GA-Z68X-UD3P-B3 + 2 SSDs on Z68 Raid Controller

[ramba69]

Hi Everybody,
i'm having trouble ... and would appreaciate your experiences. Has anybody 2 SSd running in XHD (Raid mode 0) running on GA-Z68X-UD3P-B3 rev 1.0 (F8) board?
My config is:
BeSilent 750Watt for a GA-Z68X-UD3P Z68 Rev1.0 (Bios F8), i7 2700k - Mugen 3, 8GB Samsung 1333, Gainward 560 GTX TI, Intel Z68 RAID0 mit 2*SSD OCZ Vertex 3 Max IOPS 120GB, Marvel Raid 0 with 2*3TB HDD Samsung.

My 2 OCZ Vertex 3 Max IOPS cause problems. I get a bluescreen F4 sporadically after some time running and doing some stuff (no matter what – some times it take only 5 minutes to have it crashed – sometimes 2 hours). Funny enough: The SSD that has the error-flag after reboot in Raid-Bios (Error Occured on SATA G0) was running beforehand standalone on that Sata Port without any problems.

Are there any known incompatibilities for Raid0 config of OCZ drives?

Besides - the boiard seems to boot Win7 quite slow (Compared to youtube 8 Sec on an ASRock with SSDs) mine takes still 30 secs although in Raid0!

Should i select a different board?

Any ideas are appreciated...

Thanks a lot for your advice...

 

[jaquith]

Welcome to Tom's Forum!

First, I'd take a look at this FAQ -> http://www.gigabyte.us/support-downloads/faq-page.aspx?fid=1526&pid=3850

BIOS:
eXtreme Hard Drive (XHD) -> Enabled
PCH SATA Control Mode -> RAID(XHD)
/See page 79 of manual/

Next, IMO 'eXtreme Hard Drive (X.H.D)' IMO is not a good idea for RAID especially on SSD's, and instead I'd only use the onboard Intel RAID and Intel SATA3 ports. In addition, verify that your OCZ has the latest firmware -> http://www.ocztechnology.com/ssd_tools/

BIOS:
eXtreme Hard Drive (XHD) -> Disabled
PCH SATA Control Mode -> RAID(XHD)

Next boot into Intel's RST RAID controller (Ctrl + I)
Create a RAID 0 with 128KB striping; this will ERASE the SSD's!!!
/See page 81~85

 

[ramba69]

Thank you very much - for the welcome and for your reply!

@BIOS - So i have enabled XHD - and i thought this is Gigabyte's wording for enable the RAID controller on Z68 Chipset - nothing more nothing less!?
Therefore - if i disable XHD - it will simply turn off RAID-functionality and no more RAID-BIOS will be shown at boot time.
Anyhow - I'll disable XHD tonight and check this evening on my machine what is happening then...

@Firmware of SSDs: They're both on latest Firmare from OCZ - i.e. 2.15 - that was my first action.
@Firmware of board: F8 is also the latest version for the board
@Intel RST - i've heard there is an alpha version supporting TRIM - but i think this is performance meassure only - anyhow if this is causing my problems i'll find out tonight as well ;-)

Any other recommendations are welcome!

Can you recommend any better board known to work with SATA3-RAID0 and 2 SSDs?

 

[jaquith]

On a consumer basis and use IMO don't worry too much if at all over lack of TRIM support with RAID. I see a lot of people doing all sorts of oddball stuff, especially tweaks, and forgetting the most important parts: stability and performance.

Do it the way I recommend and the MOBO is fine. If you want superior RAID then look at LSI RAID Controllers, but their cost is more than 'most' MOBO's and is unnecessary, overkill, for (2) SSD's in any RAID. Your MOBO is fine, the UD5 or UD7's are obviously better if you're pushing the MOBO: OC, SLI, etc.

 

[ramba69]

On a consumer basis and use IMO don't worry too much if at all over lack of TRIM support with RAID. I see a lot of people doing all sorts of oddball stuff, especially tweaks, and forgetting the most important parts: stability and performance.

