Question New laptop is setup in Raid 0 - Are there any benefits to this?

[liberty610]

Hello all.

I run a small project studio where do a lot of video and audio production work (recording bands with external audio interfaces, shooting higher bitrate video with pro camcorders and rendering footage in new edits, ect). I do a lot of this on the go where I meet clients and partners at random locations, so a solid laptop is key.

My current ASUS ROG Strix laptop is starting to show it's age after having it for 5 years (older CPU and a RTX 2070 GPU). The battery life is not what it was, and there are some ports starting to fail on it. So I decided to upgrade to a Lenovo Legion 9i that should be arriving this week. There was a pretty decent price drop on it, and I didn't really want to wait for the latest models to hit the shelves (especially with the possible pending terrif issues that maybe coming). So, I went ahead with model ere are the specs on it:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/prod...o_83g0001kus_16_legion_9_laptop.html/overview

-Intel Core i9-14900HX (14th Gen)
-NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 with 16 GB GDDR6 VRAM
-32gb 5600 MT/s DDR5 SO-DIMM ram
-2x M.2 Slot 2280 (PCIe 4.0 x4)

It has 2TB of drive space, but the out-of-the-box configuration is two separate 1TB drives working in tandem in RAID 0. From the research I have done, it appears that the drives are Samsung Evo drives. Now, I am a Windows 11 system builder, so I know my way around upgrades, drive formatting/configurations ect, although I have never really used a RAID setup outside NAS units that use regular HDDs. I'm going to eventually want to upgrade these 2 SSDs to larger capacity drives, possibly NOT in a raid configuration, but for now, this 2tb raid o configuration will be okay.

I have been using the free app Easus2do to make Windows 11 backup images of my systems. This has allowed me to make SSD upgrades and changes on my other machines without having to deal with the headaches of reinstalling Windows and all my apps. It actually saved me on my desktop when I had a failing SSD that I had been using for several years. On that said desktop, I have actually swapped out my main boot SSD twice in the past year. Once for a drive failing, the other to upgrade to an 8tb drive. The Easus2Do backups worked flawlessly to get me back up and running in no time. I plan on doing the same backup option with this Lenovo Legion 9i. Once I get it all setup with the current RAID 0 configuration in tact, I'll get a back up made and keep it updated util I decide to swap out the current drives.

Are there any real benefits with running 2 PCIe gen 4 drives together in RAID 0? With the speeds they have by default on each drive, they are already pretty fast these days. Because of this. I usually avoid raid setups on my other machines and just go with a mid capacity (2tb usually) Gen 4 NVMe drive for the Windows install and all my apps, VST plugins, and sound libraries, then I will get a higher capacity 2nd drive (4tb to 8tb) to save all my project files to. I also have external M.2 enclosures that will make use of the 2 Thunderbolt 4 ports on this new Lenovo model. But should I consider keeping the RAID 0 setup down the road? I'm assuming the laptop's chipset or CPU would bring out a bottleneck somewhere that would not make RAID 0 work at it's full 100% potential. But again, I have never really ran RAID configurations with SSDs before.

I know that if a drive fails in RAID 0, I will lose everything (hence the Windows mirror backup plan). And I also do several back up options on the fly at all times of all my main projects as I am doing work on them. As I work in any session, I have drag and drops to other drives going on in the back ground as new files are made. Plus if I am working on my home network, I have a 32tb NAS unit I back up to as well.

With my backup habits I have in place to avoid total data loss, Is RAID 0 worth it from a performance stance? Or should I just consider 2 separate high speed NVMe drives down the road and keep them out of RAID config....?

Thanks in advance for any replies.

 

[faalin]

Since it will be a brand new laptop, make a backup of the OS, make sure its a good functioning backup you can restore from. Wipe the drive and break the raid 0 and then restore the OS back to a single drive.

Other then just have one large drive, the raid 0 does nothing for you and can sometimes preform worse then just a single drive.

 

[kanewolf]

Hello all.

I run a small project studio where do a lot of video and audio production work (recording bands with external audio interfaces, shooting higher bitrate video with pro camcorders and rendering footage in new edits, ect). I do a lot of this on the go where I meet clients and partners at random locations, so a solid laptop is key.

