decrease access time because the drive would have less of a distance to tinker on the platter. As you can see in a 2 drive configuration, that theory holds true. But it looks as though after 2 drives on the matrix, we have something else impacting seek times as you stated such as controller, and latency, or perhaps the actual lowest physical seek time on the disk. If that makes any sense. Technically by looking at that data you would think that 6.6GB readable portion per drive would seek better than 10GB per drive on the platter. Maybe anything 10GB and under produces exactly the same results? I will need to do some more research. I was truly hoping to prove myself wrong and get those killer sub 6ms seek times.
Cheers. :beer:

Enabling Write back Cache? Just for the fun of it.

A hard drives write on the outter edge of the platter first dude, not the inside.

So, I've got 2 WD740ADFD's in RAID0 on my P5W-DH (ICH7R.) I haven't messed with any "slicing", but after reading this, I really want to.

How do I create this boot slice? I don't remember seeing any options in the BIOS level utility. I take it I'll be destroying my existing array and recreating a new one (not a problem BTW, I need to reload my OS(it's been a few months, hehe)).

Thanks. I wanna try this out NOW.

BTW would 15GB boot slice per Raptor be to big? Probably when the HDD only has 74GB total, right?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Brahmzy

So, I've got 2 WD740ADFD's in RAID0 on my P5W-DH (ICH7R.) I haven't messed with any "slicing", but after reading this, I really want to.

How do I create this boot slice? I don't remember seeing any options in the BIOS level utility. I take it I'll be destroying my existing array and recreating a new one (not a problem BTW, I need to reload my OS(it's been a few months, hehe)).

Thanks. I wanna try this out NOW.

BTW would 15GB boot slice per Raptor be to big? Probably when the HDD only has 74GB total, right?

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hmm I got 4 74gig raptors in raid 0 and I am in exactly the same position as Brahmzy. Request seconded :).

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nanometer

A hard drives write on the outter edge of the platter first dude, not the inside.

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Where did I state the inside of the platter?
No where.

I stated; "The fastest portion of the platter"

Quote:

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Originally Posted by One_Hertz

hmm I got 4 74gig raptors in raid 0 and I am in exactly the same position as Brahmzy. Request seconded :).

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Ideally you will want to create a Raid 0 slice with 25GB or less of data. Your second slice can either be Raid 0, or Raid 1 for mirroring.

With 25GB or less of data on the primary boot slic, you will force the system to read from the fastest portion of the platter and have great random access times and sustained transfer rates.

When first configuring your system in the bios you are going to first:

1. Enter the bios and enable Raid as your primary boot device.
2. Enable the Matrix Boot Rom
3. Upon the next system restart, press "Control + i" to enter the Matrix boot rom.
4. You will configure your array by first pressing "Create Array"
5. Select the Configuration (Raid 0, Raid 1, Raid 5)
6. Select the amount of drives to use in this array.
7. Select the Capacity to use for the first Raid 0 slice. Example: 20GB
8. Select the stripe size.
9. Press Create Array

It will now let you know that you can not use the matrix without using all capacity on the drives so you are going to click "Create Array" again.

10. Now, you will go ahead and use the rest of your drives capacity to make the Raid 0 or Raid 1 by using the procedure I just noted.

After that, everything is fine. You can disable the boot rom if you prefer, I leave it active by default. Now, you simply boot from CDRom, install your operating system and make sure you have a Raid/AHCI driver floppy disk created for the operating system. When you enter windows you are going to want to install the latest Intel Matrix drivers and configuration utility.

11. Go into advanced options in the Windows Matrix Configuration Utility and enable write back caching on both the Raid 0 slice and Raid 0/1 slice.

CALL IT DAY
Cheers.

a raid will never decrease random access times. the random access times will be that of the slowest response of each of the drives involved in the raid.

This will never be lower than that of a single disk.

raids only help for non-random things, like linear reads and writes.

if you want lower response times, you have to move to faster drives, in yoru case, 15krpm scsi.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by cirthix

a raid will never decrease random access times. the random access times will be that of the slowest response of each of the drives involved in the raid.

This will never be lower than that of a single disk.

raids only help for non-random things, like linear reads and writes.

if you want lower response times, you have to move to faster drives, in yoru case, 15krpm scsi.

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Do me a favor.
Look at the first pic in this post. Do normal raptors have access times of 6.3 ms???

