Ideal stripe size for SSD RAID 0 running OS and apps?

[Computurd]

OK QOTD what stripe size woul you use for 8 drives, ssd? for the best random read access"?

[yngndrw]

i would highly recommend as large as you can get..the bigger the better, i use 1MB

This is what I was considering as the drives already have lightening fast random access times and can only really benefit from sequential access improvements, but Gilhooley in the thread I made suggested that the current generation controllers were designed for normal drives and around 128K stripes. I didn't feel like testing every combination so I just decided to use that.

[SteveRo]

OK QOTD what stripe size woul you use for 8 drives, ssd? for the best random read access"?

Good evening Computurd, The answer to your question depends greatly on the controller and the drives employed. 64 or 128 is probably the best but better to test the performance of your array at as many of the stripe size options that your controller provides. Please, please report back your results!

[Biker]

128k is the sweet spot for me with 2 SSD drives for OS / apps.

[Computurd]

After much testing int his area with an 8 drive array i have come to find that the larger the better. The small file transfer sped stays the same no matter what stripe you use, however, the tall sequential will suffer from smaller stripe sizes, at least on a 9260-8i

[Biker]

After much testing int his area with an 8 drive array i have come to find that the larger the better. The small file transfer sped stays the same no matter what stripe you use, however, the tall sequential will suffer from smaller stripe sizes, at least on a 9260-8i

Agreed.

However he is discussing a 2 drive OS configuration here and in my experience sequential transfer speeds scale up with the number of drives and stripe size...

Eg.

8 drives = 1mb stripe (your setup)
4 drives = 512k
2 drives = 256k (non OS)
2 drives = 64k or 128k (OS)

As ever testing on your own system with your own specific setup / usage patterns is the best way forward.

[ic3m4n2005]

Have three 60GB Vertexes incoming. Will attach them to my Areca 1680ix and build a Raid 0 array out of it.
So i'm going to use 64 or 128k for OS, games, and everything ?!?

[Biker]

Since you are mixing games and OS i'd say 128k....

[F@32]

Here's quick 2x30Gb 1.3FW OCZ Vertex RAID-0 on ICH10R 1.20 tests: 16K vs 128K stripe size.

[Computurd]

hey F@32 would you mind running it at higher stripe ifn you can?

[F@32]

hey F@32 would you mind running it at higher stripe ifn you can?

ICH10R is limited to 128K stripe size. I also just finished installing Win7 and all apps on it, sorry

[Computurd]

sorry lol i need to pay attention

[SteveRo]

The optimum strip size will vary by controller, probably also by controller/drive combination used and by what raid level you are using.
For example - turd is right that for the LSI 9260-8i - 1MB is best - and it seems to be best for both vertex and acards.
For the Areca 1231ML I think the best strip size for the acards in R0 is 64 - I will verify.

[SteveRo]

For the 1231ML-2G/8xacardR0 combo 64 is still the best - confirmed using iometer and pcmark vantage HDD test.
Smaller block sizes result in lower small files transfer in iometer - larger block size (128) results in HDD test score dropping from 53K to 48K.