WD6400AAKS faster than Raptor?

[NapalmV5]

youre welocome ripken

raptor 740ADFD @ highpoint 3510

2x

3x

4x


2x

3x

4x



later iops @ equi GB

[ikjadoon]

Would short-stroking still be applicable at a partition size of 150GB? Is it better to create a smaller partition?

~Ibrahim~

[tiro_uspsss]

4x 640GB @ 5% = 128GB

i've been following just vaguely the topic of this thread - so lemme get this straight; u partition -in this case ~32GB- of each of the 4 HDDs )do u get a total of 128GB partition).

What does one do with the rest of the remaining space left over on the HDDs? (the other 95%)

[NapalmV5]

correct.. except for the partitioning part.. this is different its not partitioning

when i create the array @ 128GB it just uses 32GB from each drive

the other GBs were sacrificial to the performance gods lol


nothing.. what can u do with space that doesnt exist? lol

for actual storage id use these drives @ full but since im using them to install win/apps/games/etc whats the point of 2560GB if i dont need that much.. since 128GB is enough for me for now id rather have the much lower access time and increased MB/s

[tiro_uspsss]

Allright a small fixup the plates in Raptor aren't 2.5" but are definetley smaller than in 3.5" drive.

So Yes they're not 2.5" but yes, they're still smaller than 3.5's

ah, no. i'd like to know where u r getting this idea/info about the Raptors having supposedly smaller than 3.5" platters.. quite frankly, it sounds like a load of bs imo

[tiro_uspsss]

correct.. except for the partitioning part.. this is different its not partitioning

when i create the array @ 128GB it just uses 32GB from each drive

the other GBs were sacrificial to the performance gods lol


nothing.. what can u do with space that doesnt exist? lol

for actual storage id use these drives @ full but since im using them to install win/apps/games/etc whats the point of 2560GB if i dont need that much.. since 128GB is enough for me for now id rather have the much lower access time

... so u 'waste' the other ~600GB on each HDD??

y cant u make a partition out of it & use it for something else? surely just because it is being 'used' doesnt mean that the first/'fast' partition will suffer will it? - i understand that it would suffer performance-wise *IF* a read/write occurs @ same time on diff partitions - but will it still be affected if the remaining partition is barely accessed? i cant imagine that it should be

[YukonTrooper]

Napalm, any seek times for a single drive with all 640GB being used?

[IanB]

... so u 'waste' the other ~600GB on each HDD??

y cant u make a partition out of it & use it for something else? surely just because it is being 'used' doesnt mean that the first/'fast' partition will suffer will it? - i understand that it would suffer performance-wise *IF* a read/write occurs @ same time on diff partitions - but will it still be affected if the remaining partition is barely accessed? i cant imagine that it should be

Tiro, that's what I've been posting seemingly repeatedly for days, using the "waste" disk area for rarely-accessed archive data, but no-one seems to be listening. I guess some people just have more money than sense in the pursuit of speed... But then we can talk, using i-RAMs!

The thing about the i-RAM of course (especially a pair of them) is it avoids this whole issue completely, since the OS/PF sits on that and you never have these sort of continual disk contention issues with OS access. Best solution all round, really, and still totally pwns everything discussed in this thread for access and streaming speed.

[tiro_uspsss]

Tiro, that's what I've been posting seemingly repeatedly for days, using the "waste" disk area for rarely-accessed archive data, but no-one seems to be listening. I guess some people just have more money than sense in the pursuit of speed... But then we can talk, using i-RAMs!

The thing about the i-RAM of course (especially a pair of them) is it avoids this whole issue completely, since the OS/PF sits on that and you never have these sort of continual disk contention issues with OS access. Best solution all round, really, and still totally pwns everything discussed in this thread for access and streaming speed.

yeah i agree - i have an i-ram, sure it sucks GB/$, but MB/s & ms

then again if u buy a 640GB HDD & use only ~30-40GB... catch my drift?

I can understand the 'reasoning' behind doing it, & if its ones cup of tea, by all means go ahead.. but me; i'm a media whore - the thought of wasting all that loooovely storage space is.. its an abmonination! its criminal

[NapalmV5]

oh why did i bother to reply..

lol u guys make it sound so dreadful by not using @ full

but dont worry when these will be moved to the backup rigs.. will get used fully

[NapalmV5]

Napalm, any seek times for a single drive with all 640GB being used?

i can not create 1x on the hpt

i can create 1x on the areca but right now 6400 no worky on the areca

though ive used 1x (allow me to insert this: i got more money than sense.. stupendious reasoning lol ) drive @ card and takes any hard drive to its performing limit.. onboard controllers dont

[One_Hertz]

Wow at 8.4ms on raptors. Mine have 7.8... 5.6 after slicing.