Please do your homework because I am sure you are aware that these times are from 8.1ms to 8.5ms stock on a Raptor 150X... Matrix raid does indeed reduce random access time by allowing the drives to only read from the fastest portions of the platter.
And I do emphasize, please do your homework.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dominick32

Do me a favor.
Look at the first pic in this post. Do normal raptors have access times of 6.3 ms???

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They do if you use the first 6gb :P. A raid setup just lets you have a bigger amount of this fast space, but its access should be a bit slower then a single drive... by 0.1-0.2 ms.

So the Matrix Utility ALWAYS creates it's first "slice" or volume on the outside of the HDDs? Where does Windows put the OS at, initially? Does the defragger move all of the fiels to the outside edges?

So other than enabling HDTach to read access times at the volume level vs. the entire (averaged) drive level, how does this 20GB RAID0 boot slice differ from, say, a first standard 20GB boot partition?

In theory, there should be absolutely no difference whatsoever.

In both cases you're utilizing the fastest first bit of space on the outmost edges of the HDDs.

That being the case, I think I'll stick to standard partitions as those are somewhat flexible using sizing utilities (I just bought Acronis Disk Director 10, which is very cool BTW)

Basically, I see no benfit of the slicing method vs the standard partitioning method, IF ALL SLICES/PARTITIONS ARE RAID0.

This only makes sense if you're utilizing different RAID types.

Correct?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Brahmzy

So other than enabling HDTach to read access times at the volume level vs. the entire (averaged) drive level, how does this 20GB RAID0 boot slice differ from, say, a first standard 20GB boot partition?

In theory, there should be absolutely no difference whatsoever.

In both cases you're utilizing the fastest first bit of space on the outmost edges of the HDDs.

That being the case, I think I'll stick to standard partitions as those are somewhat flexible using sizing utilities (I just bought Acronis Disk Director 10, which is very cool BTW)

Basically, I see no benfit of the slicing method vs the standard partitioning method, IF ALL SLICES/PARTITIONS ARE RAID0.

This only makes sense if you're utilizing different RAID types.

Correct?

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You sir have found the million dollar questions:
My own honest opinion is also that in terms of real world performance and "snappy feel" of the XP environment that Raid 0 using the Matrix is much more noticeable than Raid 0 using NVRaid or another similar (Plain Raid 0) controller/software. These are just some questions youre going to have to answer on your own. Try it out for size. You do bring up a valid point because theoretically a small boot partition on the array (vs. creating a matrix slice) would read/write and access from the quickest portion of the platter on all raided HDD's. So technically a plain (non matrix) 3 drive Raid 0 would be exactly the same as creating a 3 drive slice on the matrix. But, my honest opinion experience proves otherwise.
Could I be noticeing simple benefits from an Intel Driver Level such as write back caching? Who knows....

There are definitely questions that need to be answered:

1. Is a standard "plain raid 0" 20GB boot partition the same as a "Matrix Raid 0" boot slice?

2. Does Intels Matrix Write Back Caching produce any real world performance gains over "plain raid 0" disregarding the proven synthetic benchmarks that I posted in HDTach and ATTO?

finally the most important question:

3. Are there any gains or benefits running the Matrix with a dual slice Raid0/Raid0 if you do not plan on using the Raid0/Raid1or5 implementatin that Intel designed the matrix for?

Good stuff. Actually in MY particular case, I AM using the Intel Matrix RAID0 with my Raptors right now. I just have a 70GB boot partition and a 72GB data partition. I don't have seperates volumes, or "slices" though, just standard partitions. I'm still currently using Matrix write back caching just as described above.

So, for me, the only question is...is there any performance difference between a 20GB Matrix RAID0 boot volume/slice ~or~ a 20GB Matrix boot partition?

Theoretically, yes, there shouldn't be a difference.
Still, you do let the chip instead of the OS control the access, plus you have the flexibility of controlling the disk as a separate device (enabling/disabling caching etc.)

Well, I rebuilt my box last night using a small 20GB boot partition. I noticed absolutely no difference with it over my previous 70GB boot partition. I expected this as it's something that would degrade over time as the system files get spread over 70GB vs. 20GB. In fact it seems noticably slower to boot now for some odd reason. This is after extensive defragging, Bootvis etc. More bars on splash and longer hourglass on initial desktop. Hmmmm.

