Areca 1880

[Computurd]

things going well gonna have to call it a night/morning? though soon.
running the small stripes now, but the vertex do not respond as well to that...there is more to give from this setup i feel it!
also a few other things i will do differently tonight...
but all in all not a bad show from the 920..i can dial it up to 4.6 but i have to find my perfect setup first...I dont feel i have found it yet..
an excellent show though from the 1880! wow i cant say enough about this controller!

EDIT: just jumped another 500....i will add 2k without the six-core!

[Anvil]

Great resullts Computurd,

Can't wait for that 4GB stick

I've been playing a bit with raid-5, looks good as well.

I did try storeport vs scsiport, couldn't find that much of a difference, about the same number of iops @4K.
(scsiport was installed by default on my system)

[Nitrobass24]

@CT

You can pick up an ES L5640 on ebay for around $400. Cheaper way to get 12 threads compared to the 980x.
Now of course it prob wont clock as high as the 980x but you still be able to pull 4ghz.

[Computurd]

i will make a graph if there is anything left after this kamikaze run i am setting up for there were some differences on my setup, but i only checked quickly, while i was doing other things. i will need to make a bigger test file..

[Computurd]

@nitrobass excellent suggestion...with a six core i could make a run at the top three i believe. i should be able to get top five with a bit more persistence with this here 920...but that will not last for long I am sure without a sixcore. some of the HDD suites on the runs i have are better than any on there...

[Anvil]

I've ordered a few more SF drives , should be here early next week.
(should be interesting comparing to all the C300s out there)

I'll postpone my pcmv testing until I get the 4GB stick, looks like it's worth the wait

[Computurd]

yeah lol...let me savor my rank for a little while at least
the 4gb and this controller are the ticket...

@anvil i believe your SF will torch the c300's

[Anvil]

C300 vs SF?
could go both ways, as long as the SF drives are fresh, they seriously kick ass.

I haven't benched for a long time on my 980X rig, using the 920 rig for experimenting, the 980X rig still hosts the dual 9260 config. (about to try the new fw on one of them)

[Computurd]

dual 9260 config just SOUNDS uber..
i dont think it will be as close with the SF v c300 like most do. In real life usage the SF just seem better to me....
EDIT: GL with the 9260 firmware...my 9260 is totally borked, have to wait for level 3 support on tuesday (holiday monday) the card wont even boot so there is no means of accessing it. very disappointing.

[SteveRo]

Famous quote from CT now applies to me - *grabs popcorn*

[Computurd]

lol !
i have been benching for twelve hours, now it keeps crashing....gonna give it one more shot then rest!
@30394 btw..so close to nizzen...
tbh the points would happen if i let the GC run on the drives LOL pushing too hard!

[Anvil]

Looks like the 1880 is on its way to the 980 rig, iops on the new 9260 fw are gone!
Tried to downgrade one of the cards and now the card wont boot

[SteveRo]

It's a wonder I've never bricked a 1231 - i have punished them severely.

Let the 9260 set unattached for a day or so - stray capacitance?

[SteveRo]

@ CT congrats on breaking 30K!
Even more of an accomplishment since gen 1 vertex and only quad core!
I think in the bot forum they refer to this as efficiency.
You have efficiency to the max!

[Anvil]

It's a wonder I've never bricked a 1231 - i have punished them severely.

Let the 9260 set unattached for a day or so - stray capacitance?

I'l do that, going to try removing one of the cards first, might help as well.

edit:

Congrats to CT, great achivement, especially without the 980X.

[Nizzen]

lol !
i have been benching for twelve hours, now it keeps crashing....gonna give it one more shot then rest!
@30394 btw..so close to nizzen...
tbh the points would happen if i let the GC run on the drives LOL pushing too hard!

How high are you pushing the 920?

I like low clock challenge I`m still on hot air cooler

Some close to Areca said that a bbu unlock even more performance to the 1880! I ordered a bbu just in case

If the performance go down, I just plug out the bbu again :p

[Computurd]

excellent idea nizzen...but the price! how much is a BBU?
the 920 has only been at 4.45 i think during my highest run so far...i am back awake...Coffee!! and going to work on a few things. i agree a low clock challenge would be nice, however, i need to have about a 4.6 to hang with the 980 at 3.2
also bear in mind that i am running a venerable GTX280 so that isnt making things easy either.

tyvm guys for your comments, to be honest that was one of the best sessions i have ever had..great to get runs that good! also some credit to Tiltevros, he helps me very much with the thought process in video cram sessions, always my right hand man! thats what throws my schedule off when i tear off on runs, i have to live on Athens time!

