• Welcome to TechPowerUp Forums, Guest! Please check out our forum guidelines for info related to our community.

Raid???

xanimefreak

New Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2011
Messages
16 (0.00/day)
System Name xanimefreak's PC
Processor AMD Athlon II 240 x2
Motherboard EMX-MCP61P-AVL
Cooling none
Memory Kingston 2GB 800MHz
Video Card(s) Sapphire HD 5850 1GB GDDR5
Storage WD Caviar Blue 320GB
Display(s) Samsung T190 19"
Case Coolmaster Elite Black 430
Audio Device(s) Built-In
Power Supply Hec Raptor 500watts
Software Windows 7 64bit
What is Raid? And whats the purpose and advantage about it for my harddrive??
I know I can google and get info's about this but it seems I cant really understand the explanation... I know I can get a must more easier definition on this topic from all the expert here.....

I currently have a 320GB HD and planning to buy a 2nd HD(500GB)
 

Fourstaff

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Nov 29, 2009
Messages
10,020 (1.91/day)
Location
Home
System Name Orange! // ItchyHands
Processor 3570K // 10400F
Motherboard ASRock z77 Extreme4 // TUF Gaming B460M-Plus
Cooling Stock // Stock
Memory 2x4Gb 1600Mhz CL9 Corsair XMS3 // 2x8Gb 3200 Mhz XPG D41
Video Card(s) Sapphire Nitro+ RX 570 // Asus TUF RTX 2070
Storage Samsung 840 250Gb // SX8200 480GB
Display(s) LG 22EA53VQ // Philips 275M QHD
Case NZXT Phantom 410 Black/Orange // Tecware Forge M
Power Supply Corsair CXM500w // CM MWE 600w
Perhaps wiki can help you: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

Take a good look, then come back with terms that you don't understand. Any posts we make right now is less "complete" than the article due to lack of rigour and general laziness.
 
Joined
Nov 13, 2004
Messages
455 (0.06/day)
Location
Canada/quebec/Montreal
System Name Custom DIY
Processor Intel i7 2600K @ 4.8 Turbo 1.4v
Motherboard Asus P8Z68-V Pro 8801
Cooling XSPC RS240 + 120mm Rad/fan
Memory Corsair 1866 Vangence 9-10-9-27-2T
Video Card(s) 2X EVGA GTX570 SLI
Storage OCZ Revodrive 110GB + 2x1TB seagate
Display(s) ASUS MT276HE
Case CoolerMaster Sniper
Audio Device(s) X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series
Power Supply ANTEC TP-750 Blue 750Watts
Software win7 64
Benchmark Scores http://3dmark.com/3dm11/1347866
Perhaps wiki can help you: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

Take a good look, then come back with terms that you don't understand. Any posts we make right now is less "complete" than the article due to lack of rigour and general laziness.

+1

RAID = Redundant array of inexpensive disk

if you can't understand the google used therm it mean you don't need raid!

also raid is most used to get some more performance with 2 identical HD . but with much more problem around it for the new guy.
 

Kreij

Senior Monkey Moderator
Joined
Feb 6, 2007
Messages
13,817 (2.21/day)
Location
Cheeseland (Wisconsin, USA)
The people here on TPU aren't lazy, we just perfer to answer questions and not write short novels. :D

Feel free to ask any questions you might have after digging in a little, xanime
 

Fourstaff

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Nov 29, 2009
Messages
10,020 (1.91/day)
Location
Home
System Name Orange! // ItchyHands
Processor 3570K // 10400F
Motherboard ASRock z77 Extreme4 // TUF Gaming B460M-Plus
Cooling Stock // Stock
Memory 2x4Gb 1600Mhz CL9 Corsair XMS3 // 2x8Gb 3200 Mhz XPG D41
Video Card(s) Sapphire Nitro+ RX 570 // Asus TUF RTX 2070
Storage Samsung 840 250Gb // SX8200 480GB
Display(s) LG 22EA53VQ // Philips 275M QHD
Case NZXT Phantom 410 Black/Orange // Tecware Forge M
Power Supply Corsair CXM500w // CM MWE 600w
also raid is most used to get some more performance with 2 identical HD . but with much more problem around it for the new guy.