You're right - stability & performance in this order is what i wanted as well! But i'm still confused why my other config with ASRock board and a single Crucial m4 SSD boots Win7 faster than my Raid0 config with to OCZ SSD does !?

Do it the way I recommend and the MOBO is fine. If you want superior RAID then look at LSI RAID Controllers, but their cost is more than 'most' MOBO's and is unnecessary, overkill, for (2) SSD's in any RAID. Your MOBO is fine, the UD5 or UD7's are obviously better if you're pushing the MOBO: OC, SLI, etc.

You're right - stability & performance in this order is what i wanted as well! But i'm still confused why my other config with ASRock board and a single Crucial m4 SSD boots Win7 faster than my Raid0 config with to OCZ SSD does !?

You were right. After enabling XHD and the configuring RAID - then disabling XHD again Raid0 still works! That's funny - it is not descibed this way in the manual!
-> Thank you very much for that hint!!!
From a consumer basis i'm puzzeld why there is a feature i can't use in a SSD config though! And why this config still is slower in booting Win7? Still 30 secs! After that performance seems fine:



So i installeld than the Intel RST Alpha 11.5 driver as well to make sure i have the latest - and then resetted the error in the volume in the intel RST management tool!

So far no crash again - but i'll test it tonight more extensively!

 

[jaquith]

I assume the SSD's are on the SATA3 Ports and not the SATA2 ports; use (SATA3_0~SATA3_1) which as I recall are the top (2) ports (check your manual).

As far as booting, it depends: 1. Quick Start vs Normal, 2. BIOS checksums, 3. Slash Screens (on/off), 4. Drivers & Drives themselves, 5. How much RAM, 6. Windows Startup items, etc.

AS SSD is only (1) bench, and IMO try ATTO -> http://www.attotech.com/products/product.php?sku=Disk_Benchmark this is the application that the OEM (OCZ, Corsair, Crucial, etc) uses to determine maximum R/W speeds.

Good Luck!

 

[klideklide]

In case you didn't find the answer to your question, this should do it, update your SSDs to the lastest firmware, it's possible that they actually run on 2 different firmware versions. I have 2 max iops, and would get the blue screen once in a while, ever since I updated the firmware on both, it has never occured again.

You must disable raid in the bios, and the easy way to update in using the preboot software, you can get it here: https://rapidshare.com/files/2654935502/ocz_fwupd_2.68.12.zip
If you can't use this software, then boot in other windows installation and use the software in their site, or plug you drives in another computer.

I hope this works out for you!

Hi Everybody,
i'm having trouble ... and would appreaciate your experiences. Has anybody 2 SSd running in XHD (Raid mode 0) running on GA-Z68X-UD3P-B3 rev 1.0 (F8) board?
My config is:
BeSilent 750Watt for a GA-Z68X-UD3P Z68 Rev1.0 (Bios F8), i7 2700k - Mugen 3, 8GB Samsung 1333, Gainward 560 GTX TI, Intel Z68 RAID0 mit 2*SSD OCZ Vertex 3 Max IOPS 120GB, Marvel Raid 0 with 2*3TB HDD Samsung.

My 2 OCZ Vertex 3 Max IOPS cause problems. I get a bluescreen F4 sporadically after some time running and doing some stuff (no matter what – some times it take only 5 minutes to have it crashed – sometimes 2 hours). Funny enough: The SSD that has the error-flag after reboot in Raid-Bios (Error Occured on SATA G0) was running beforehand standalone on that Sata Port without any problems.

Are there any known incompatibilities for Raid0 config of OCZ drives?

Besides - the boiard seems to boot Win7 quite slow (Compared to youtube 8 Sec on an ASRock with SSDs) mine takes still 30 secs although in Raid0!

Should i select a different board?

Any ideas are appreciated...

Thanks a lot for your advice...