However, tonight I will wipe the array and try the Matrix slice method.

It's a little more permanent, but if it's better (faster) I'm all about it.

I WANT FASTER DRIVES! Man I wish they'd make 15K Raptors. I'm already tired of these ADFD 74GBers and they're about as fast as SATA gets.

When will they have solid, reliable, affordable desktop class solid state? Argh.

Mate... for the price of Raptors, a Seagate 15k.5 is not far, and that will give you SPEEEEEEEEEEEED :D (15k rpm, with 140 MB/s average trasnfer rate).
I just have to make sure they work on X7DA3's onboard SAS!

WOW. I just blew away my existing RAID0 array. It had a 20GB boot partition - here's HDTach right before I did it:
http://img522.imageshack.us/img522/9854/hd1tt7.png
Here's my new Intel Matrix RAID0 20GB boot volume
http://img75.imageshack.us/img75/3555/hd2qi3.png

Folks, this isn't just HDTach showing us things are faster, it actually IS faster! Before I would get 3.5 bars on the XP splash screen. Now I'm getting exactly 2!! I don't know how this is faster, but it is. My box boots faster and seems even snappier in Windows.

Both of these benchies were takin' on brand-new fresh builds with full boot-time defrags and BootVis traces. This is NOT placebo as I have blown away and recreated this array 4 different times in the last 2 days.

This friggin' rocks. I can't believe I just sped up my RAID0 Raptors more than they were.

Thanks Dom!

The more HDDs in RAID-0 the longer the access time. This is fact.

Its pretty much negligible, though.

I knew I wasnt completely crazy. I mean, all of the data about slicing/partitioning being the same proves otherwise but whether it be the write back caching enabled by software in windows or something the Intel Matrix is doing differently it definitely does speed things up a tad.

I am glad you have such great results!

i dunno i still think its just a way to trick the benchmark by only limiting just the first 20gb. Kinda like just reading it burst. What about the rest of the partition, what does the benchmark shows?

Well it is tricking the benchmark, that's not the point.

Obviously the rest of the drives (the other RAID0 volume) show up to be slower.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dominick32

Ideally you will want to create a Raid 0 slice with 25GB or less of data. Your second slice can either be Raid 0, or Raid 1 for mirroring.

With 25GB or less of data on the primary boot slic, you will force the system to read from the fastest portion of the platter and have great random access times and sustained transfer rates.

When first configuring your system in the bios you are going to first:

1. Enter the bios and enable Raid as your primary boot device.
2. Enable the Matrix Boot Rom
3. Upon the next system restart, press "Control + i" to enter the Matrix boot rom.
4. You will configure your array by first pressing "Create Array"
5. Select the Configuration (Raid 0, Raid 1, Raid 5)
6. Select the amount of drives to use in this array.
7. Select the Capacity to use for the first Raid 0 slice. Example: 20GB
8. Select the stripe size.
9. Press Create Array

It will now let you know that you can not use the matrix without using all capacity on the drives so you are going to click "Create Array" again.

10. Now, you will go ahead and use the rest of your drives capacity to make the Raid 0 or Raid 1 by using the procedure I just noted.

After that, everything is fine. You can disable the boot rom if you prefer, I leave it active by default. Now, you simply boot from CDRom, install your operating system and make sure you have a Raid/AHCI driver floppy disk created for the operating system. When you enter windows you are going to want to install the latest Intel Matrix drivers and configuration utility.

11. Go into advanced options in the Windows Matrix Configuration Utility and enable write back caching on both the Raid 0 slice and Raid 0/1 slice.

CALL IT DAY
Cheers.

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where is the option 2?? on P5WDH mobo?
i couldnt find it. the only option is Enable RAID .

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nanometer

The more HDDs in RAID-0 the longer the access time. This is fact.

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Actually its not a fact.

Math is baised on postulates and theorems that are "ASSUMED" to be true.

Further more there are contless examples that proove the "boldness" of your reasong to be more likely to be wrong then right. It used to be a "fact" that space was made of nothing, then it was a "fact" that it was made of magic either, now its a "fact" that its made of dark matter which accounts for something like 90% off all matter in the universe. I quote "fact" because its not really a fact.

The ONLY fact here is that technology is moving alot faster then we understand it and why and how it works.