Or for people who does not like to lose their "warez" :roll: RAID can either be used to speed up your HDD performance or provide redundancy so that if one of your drives fail, you will not lose your data. Its not that difficult to set up raid nowadays.
 

xanimefreak

New Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2011
Messages
16 (0.00/day)
System Name xanimefreak's PC
Processor AMD Athlon II 240 x2
Motherboard EMX-MCP61P-AVL
Cooling none
Memory Kingston 2GB 800MHz
Video Card(s) Sapphire HD 5850 1GB GDDR5
Storage WD Caviar Blue 320GB
Display(s) Samsung T190 19"
Case Coolmaster Elite Black 430
Audio Device(s) Built-In
Power Supply Hec Raptor 500watts
Software Windows 7 64bit
thanks guys! I ask later ^_^
 

Kreij

Senior Monkey Moderator
Joined
Feb 6, 2007
Messages
13,817 (2.21/day)
Location
Cheeseland (Wisconsin, USA)
I forgot to add that there are many threads on RAID here at TPU from which you can learn more.
Just use the little old search function. :toast:
 
Joined
Nov 13, 2004
Messages
455 (0.06/day)
Location
Canada/quebec/Montreal
System Name Custom DIY
Processor Intel i7 2600K @ 4.8 Turbo 1.4v
Motherboard Asus P8Z68-V Pro 8801
Cooling XSPC RS240 + 120mm Rad/fan
Memory Corsair 1866 Vangence 9-10-9-27-2T
Video Card(s) 2X EVGA GTX570 SLI
Storage OCZ Revodrive 110GB + 2x1TB seagate
Display(s) ASUS MT276HE
Case CoolerMaster Sniper
Audio Device(s) X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series
Power Supply ANTEC TP-750 Blue 750Watts
Software win7 64
Benchmark Scores http://3dmark.com/3dm11/1347866
Or for people who does not like to lose their "warez" :roll: RAID can either be used to speed up your HDD performance or provide redundancy so that if one of your drives fail, you will not lose your data. Its not that difficult to set up raid nowadays.

actually using raid like RAID1 "mirror" when 1 HD dies it can be hell to replace and rebuild...

raid is nice in theory ... and most people use raid 0 to get better performance .. not many use RAID1 or 0+1 .. because it cost twice per GB ...
 
Joined
Apr 2, 2011
Messages
2,645 (0.56/day)
Idiot explanation (others will fill in the details):

Raid effectively makes multiple physical disks available to the OS as a single disk. There are different ways to do this, but only three which are commonly used.

Raid 0:
Striping. Imagine taking each disk and cutting them into bands, then layering the bands into one disk twice the size of the smallest disk. This solution allows for an increase in speed (you can write to both disks at once, ideally doubling write speed). What it does is decrease fault tolerance. Specifically, if either drive dies the data from the other is worthless.
So faster speed, but higher instances of failure.

Raid 1:
Mirroring. Imagine one disk as a mirror of the other. Each bit is written to both disks, which provides a complete image to recover should either of the HDDs die. It will be about as fast as a single disk, but you only get half of the space you paid for (less if one drive is larger than the other).
So high fault tolerance, but a large decrease in storage space.

Raid 5:
Parity. This requires at least 3 disks, and generates a parity string for the data stored on the other HDDs on the last disk. In effect, any one of the disks could fail, without any data loss. Visually:
______Bit 1_____Bit 2_____Bit 3____
Disk 1 |_1____|___0____|__Par___|
Disk 2 |_0____|___Par__|__0_____|
Disk 3 |_Par___|___1____|__1____|
This type of raid does not offer performance boosts, but it does offer high reliability with a minimum of lost space. If you were to create a raid 5 with 4 disks you would have 1 disk worth of lost space, so less lost space as disks increase. It compares with Raid 1 as follows:
Raid level Disks % Space loss
1________ 4_______ 50
5________ 4_______ 25
1________ 6_______ 50
5________ 6_______ 16.7
1________ 8_______ 50
5________ 8_______ 12.5
So you choose Raid 5 for larger storage arrays, that still need reliability.


There are also a few things you should know about any Raid setup.
Hardware level raid is supported by either motherboards (starting at the medium end, and generally all high end boards support it) or expansion cards. This requires the disks to be formatted, so your data will be lost unless you're starting from scratch.
Software Raid blows, there is no more concise way to put it. It is slower, and if anything gets changed in software your data is up in smoke.
Raid arrays can only build from the size of your smallest disk. So if you have a 320GB, 500GB, and 1TB drive in Raid 5 you'll only see 640GB of useful data (these numbers are based on 1000=GB, like advertised on HDDs). In Raid 0 you will only see 640GB if you use a 320GB and 500GB HDD (the rest of the data storage is inaccessible). If you use Raid 1 you'll only see 320GB if you install a 320GB and 500GB drive.