[tiro_uspsss]

lol u guys make it sound so dreadful by not using @ full

ahh yeah... lemme see if i can clarify..

the idea is that someone buys a 6400aaks cause its CHEAPER than Raptor
in return that someone gets: better MB/s & more storage (more storage for the time being)

i-ram cant be 'justified' cause its got really bad GB/$ (albiet it being the best performing RE: MB/s & ms)

right now @ newegg,
the RaptorX (150GB oem) costs: USD$175
the 6400aaks (oem) costs: USD$130

GB/$ ratio for 640, RX, i-ram:

640/130 = ~4.9
150/175 = ~0.857
4GB/~190 = ~0.02

now lets 'factor' in the slicing/partitioning one does. Lets make it a 40GB slice (so one would use 40/640 GB).

40/130 = 0.3

*if* one ends up not using the remaining partition(s), they definitely get 'ripped-off' even more than when buying a Raptor!
the ~8.5ms access time for a Raptor, is access time for the ENTIRE platter, whereas the ~7.7ms is for 40/640. As One Hertz pointed out, if u partition Raptor u can go even lower (~5.5ms). I reckon anyone doing this, would 'have' to make use of the extra space to make it well worth the $.

& while it might 'seem' like a bonus that, after one is done they can use full 640GB as actual storage, that would mean giving up a fast 'place' to hold the OS. What I mean by that is this.. last yr when I bought my Raptors, I had to 'coerce' myself to do so - I had never spent that kinda money on HDD subsystem purely for speed. But shortly after I realised: these Raptors are *ALWAYS* gonna provide me with fast storage, for this build, the next & the next. In fact they will provide me with fast storage till SSDs come waaaaay down in $$$ . One could buy those 6400aaks' now, have 'fast' storage - but that storage in the mean time is even more expensive than Raptor; & after using it for fast storage, they would be 'back to square one', because what are they gonna use as fast storage then? & dont say SSDs - cause they supposedly bought the 6400aaks cause they were cheap(er) in the first place.

for this idea to hold any merit (imho), one would either have to use the full capacity from 'day one' OR buy a 'storage' HDD with the best BFB RE: GB/$ - that way, one could use a partition of this HDD(s) (& have temporary more-expensive-than-raptor storage) & then down the track use it as a bfb storage drive. Otherwise they'd be getting ripped of now *&* later RE: GB/$ (they'd be getting ripped of 'later' *IF* the HDD they buy is *NOT* bfb re: GB/$) - that drive may well be the 6400aaks, but i have no idea, so get prices, do the math, think it thru...

just me thoughts/ideas...

[EvilBellyLint]

Napalm, any seek times for a single drive with all 640GB being used?

People have been getting access Times of 12.1ms - 12.8ms, non-partitioned.
So subtracting avg. rotational latency (4.2ms) and people are getting roughly
7.9ms - 8.6ms seeks.

EBL

[EvilBellyLint]

ahh yeah... lemme see if i can clarify..

the idea is that someone buys a 6400aaks cause its CHEAPER than Raptor
in return that someone gets: better MB/s & more storage (more storage for the time being)

i-ram cant be 'justified' cause its got really bad GB/$ (albiet it being the best performing RE: MB/s & ms)

right now @ newegg,
the RaptorX (150GB oem) costs: USD$175
the 6400aaks (oem) costs: USD$130

GB/$ ratio for 640, RX, i-ram:

640/130 = ~4.9
150/175 = ~0.857
4GB/~190 = ~0.02

now lets 'factor' in the slicing/partitioning one does. Lets make it a 40GB slice (so one would use 40/640 GB).

40/130 = 0.3

*if* one ends up not using the remaining partition(s), they definitely get 'ripped-off' even more than when buying a Raptor!
the ~8.5ms access time for a Raptor, is access time for the ENTIRE platter, whereas the ~7.7ms is for 40/640. As One Hertz pointed out, if u partition Raptor u can go even lower (~5.5ms). I reckon anyone doing this, would 'have' to make use of the extra space to make it well worth the $.

& while it might 'seem' like a bonus that, after one is done they can use full 640GB as actual storage, that would mean giving up a fast 'place' to hold the OS. What I mean by that is this.. last yr when I bought my Raptors, I had to 'coerce' myself to do so - I had never spent that kinda money on HDD subsystem purely for speed. But shortly after I realised: these Raptors are *ALWAYS* gonna provide me with fast storage, for this build, the next & the next. In fact they will provide me with fast storage till SSDs come waaaaay down in $$$ . One could buy those 6400aaks' now, have 'fast' storage - but that storage in the mean time is even more expensive than Raptor; & after using it for fast storage, they would be 'back to square one', because what are they gonna use as fast storage then? & dont say SSDs - cause they supposedly bought the 6400aaks cause they were cheap(er) in the first place.

for this idea to hold any merit (imho), one would either have to use the full capacity from 'day one' OR buy a 'storage' HDD with the best BFB RE: GB/$ - that way, one could use a partition of this HDD(s) (& have temporary more-expensive-than-raptor storage) & then down the track use it as a bfb storage drive. Otherwise they'd be getting ripped of now *&* later RE: GB/$ (they'd be getting ripped of 'later' *IF* the HDD they buy is *NOT* bfb re: GB/$) - that drive may well be the 6400aaks, but i have no idea, so get prices, do the math, think it thru...

just me thoughts/ideas...