Your "100% sure" faith would be more appropriate at your local church, this however is a place of science.

----------------------

@Dom

Great post, I will be looking in to this for sure, looks awsome so far. Thanks for letting us know your results.

u can only get this by having a intel motherboard? i would love to have a pci-e 8x(or16x) card wich i could put in the other x16 port since i dont want CF.
That and two 74gb adfd and i would be happy!

Sounds very interesting I'll have to test this for my self.

This is what I get on my 25Gb slice (2 x Seagate 320Gb 7200.10 RAID 0)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...nga/hdtach.png

Any good? :confused:

wow, that beats single raptors. Same random access but twice the transfer speed!

guys I have a single 74gig 16mb raptor.. can I you intel matrix?? hehehe :)

I'll bring this back from the dead.

After seeing so many benchmarks showing standard RAID0 to be of next to no benefit for gaming, I wonder if this is any different.

If anyone is considering switching their array over from standard to matrix, could you do some timed benchmarks of game level loading before and after? I think it would answer some questions for a lot of people and be of good benefit to the community.

I've 4 36GB 8MB Raptors and am running them all in RAID0.

So what should i do then to get the best and mind blowing speeds from them?

Stripe size and should i try this matrix raid on the drives?

I've no idea so please be nice to me and help. I will give credit for it i promiss

What motherboard do you have Pete?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Polizei

What motherboard do you have Pete?

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Im gifted by having a ICH9R on a Maxiums Formula SE with a Yorkfield in there and 2GB DDR2 @ DDR1200 4-4-4-6

Sorry thats a bit of shamless plug, edit as needs be there mods!

Well, the way I did it was:

Enable RAID in the BIOS. I rebooted, and then upon reboot, started hitting Control + i to get into the RAID BIOS - your manual should tell you what you need to press to get into the RAID BIOS. I then selected which disks I wanted in the RAID array and what type of RAID. After choosing RAID 0, I got to choose the stripe size - I picked 64k. Seems ok for 2 disks. I saved all that and exited, rebooted once more. I booted into the regular BIOS, and then chose the new RAID array as the first boot device (or first hard drive boot device). Once that was done, put the Windows CD in, rebooted once more and installed Windows.

Thanks for that but i said i have the 4 already in RAID0, so i know how to do the raid array for all of them but i was talking about the uber fast matrix raid array.

Cntl + i is the std Intel control to acess it in BIOS posting/Rom init

What stripe size are you guys using for your raid 0?

4kb to prove a mate wrong that it mkes windows load slower (he said windows is built on small files so it will boot faster with it like that, yeah right)

4kb is way too small. 32k minimum.

Um, as far as I know, I though the Control + i was the Intel Matrix RAID?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Polizei

4kb is way too small. 32k minimum.

Um, as far as I know, I though the Control + i was the Intel Matrix RAID?

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If you read i was proving a so called little kid wrong as i can i have the time to do so by running the 4kb, i was running 64kb before!

Nope the IMR is a bit of windows softwear i think. The control + i is the ICHXR rom on the SB

Oh.. hmm.

Im curious how to set up the Matrix RAID now as well, if Control + i is NOT how you do it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dominick32
Ideally you will want to create a Raid 0 slice with 25GB or less of data. Your second slice can either be Raid 0, or Raid 1 for mirroring.

With 25GB or less of data on the primary boot slic, you will force the system to read from the fastest portion of the platter and have great random access times and sustained transfer rates.

When first configuring your system in the bios you are going to first:

1. Enter the bios and enable Raid as your primary boot device.
2. Enable the Matrix Boot Rom
3. Upon the next system restart, press "Control + i" to enter the Matrix boot rom.
4. You will configure your array by first pressing "Create Array"
5. Select the Configuration (Raid 0, Raid 1, Raid 5)
6. Select the amount of drives to use in this array.
7. Select the Capacity to use for the first Raid 0 slice. Example: 20GB
8. Select the stripe size.
9. Press Create Array

It will now let you know that you can not use the matrix without using all capacity on the drives so you are going to click "Create Array" again.

10. Now, you will go ahead and use the rest of your drives capacity to make the Raid 0 or Raid 1 by using the procedure I just noted.

After that, everything is fine. You can disable the boot rom if you prefer, I leave it active by default. Now, you simply boot from CDRom, install your operating system and make sure you have a Raid/AHCI driver floppy disk created for the operating system. When you enter windows you are going to want to install the latest Intel Matrix drivers and configuration utility.

