New SSD RAID-0 Purchase

[JATownes]

Well I had a little cash to blow and was trying to figure out what to purchase. I thought about doing a little water cooling, but decided that a new SSD would be the best bang for buck purchase right now. I will wait for water until after Bulldozer drops.

So I just pulled the trigger on a pair of Patriot Inferno 60GB SSDs for RAID-0, and a new Samsung Spinpoint F4 2TB to add to my current Seagate Barracuda 1TB for storage.

Any comments/suggestions on using these drives? Anyone have any advice to help me avoid any pitfalls in setting a pair of these SSDs up in a RAID-0 Array? This is my first SSD purchase so I am feeling like a n00b.

They will be here TUESDAY!!! WOOHOO!!!

 

[JATownes]

Bump for advice on configuring RAID-0 on these SSDs using the SB750 on my MB.

 

[Wrigleyvillain]

Hello,

In a striped array (RAID level 0), multiple drives work in parallel to eke out the best possible performance and provide a combined storage capacity (good for video production); however, this type of RAID provides no backup protection-you’ll lose all your data if one disk fails.

Yes but this is an SSD, not a traditional mechanical HDD.

Nice choice and you will love it though I can't help but point out I just picked up a G.Skill Sniper 60GB for $102 shipped no rebate at Newegg with a promo code on Thursday before they sold out. The day before that they were $95 with a diff HardOCP code and I missed it just by bad luck though only $5. Almost bought two myself...

 

[MoonPig]

Doesn't RAID0 on SSDs still not allow TRIM? If so, i'd aim to get two Intel's if i HAD to Raid them, they allow it AFAIK.

 

[JATownes]

Yea, I have pair of 500GB in RAID-0 now, so I am not new to RAID. I am just curious if there is any issues with SSDs in RAID-0. I am not too worried about the TRIM issue as the SSDs have SF1222 controllers that support Garbage Collection, which to my understanding is just like TRIM but on a controller level as opposed to a OS level, but I could be mistaken.

So has anyone around here put a pair of SSDs in RAID-0? Any pointers to optimize performance?

 

[Wrigleyvillain]

That at least used to be the case, yes, and probably still is so it's a pretty major consideration when decide to RAID or not.

As for pointers just Google like SandForce RAID 0 or something like that.

 

[JATownes]

Well, the new drives arrived last night, and after a lot of file transferring and a fresh Win7 x64 install, this is the result. I must admit, these things freakin' scream. They are much faster than my old 500GB x2 RAID-0.

 

[Wrigleyvillain]

Dayum. Ya I may pick up another 60GB down the road.

 

[JATownes]

Dayum is right. I knew they were going to be fast, but I can literally feel the speed in EVERYTHING I do. It's pretty damn crazy, I highly recommend it.

 

[t_ski]

I have three Sandforce drives in Raid 0 and they max out my controller.

 

[MoonPig]

You can actually tell a difference from on SSD with the OS one it, to a Raid0 SSD OS?

 

[JATownes]

You can actually tell a difference from on SSD with the OS one it, to a Raid0 SSD OS?

IDK. I haven't tried with just one. I went straight to RAID.

 

[Wrigleyvillain]

Yeah I'd be really interested to see your numbers from just one of those but guess it's too late for that...

 

[JATownes]

Damn, I wish I would have thought of it and I would have installed and benched on one just for grins, but I was in too much of a hurry to get it up and running. :shadedshu

 

[Chewers]

BTW how about TRIM? does it works? as far im using F120 @ Raid0 (~R550MB/s | W520MB/s). So far from fsutil behavior query disabledeletenotify = 0 (means its enabled) anyone can confirm this?

 

[2DividedbyZero]

as far as i am aware, the TRIM command is allowed to pass through the RAID controller/BIOS, but will only TRIM the SSD itself so long as it is not in RAID

i.e. if you have 2 generic drives in RAID-0 as storage and games for example, and 1 SSD for OS, then TRIM is still sent to the SSD

 

[2DividedbyZero]

just to expand, if you have 2 SSD in RAID 0, win 7 will report TRIM "on" - this is because it can send the command through the RAID controller, as of yet - it CANNOT send the command to the RAID-0 SSD's (latest intel RST driver)

Am i making sense here?

I almost confused myself reading it back

 

[Chewers]

As far i've discovered - it should work 2xF120 are used for OS and program files + storage uses single HDD. More info

 

[2DividedbyZero]

tbh, i dont think you will see a signifcant loss in performance in an SSD if TRIM is not working (for a long time of daily use) UNLESS your drive is already nearing full - then you're in trouble.

 

[Wrigleyvillain]

With no TRIM def make sure to do all the tweaks so as to minimize writes as much as possible. I have even moved the Windows temp folders. A good guide on sevenforums.com; Google that + SSD tweaks. I hardly ever see my hard drive activity light blink when I'm not actually doing something utilizing the drive(s) as it should be.

Note I have left my page file alone other than trimming it down to a min/max of 1 and 4 as opposed to 4 and 6 (4GB RAM). It's BS that you don't need one even with 8+ GB and in Windows 7 it's written sequentially and the page operations are something like 40-to-1 reads. Leave it enabled and on your fast SSD where it belongs.

 

[JATownes]

To the best of my knowledge, TRIM is not really an issue with the newer Sandforce controllers. They all support Garbage Collection, which is "almost" just like TRIM, it is just on the controller level, as opposed to the OS level, but the end result is the same.

 

[2DividedbyZero]

To the best of my knowledge, TRIM is not really an issue with the newer Sandforce controllers. They all support Garbage Collection, which is "almost" just like TRIM, it is just on the controller level, as opposed to the OS level, but the end result is the same.

agreed. but i think "most" SSD's support some form of garbage collection or another either by hardware or software. The point being made is you cannot access this in RAID-0 SSD array.

 

[techtard]

I think you just need to leave your computer idle every now and then for the garbage collection to kick in. Nice results, BTW. I'm thinking about getting another X25-M G2 80Gb for raid 0.
Ssd are the new hotness.