The simple solution is you use short-stroke the WD6400AAKS as you stated,
use it for your OS, and the remainder of that drive gets used for off-peak
storage (data mirroring/backup.)

You won't "lose" any of that extra drive space... unless backing up data
isn't common practice.

EBL

[ripken204]

ok i am confusde with this short stroking thing.
the only way to do it is when you build your array?

making a 20gb partition and putting your OS it is different from say shortstroking and making the array 20gb?

[EvilBellyLint]

ok i am confusde with this short stroking thing.
the only way to do it is when you build your array?

making a 20gb partition and putting your OS it is different from say shortstroking and making the array 20gb?

Short-stroking is indeed just another term for partitioning.
You can short-stroke a single drive (or multiple drives for
that matter) without creating an array, or you can create
a RAID partition if you do plan on an array. But the
array is by no means required or necessary.

The advantage to short-stroking a drive is two-fold. First,
when you create a partition, by default it "starts" at the
outermost sectors of your hard drive's platter/s and extends
inward. The drive heads are able to read data faster at these
outer sectors, so you increase your sustained throughput.

Second, since you are shortening the amount of physical space
your drive heads must travel in order to access data, your Seek
Times (and hence, Access Time) will be faster.

Hope this helps

EBL

[ripken204]

i know all of that, i am talking about for raid tho.
if i partition my 2 disk array to a 20gb partition, will it take the first 10gb of each disk?

and back to my question about does shortstroking=parititioning? does it matter if i do either one?

[NapalmV5]

4x 6400 @ 80GB @ highpoint 3510


4x raptor @ 80GB @ highpoint 3510



ive tried to bench a single 6400 @ onboard mobo controller on several systems and none support the 6400 right now

the only controller i got that runs the 6400 is the highpoint 3510 and i cant create 1x raid0 on the hpt

[One_Hertz]

WOW those results are close. Well within margin of error actually.

Edit: Just ran IOMeter as well and my 3x 74gb raptors @ 20gb on software raid beat both of your results by about 10% @ 1 Queue Depth. ~250 iops.

[XS Janus]

Very close.
Great results.
Looks like new WD truly are winners.
I bet in 6 months (cause the competition came from their own house) we'll se news on a better Raptor to tale the cake and take the premium.

[NapalmV5]

WOW those results are close. Well within margin of error actually.

Edit: Just ran IOMeter as well and my 3x 74gb raptors @ 20gb on software raid beat both of your results by about 10% @ 1 Queue Depth. ~250 iops.

so uve been comparing ur 20GB against my 80GB/full.. your iops are higher because of the cache being used.. @ real world true hard raid always wins over soft raid despite benches showing higher bursts

look guys i didnt post these benches to beat u guys up or to break records.. or to tell u guys how to partition/how to set up your hard drives.. to each his own.. since no one else.. i posted these benches so u guys can see the difference between the two.. thats all

if id wanted to brag my arse of.. 4x 640GB iodrives benches @ 3200MB/s @ 0.1ms would do..

out!

[tam2]

@napalm
I've been checking this particular thread twice a day from the beginning, so all i can say is just continue what ur doin, dont let prehistoric dinosaur clans gets u

-tam2-

[EvilBellyLint]

i know all of that, i am talking about for raid tho.
if i partition my 2 disk array to a 20gb partition, will it take the first 10gb of each disk?

and back to my question about does shortstroking=parititioning? does it matter if i do either one?

Yes, if you partition a 2-disk array, it will utilize the first 10GB of each disk.

RAID tends to actually slow Access Times, so yes, slicing your RAID set
into a smaller partition for your OS (or Apps, whatever...) will combat this
by shaving milliseconds off your Access Times.

EBL

[EvilBellyLint]

so uve been comparing ur 20GB against my 80GB/full.. your iops are higher because of the cache being used.. @ real world true hard raid always wins over soft raid despite benches showing higher bursts

look guys i didnt post these benches to beat u guys up or to break records.. or to tell u guys how to partition/how to set up your hard drives.. to each his own.. since no one else.. i posted these benches so u guys can see the difference between the two.. thats all

if id wanted to brag my arse of.. 4x 640GB iodrives benches @ 3200MB/s @ 0.1ms would do..

out!

I hear ya Bro. And I really appreciate all your work. Thanks much


EBL