11. Go into advanced options in the Windows Matrix Configuration Utility and enable write back caching on both the Raid 0 slice and Raid 0/1 slice.

CALL IT DAY
Cheers.

---

Belive thats what ya need to do but.

What strip should i set?

20 or 25GB for windows RAID0?

What should i really set the rest of the drives up as? I only use my OS and app (Photoshop, games, etc on the RAID0 drivers)

I really want the best speed i can get for booting into windows and stuff loading

Here's my 4 x 80GB Hitachi Deskstars in RAID0 with a 25GB C / 1st slice & the remaining 280GB's partitioned D & E in the second slice. The cluster size is default XP & the strip size is 64kb with write back cache enabled.

I have played with 4,16,32 & 64kb stripe sizes as well as 2,3 & 4 drives & each time the random access is the same for all configurations on the sliced array.

I have also run HD Tune, HD Tach & ATTO & the average read & burst speed increase increase linear with every extra disk whilst the random access on the 1st slice stays the same.

I have un-rared a 200mb file on the 1st & 2nd slice & cant measure any performance gain time wise, windows still boots to the desktop in 30 seconds so for me I cant really tell/feel any improvement over a normal array disk partitioned up although it is clear the access time has improved considerably.

Slicing definitely improves benches but I think you will be hard pushed to feel a difference using a sliced array rig.

CN :)

Pete, thats exactly what I did, except my slice size was the entire disk size.

I would say more than 20 or 25GB... I thought I wouldnt need much but after installing Photoshop, Battlefield 2 + expansions and a bunch of other programs, Ive bloated to 29GB including a full XP install. I would say 30GB atleast, to be safe.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Polizei

Pete, thats exactly what I did, except my slice size was the entire disk size.

I would say more than 20 or 25GB... I thought I wouldnt need much but after installing Photoshop, Battlefield 2 + expansions and a bunch of other programs, Ive bloated to 29GB including a full XP install. I would say 30GB atleast, to be safe.

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Ah 20/25GB is fine for me.Clocked XP using 7GB last so i think 25GB be safe bet.

Might give it a go tormrow some time when my spear CPU arrives

Just what do i set the left over as...

36 x 4 = 144 - 25 = 119

25 as RAID 0 and my XP boot slice and apps etc

119 as Raid what???

0 or 1 or 5 or whatever you want.

What I want to know is, would making that other slice (the non-RAID 0 slice) a RAID1 or RAID5 slice slow down the RAID0?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Polizei

0 or 1 or 5 or whatever you want.

What I want to know is, would making that other slice (the non-RAID 0 slice) a RAID1 or RAID5 slice slow down the RAID0?

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Thats what making me wander too but with RAID1 wiriting and reading all the time i am wanderinf if thats going to make the RAID0 a bit more faster

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Soulburner

I'll bring this back from the dead.

After seeing so many benchmarks showing standard RAID0 to be of next to no benefit for gaming, I wonder if this is any different.

If anyone is considering switching their array over from standard to matrix, could you do some timed benchmarks of game level loading before and after? I think it would answer some questions for a lot of people and be of good benefit to the community.

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gj for bringing this up, WAY too many people aren't aware of this.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Pete

Thats what making me wander too but with RAID1 wiriting and reading all the time i am wanderinf if thats going to make the RAID0 a bit more faster

---

If anything, I think it would be slower. The read/write heads would be used for reading things other than whats on the RAID 0 array, which is where you want the speed.

So maybe set both to RAID0 then

Is there a setup guide for MATRIX?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Machinus

Is there a setup guide for MATRIX?

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Yes

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dominick32
Ideally you will want to create a Raid 0 slice with 25GB or less of data. Your second slice can either be Raid 0, or Raid 1 for mirroring.

With 25GB or less of data on the primary boot slic, you will force the system to read from the fastest portion of the platter and have great random access times and sustained transfer rates.

When first configuring your system in the bios you are going to first:

1. Enter the bios and enable Raid as your primary boot device.
2. Enable the Matrix Boot Rom
3. Upon the next system restart, press "Control + i" to enter the Matrix boot rom.
4. You will configure your array by first pressing "Create Array"
5. Select the Configuration (Raid 0, Raid 1, Raid 5)
6. Select the amount of drives to use in this array.
7. Select the Capacity to use for the first Raid 0 slice. Example: 20GB
8. Select the stripe size.
9. Press Create Array

It will now let you know that you can not use the matrix without using all capacity on the drives so you are going to click "Create Array" again.