In short, you either need to save money and get a 320 GB HDD if you are going Raid, or not use Raid. Given your lack of experience, and contingent upon the fact that you only presumably have one drive, Raid is not a good solution for you right now. Just get the 500GB and use it as a second storage drive.
 
Last edited:

xanimefreak

New Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2011
Messages
16 (0.00/day)
System Name xanimefreak's PC
Processor AMD Athlon II 240 x2
Motherboard EMX-MCP61P-AVL
Cooling none
Memory Kingston 2GB 800MHz
Video Card(s) Sapphire HD 5850 1GB GDDR5
Storage WD Caviar Blue 320GB
Display(s) Samsung T190 19"
Case Coolmaster Elite Black 430
Audio Device(s) Built-In
Power Supply Hec Raptor 500watts
Software Windows 7 64bit
Or for people who does not like to lose their "warez" :roll: RAID can either be used to speed up your HDD performance or provide redundancy so that if one of your drives fail, you will not lose your data. Its not that difficult to set up raid nowadays.

I see now I understand..... But will I still dig for infos about it in wiki. Thanks Fourstaff
 

xanimefreak

New Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2011
Messages
16 (0.00/day)
System Name xanimefreak's PC
Processor AMD Athlon II 240 x2
Motherboard EMX-MCP61P-AVL
Cooling none
Memory Kingston 2GB 800MHz
Video Card(s) Sapphire HD 5850 1GB GDDR5
Storage WD Caviar Blue 320GB
Display(s) Samsung T190 19"
Case Coolmaster Elite Black 430
Audio Device(s) Built-In
Power Supply Hec Raptor 500watts
Software Windows 7 64bit
Idiot explanation (others will fill in the details):

Raid effectively makes multiple physical disks available to the OS as a single disk. There are different ways to do this, but only three which are commonly used.

Raid 0:
Striping. Imagine taking each disk and cutting them into bands, then layering the bands into one disk twice the size of the smallest disk. This solution allows for an increase in speed (you can write to both disks at once, ideally doubling write speed). What it does is decrease fault tolerance. Specifically, if either drive dies the data from the other is worthless.
So faster speed, but higher instances of failure.

Raid 1:
Mirroring. Imagine one disk as a mirror of the other. Each bit is written to both disks, which provides a complete image to recover should either of the HDDs die. It will be about as fast as a single disk, but you only get half of the space you paid for (less if one drive is larger than the other).
So high fault tolerance, but a large decrease in storage space.

Raid 5:
Parity. This requires at least 3 disks, and generates a parity string for the data stored on the other HDDs on the last disk. In effect, any one of the disks could fail, without any data loss. Visually:
______Bit 1_____Bit 2_____Bit 3____
Disk 1 |_1____|___0____|__Par___|
Disk 2 |_0____|___Par__|__0_____|
Disk 3 |_Par___|___1____|__1____|
This type of raid does not offer performance boosts, but it does offer high reliability with a minimum of lost space. If you were to create a raid 5 with 4 disks you would have 1 disk worth of lost space, so less lost space as disks increase. It compares with Raid 1 as follows:
Raid level Disks % Space loss
1________ 4_______ 50
5________ 4_______ 25
1________ 6_______ 50
5________ 6_______ 16.7
1________ 8_______ 50
5________ 8_______ 12.5
So you choose Raid 5 for larger storage arrays, that still need reliability.


There are also a few things you should know about any Raid setup.
Hardware level raid is supported by either motherboards (starting at the medium end, and generally all high end boards support it) or expansion cards. This requires the disks to be formatted, so your data will be lost unless you're starting from scratch.
Software Raid blows, there is no more concise way to put it. It is slower, and if anything gets changed in software your data is up in smoke.
Raid arrays can only build from the size of your smallest disk. So if you have a 320GB, 500GB, and 1TB drive in Raid you'll only see 640GB of useful data (these numbers are based on 1000=GB, like advertised on HDDs). In Raid 0 you will only see 640GB if you use a 320GB and 500GB HDD (the rest of the data storage is inaccessible). If you use Raid 1 you'll only see 320GB if you install a 320GB and 500GB drive.


In short, you either need to save money and get a 320 GB HDD if you are going Raid, or not use Raid. Given your lack of experience, and contingent upon the fact that you only presumably have one drive, Raid is not a good solution for you right now. Just get the 500GB and use it as a second storage drive.

now this is the reason Idiots like me cant live w/o this type of explanation :respect:

you :rockout: lilhasselhoffer

with this info it wont be hard for me to understand RAID setup!!! thanks guys!!!
 
