Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.asus (
More info?)
http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20041119/
re hack
"Tim" <Tim@NoSpam.com> wrote in message news:d6r0kf$sgh$1@lust.ihug.co.nz...
> So,
>
> You are trying to set up Windows soft raid on multiple drives, possibly
> spanning controllers where the controllers themselves support raid, but
due
> to the number of drives involved the inbuilt hardware raid is of no use
and
> you are wanting them to present the drives as ordinary drives?
>
> Does the BIOS have an option along the lines of setting the silicon image
> controller in 3 modes: Disabled, Basic (non RAID), and RAID? If so then
set
> it to the Basic (the term may be different) mode.
>
> What is the hack? What does it do? Do you have a link to it?
>
> I don't see how creating the RAID 5 array on another machine fits in. If
> Windows can see the 5 discs then surely you can create the raid within
> Windows... Windows soft raid doesn't care where the drives are or what
type
> they are so long as they are all internal IE not a mix of USB / Firewire
> unpluggable external drives and internals.
>
> Personally, for the number of drives involved, I would not let any hack
> anywhere near any system with RAID 5 and 6 x 250GB disc drives.
>
> There are other options you could consider: if the 3114 controller
supports
> raid 5 already then create raid 5 on 4 discs and using the other
> controller's RAID 1 or if it supports RAID 5 on 3 discs (it will cost 1
> disc). The benefit here is that you have no hacks installed, no more h/w
to
> get other than 1 more HDD.
>
> Depending on the controller, people often say that having more than 3
discs
> in RAID 5 gives a more degraded write performance as more discs are added
> (and progressively improved read) - it is highly controller dependant and
> and write performance degradation is perhaps only likely in older design
> controllers.
>
> At the end of the day, you would seem to have 2 major requirements: data
> resilience and a need for 1.25TB of disc storage. That write performance
> (and CPU overhead) is not an issue for you and that benchmarks from
research
> have indicated that the system will work fine in this config. If this is
not
> the case then I suggest when you post back, that you state what your
> requirements are because the next big issue is How will you back up this
> data? Tape drives with this capacity are far from cheap, you have too much
> data to back up to HDD and RAID is no substitute for backups. Believe me,
> RAID is not a substitute for backups - you can have multiple disc failures
> in RAID systems. Your system can be stolen... someone could kick it
over...
> earthquake, electrician, plumber...
>
> If you have a RAID 5 or 1 or 10 system of this capacity, you *must* have
> standby disc drives. As soon as 1 drive fails you will be back to square 1
> in terms of data resilience and the amount of time your system runs in a
> degraded state = the window of opportunity for loss of all raid data. You
> also *must* have a quality UPS.
>
> When you factor in your data load / backup / time to restore, you will
need
> to benchmark the write performance so that in the event of raid failure
you
> know in advance how long it is going to take to re-create the raid. If you
> use a hack, will you always be able to rebuild?
>
> I would also rehearse drive failure. When the system is down, pull out a
> drive and restart. Then learn how to find out the drive has failed, how
you
> can be alerted, and how to rebuild the failed drive, how long it takes and
> what level of performance you get while this is going on.
>
> RAID 10 won't help you in this situation - the key difference between RAID
5
> and 10 is cost and write performance. If the restore / rebuild times are
not
> acceptable then consider getting a full implementation of hardware raid 5
> and skip all the problems (hopefully, and don't assume there are none).
>
> Given the costs of all the above and all other factors, I would err on
using
> a h/w RAID controller that has well known and proven behaviours, is well
> supported, mature (Windows soft raid is mature.... but is at the whim of
the
> discs and controllers you use - Windows will be the most reliable part of
> the configuration), and supports hot standby discs. You will likely also
get
> hot swapping capability, better raid management along with fault
disgnosis,
> alerts via email or pager etc. and so on.
>
> HTH
> - Tim
>
>
>
>
> "Leif Nordmand Andersen" <lna@flashmail.com> wrote in message
> news:qh11911i4c9nfgq39plskomd6nege3thrs@4ax.com...
> > Hello Group,
> >
> > I have just got this motherboard.
> >
> > I needed 8 sata ports, I want to run one system disk and one backup
> > disk - Not in a raid, just manual backups.
> >
> > I wanted to use the remaining 6 ports for 6x250 Gb disks set up in a
> > Windows XP soft Raid 5 (I've applied the hack!).
> >
> > But I can't for the life of me get the the Silicon Sil3114 controller
> > to just recognize the 4 attached drives as 4 single drives to pass on
> > to Windows for me to use.
> >
> > Have already on a friends computer formatted the 6x250 GB harddisks as
> > Windows Soft Raid 5 and copied the data to them (I had another raid
> > from which I needed to copy the data - And I don't have ports enough
> > to connect both raids on my own computer and do the copy).
> >
> > When I connect the drives to the Sil3114 controller the computer stops
> > at the sil3114 controller - and never get any futher in the boot
> > process. I can then by hitting F4 go into the controller. But I cant
> > like on the Asus A7N board set up each drive as a single drive, it
> > INSISTS on making some kind of raid.
> >
> > Is it correct that this controller can't funciton as a 'dump' Sata x 4
> > port controller?
> >
> > Thank you for any help.
> >
> > Regards Leif.
>
>