10. Now, you will go ahead and use the rest of your drives capacity to make the Raid 0 or Raid 1 by using the procedure I just noted.

After that, everything is fine. You can disable the boot rom if you prefer, I leave it active by default. Now, you simply boot from CDRom, install your operating system and make sure you have a Raid/AHCI driver floppy disk created for the operating system. When you enter windows you are going to want to install the latest Intel Matrix drivers and configuration utility.

11. Go into advanced options in the Windows Matrix Configuration Utility and enable write back caching on both the Raid 0 slice and Raid 0/1 slice.

CALL IT DAY
Cheers.

---

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by C-N

Here's my 4 x 80GB Hitachi Deskstars in RAID0 with a 25GB C / 1st slice & the remaining 280GB's partitioned D & E in the second slice. The cluster size is default XP & the strip size is 64kb with write back cache enabled.

I have played with 4,16,32 & 64kb stripe sizes as well as 2,3 & 4 drives & each time the random access is the same for all configurations on the sliced array.

I have also run HD Tune, HD Tach & ATTO & the average read & burst speed increase increase linear with every extra disk whilst the random access on the 1st slice stays the same.

I have un-rared a 200mb file on the 1st & 2nd slice & cant measure any performance gain time wise, windows still boots to the desktop in 30 seconds so for me I cant really tell/feel any improvement over a normal array disk partitioned up although it is clear the access time has improved considerably.

Slicing definitely improves benches but I think you will be hard pushed to feel a difference using a sliced array rig.

CN :)

---

Wow , your array outperform my 3 x raptors with areca card

http://www5.0zz0.com/2007/11/14/13/79698384.jpg

Quote:

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Originally Posted by koc

Wow , your array outperform my 3 x raptors with areca card

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Its pretty close but don't forget this performance is only on the 1st slice (25GB C:) my array reverts back to std 12ms 200mb/s on the 2nd slice, your Areca/Raptor array should be nice & constant across the board.

The only real benefit hear for me is cost, I have comparable RAID performance on my boot/os slice utilising on-board RAID & 4 cheep drives (£80 for all 4) where as your setup probably cost £500 +

CN :)

So for this boot slice is it worth me even slecting all 4 drivers and making that secition of the lsice 25GB?

Care to spoon feed a newbie?

First time building a system from scratch, and super weak on the BIOS and initial install stuff.

So I have 2 Raptor 150's I want to run in Raid 0 for OS and Games.

I also want to run Vista Ultimate and my 4GB of ram.

My Maximus SE is in the INTEL club, so running Matrix raid is an option for me.

Can you give me a direct link to the file I need to have on my flash drive to set this up.

When installing this with Vista Ultimate, are my install steps different?

Would I want to make the boot partition bigger than 25GB due to Vista, and still use a 64k stripe size?
The remaining portion of my 2 150's will be ran in RAID 0.

Thanks for any help. ;)

Quote:

---

Its pretty close but don't forget this performance is only on the 1st slice (25GB C my array reverts back to std 12ms 200mb/s on the 2nd slice, your Areca/Raptor array should be nice & constant across the board.

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OK. noob question , if you leave the total size of the 4 hard drives , can you get the same read speed ?

So this is just on your chip, and requires no software to download, just activate your Matrix boot rom on the Maximus?

Nice find there :) Improvement not only in hdtach but other appz too

This is 2x150 raptors with write cache enabled. Access time down from ~8.5ms to ~6.1ms. Average read up from 160

http://img108.imageshack.us/img108/7...ix2564kms3.jpg

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Talonman

Care to spoon feed a newbie?

First time building a system from scratch, and super weak on the BIOS and initial install stuff.

So I have 2 Raptor 150's I want to run in Raid 0 for OS and Games.

I also want to run Vista Ultimate and my 4GB of ram.

My Maximus SE is in the INTEL club, so running Matrix raid is an option for me.

Can you give me a direct link to the file I need to have on my flash drive to set this up.

When installing this with Vista Ultimate, are my install steps different?