Last edited:
Joined
Apr 2, 2011
Messages
2,645 (0.56/day)
now this is the reason Idiots like me cant leave with this type of explanation :respect:

you :rockout: lilhasselhoffer

with this info it wont be hard for me to understand RAID setup!!! thanks guys!!!

My apologies if this is misconstrued, but I refer to this as an idiot explanation because these are only the broad strokes. I view it as "any idiot can understand anything if you explain it simply enough."

When asked such an open question I try to explain simply, and not belittle the person asking the question. It is meant to be an introduction, and the finer points will be explained later whenever you have a working knowledge of the basics. I apologize if this was seen as insulting, because that was definitely not my intention.
 

xanimefreak

New Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2011
Messages
16 (0.00/day)
System Name xanimefreak's PC
Processor AMD Athlon II 240 x2
Motherboard EMX-MCP61P-AVL
Cooling none
Memory Kingston 2GB 800MHz
Video Card(s) Sapphire HD 5850 1GB GDDR5
Storage WD Caviar Blue 320GB
Display(s) Samsung T190 19"
Case Coolmaster Elite Black 430
Audio Device(s) Built-In
Power Supply Hec Raptor 500watts
Software Windows 7 64bit
No, Im not at all offended....Im really glad you reply with that answer. Its true that Im an idiot on this kind of stuff. I'd be lying to myself if I dont admit it. :laugh: ahahahahaha.
 

Kreij

Senior Monkey Moderator
Joined
Feb 6, 2007
Messages
13,817 (2.21/day)
Location
Cheeseland (Wisconsin, USA)
One thing you must understand about RAID1 (mirroring) is that it does not eliminate the need for backups.
RAID1 is for failure prevention (one of the HDDs craps out) only.
If the data on one RAID1 hard drive corrupts, it will corrupt the data on the other as well.
If you delete a file, it will be gone from both drives in the RAID1 array.
I've seen too many people who think RAID1 acts as a backup for their data. It does not.

Just a tip from yer ol' Uncle Kreij. ;)
 

xanimefreak

New Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2011
Messages
16 (0.00/day)
System Name xanimefreak's PC
Processor AMD Athlon II 240 x2
Motherboard EMX-MCP61P-AVL
Cooling none
Memory Kingston 2GB 800MHz
Video Card(s) Sapphire HD 5850 1GB GDDR5
Storage WD Caviar Blue 320GB
Display(s) Samsung T190 19"
Case Coolmaster Elite Black 430
Audio Device(s) Built-In
Power Supply Hec Raptor 500watts
Software Windows 7 64bit
hehhehehehehe yup! NOTED! :smile:
 

techspec6

New Member
Joined
Sep 20, 2009
Messages
40 (0.01/day)
My only question about RAID is who the rich prick was that considered hard drives to be inexpensive. Unless they're hooking 3.5" AOL floppies together they got from the mail, they're not what I'd call "inexpensive". Wonder if the rich jerk would consider todays SSDs inexpensive...
;-)

-Jason
 

Fourstaff

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Nov 29, 2009
Messages
10,020 (1.91/day)
Location
Home
System Name Orange! // ItchyHands
Processor 3570K // 10400F
Motherboard ASRock z77 Extreme4 // TUF Gaming B460M-Plus
Cooling Stock // Stock
Memory 2x4Gb 1600Mhz CL9 Corsair XMS3 // 2x8Gb 3200 Mhz XPG D41
Video Card(s) Sapphire Nitro+ RX 570 // Asus TUF RTX 2070
Storage Samsung 840 250Gb // SX8200 480GB
Display(s) LG 22EA53VQ // Philips 275M QHD
Case NZXT Phantom 410 Black/Orange // Tecware Forge M
Power Supply Corsair CXM500w // CM MWE 600w
My only question about RAID is who the rich prick was that considered hard drives to be inexpensive. Unless they're hooking 3.5" AOL floppies together they got from the mail, they're not what I'd call "inexpensive". Wonder if the rich jerk would consider todays SSDs inexpensive...

I am not quite sure what you mean there. I take it as you mean that harddrives are expensive. If your work depends on it,an extra $60 put in to minimise data loss is by no means expensive, especially when it will take you days to reconstruct it. Also, instead of spending money on a SSD, RAID 0 almost doubles your HDD speed. In both cases, RAID is relatively cheap.
 
Top