I am not naive, however, I know you guys (tilt, nizzen, anvil) will come charging once you guys get your cards/cache, but still fun to strike while the iron is hot!

gonna do a big refresh with G3, might even pick up a proc (and definitely a GPU) so dont get lazy guys...

@anvil...that is what happened to my card as well! downflashing borked it. they have serious issues with that firmware, i am getting tiresome with LSI lack of support for enthusiasts. the most troublesome part is the lack of any type of access to the card, including the CLI...makes it an unworkable issue! one i am sure will end with RMA doubly disappointing as i had a plan for it with my runs...you do have a server motherboard though?

[Anvil]

Computurd,

I'm currently using them on my X58-UD7, I do have a few servers I could try though. (Dell)

It lists 5 lines of text, showing FW package etc, while initializing devices it stops with the message. (takes a minute or so)
"A discovery error has occured, please powercycle the system and all the enclosures attached to this system"

I've tried on an AMD system, same result.

Not sure what's going on, the new firmware might require some kind of action, there are a few options in the MSM that weren't available before.

I'm making a few backups and then it's Areca time.
I'll have to contact LSI somehow on monday, there must be a way to downgrade/revert to older fw or else it's 2 cards offline/RMA or whatever it takes to get them fixed.

well, enough about the LSI card...
I'll make a few posts in the FW upgrade thread.

[Computurd]

A discovery error has occured, please powercycle the system and all the enclosures attached to this system"

GAH! i have the exact same error...i called LSI last night (their support is here in my city, of all places!) and they said i have to wait for tech support Level 3 and they come in tuesday. monday is a holiday here in the states!
What is so troubling is that there is no way to access anything, not even pre-boot cli...just noting to do but be irritated!
I also tried on multiple motherboards, all intel though but three of them. no luck!

[Computurd]

I just flashed my 9260-4i with the latest firmware (dated 9/3/2010) and am having no issues on an Asus Rampage Formula x48. Note though that if I do not put my ICH in IDE mode and have the JMicron RAID chip on my motherboard disabled, I am unable to either install windows or get into WebBIOS.

have you tried with ACHI/RAID off?

[Anvil]

Areca 1880, booting off of 2R0 X25-E, coming soon...
(about to HDDerase the drives as well as upgrading to bios F7 on the UD7)



One week ahead of schedule.

[Computurd]

*hides*

EDIT: cant wait to see these results!

[Anvil]

First benchmark, no tweaking, all windows updates installed, no OC. (3.33+turbo)

C:\Windows\system32>winsat disk
Windows System Assessment Tool
> Running: Feature Enumeration ''
> Run Time 00:00:00.00
> Running: Storage Assessment '-seq -read -n 1'
> Run Time 00:00:01.39
> Running: Storage Assessment '-ran -read -n 1'
> Run Time 00:00:00.17
> Running: Storage Assessment '-scen 2009 -drive C:'
> Run Time 00:00:51.47
> Running: Storage Assessment '-seq -write -drive C:'
> Run Time 00:00:01.28
> Running: Storage Assessment '-flush -drive C: -seq'
> Run Time 00:00:00.48
> Running: Storage Assessment '-flush -drive C: -ran'
> Run Time 00:00:00.28
> Running: Storage Assessment '-hybrid -ran -read -n 1 -ransize 4096'
NV Cache not present.
> Run Time 00:00:00.00
> Running: Storage Assessment '-hybrid -ran -read -n 1 -ransize 16384'
NV Cache not present.
> Run Time 00:00:00.02
> Disk Sequential 64.0 Read 567.05 MB/s 7.9
> Disk Random 16.0 Read 327.95 MB/s 7.9
> Responsiveness: Average IO Rate 0.15 ms/IO 7.9
> Responsiveness: Grouped IOs 5.64 units 7.9
> Responsiveness: Long IOs 4.16 units 7.8
> Responsiveness: Overall 23.50 units 7.7
> Responsiveness: PenaltyFactor 0.0
> Disk Sequential 64.0 Write 3191.80 MB/s 7.9
> Average Read Time with Sequential Writes 0.436 ms 7.9
> Latency: 95th Percentile 0.193 ms 7.9
> Latency: Maximum 177.943 ms 7.4
> Average Read Time with Random Writes 0.077 ms 7.9
> Total Run Time 00:00:56.57

[Computurd]

awesome. that max latency seems to be an issue i have been running into as well with my card..can you do a everest latency test, to see if yours spikes? mine has intermittent spikes every thirty seconds or so...
EDIT: that random read is unbelievable 2 x-25e?

[Anvil]

2R0 X25-E stripe size 4KB, volume read ahead Normal

I installed the storeport driver this time, I used the scsiport on the other rig, not sure which one is the better one, will try.

I'll do a few latency tests before I start OCing a bit, the new bios on the UD7 needs some testing.