Would I want to make the boot partition bigger than 25GB due to Vista, and still use a 64k stripe size?
The remaining portion of my 2 150's will be ran in RAID 0.

Thanks for any help. ;)

---

Go with a 32k stripe size and if you're using Vista Ultimate, make it at least 40GB. SP1 for Vista is rumored at requiring 12GB of free space on the OS drive!

I made a 35GB partition and I'm going to have to rebuild when SP1 comes. :(

I'm going 45 GB next time. Fing ridiculous if you ask me.

4 36GB's all used to makw 1 25GB slice and the leftover

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...ete/HDTACH.jpg

hi guys,

So I too am building my new system myself ([url=http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=165933]click[/url) and what I wanted to know is how much difference does RAID0 make ingame ic a normal WD Raptor? And could someone exactly explain How you create that Raid0 array(and if its really so much faster? a +-50 GB slice)

thank you so much

here are my thoughts and theories from what i've read and gathered...

2x 150Gb Raptors in which i'd like to do dual boot with XP64 and Vista64

1st slice (RAID-0) = 25 GB (XP64)
2nd slice (RAID-0) = 50 GB (Vista64) not positive about the size on this one
3rd slice (RAID-0) = whatever is left over

with the 3rd slice, i don't see a point in running anything other then RAID-0 due to the fact that if you lose a drive you can't just swap it out and continue along... running a redundant RAID would be pointless. ofcourse, though, i'll be running a 500Gb drive for storage and backups.

what are your thoguhts on this? flaws? am i incorrect in my assumptions?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by TheSamurai

here are my thoughts and theories from what i've read and gathered...

2x 150Gb Raptors in which i'd like to do dual boot with XP64 and Vista64

1st slice (RAID-0) = 25 GB (XP64)
2nd slice (RAID-0) = 50 GB (Vista64) not positive about the size on this one
3rd slice (RAID-0) = whatever is left over

with the 3rd slice, i don't see a point in running anything other then RAID-0 due to the fact that if you lose a drive you can't just swap it out and continue along... running a redundant RAID would be pointless. ofcourse, though, i'll be running a 500Gb drive for storage and backups.

what are your thoguhts on this? flaws? am i incorrect in my assumptions?

---

Sounds good and very similar to how I setup my drives. I always put a very minimalist XP32 install on the single backup drive to launch Norton Ghost from to do backups of the OSs on the array that will not run the backup programs I like...(XP64 & Ghost). Works like a charm for me!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Brahmzy

Go with a 32k stripe size and if you're using Vista Ultimate, make it at least 40GB. SP1 for Vista is rumored at requiring 12GB of free space on the OS drive!

I made a 35GB partition and I'm going to have to rebuild when SP1 comes. :(

I'm going 45 GB next time. Fing ridiculous if you ask me.

---

Thanks for the reply..

just wondering if you guys could take a look at my thread... running into a few issues. thanks!

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...d.php?t=166604

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by TheSamurai

here are my thoughts and theories from what i've read and gathered...

2x 150Gb Raptors in which i'd like to do dual boot with XP64 and Vista64

1st slice (RAID-0) = 25 GB (XP64)
2nd slice (RAID-0) = 50 GB (Vista64) not positive about the size on this one
3rd slice (RAID-0) = whatever is left over

with the 3rd slice, i don't see a point in running anything other then RAID-0 due to the fact that if you lose a drive you can't just swap it out and continue along... running a redundant RAID would be pointless. ofcourse, though, i'll be running a 500Gb drive for storage and backups.

what are your thoguhts on this? flaws? am i incorrect in my assumptions?

---

How about just creating one array and partitioning the drive? That will do the same thing for "performance" as a Matrix setup which is being advocated as nothing more than a file squeezer really. This is nothing new. And if you don't need a third partition, don't make it and leave the space unallocated. You want the best possible drive performance?, get a thrid party defragger which will place your files from the outer edge of the platter in and in order of usage.

actually, the "slice" worked much better then a partition at the same size. you're only allowed two different slices so i ended up partitioning the last part. reason for the seperate sections is so that the HDD head only has to read in that small area making it faster (like the defragger you were talking about). i ran my tests, and have realized that for me, even with my photo intensive work, it's not of any worth. so i've since moved back to a regular setup (incase i ever have to switch mobo's, etc.). i'll get another raptor eventually for my linux system.