My current ASUS ROG Strix laptop is starting to show it's age after having it for 5 years (older CPU and a RTX 2070 GPU). The battery life is not what it was, and there are some ports starting to fail on it. So I decided to upgrade to a Lenovo Legion 9i that should be arriving this week. There was a pretty decent price drop on it, and I didn't really want to wait for the latest models to hit the shelves (especially with the possible pending terrif issues that maybe coming). So, I went ahead with model ere are the specs on it:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/prod...o_83g0001kus_16_legion_9_laptop.html/overview

-Intel Core i9-14900HX (14th Gen)
-NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 with 16 GB GDDR6 VRAM
-32gb 5600 MT/s DDR5 SO-DIMM ram
-2x M.2 Slot 2280 (PCIe 4.0 x4)

It has 2TB of drive space, but the out-of-the-box configuration is two separate 1TB drives working in tandem in RAID 0. From the research I have done, it appears that the drives are Samsung Evo drives. Now, I am a Windows 11 system builder, so I know my way around upgrades, drive formatting/configurations ect, although I have never really used a RAID setup outside NAS units that use regular HDDs. I'm going to eventually want to upgrade these 2 SSDs to larger capacity drives, possibly NOT in a raid configuration, but for now, this 2tb raid o configuration will be okay.

I have been using the free app Easus2do to make Windows 11 backup images of my systems. This has allowed me to make SSD upgrades and changes on my other machines without having to deal with the headaches of reinstalling Windows and all my apps. It actually saved me on my desktop when I had a failing SSD that I had been using for several years. On that said desktop, I have actually swapped out my main boot SSD twice in the past year. Once for a drive failing, the other to upgrade to an 8tb drive. The Easus2Do backups worked flawlessly to get me back up and running in no time. I plan on doing the same backup option with this Lenovo Legion 9i. Once I get it all setup with the current RAID 0 configuration in tact, I'll get a back up made and keep it updated util I decide to swap out the current drives.

Are there any real benefits with running 2 PCIe gen 4 drives together in RAID 0? With the speeds they have by default on each drive, they are already pretty fast these days. Because of this. I usually avoid raid setups on my other machines and just go with a mid capacity (2tb usually) Gen 4 NVMe drive for the Windows install and all my apps, VST plugins, and sound libraries, then I will get a higher capacity 2nd drive (4tb to 8tb) to save all my project files to. I also have external M.2 enclosures that will make use of the 2 Thunderbolt 4 ports on this new Lenovo model. But should I consider keeping the RAID 0 setup down the road? I'm assuming the laptop's chipset or CPU would bring out a bottleneck somewhere that would not make RAID 0 work at it's full 100% potential. But again, I have never really ran RAID configurations with SSDs before.

I know that if a drive fails in RAID 0, I will lose everything (hence the Windows mirror backup plan). And I also do several back up options on the fly at all times of all my main projects as I am doing work on them. As I work in any session, I have drag and drops to other drives going on in the back ground as new files are made. Plus if I am working on my home network, I have a 32tb NAS unit I back up to as well.

With my backup habits I have in place to avoid total data loss, Is RAID 0 worth it from a performance stance? Or should I just consider 2 separate high speed NVMe drives down the road and keep them out of RAID config....?

Thanks in advance for any replies.

RAID 0 doubles the probability of 100% data loss. Since if either of the two drives fails, ALL data is lost. It is the worst possible situation for a home user.

 

[USAFRet]

Is RAID 0 worth it from a performance stance?

No.
Artificial benchmarks can look great. But actual user facing performance can even be slower than individual drives.

This, from several years ago. But I've not found anything yet to refute it.
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/samsung-950-pro-256gb-raid-report,4449.html

One SSD Vs. Two In RAID: Which Is Better?

One SSD is good, right? So, two SSDs in RAID 0 must be better. That’s certainly the case when you're benchmarking sequential performance. But we're finding that, except in extreme examples, one SSD that's twice as large is often better.

www.tomshardware.com

 

[liberty610]

Since it will be a brand new laptop, make a backup of the OS, make sure its a good functioning backup you can restore from. Wipe the drive and break the raid 0 and then restore the OS back to a single drive.

Other then just have one large drive, the raid 0 does nothing for you and can sometimes preform worse then just a single drive.

So I received the laptop today, and I have tried to break the Raid 0 and reinstall windows. It's not letting me do it. I am having the same issue as other users who have posted about this problem on their forums.

I even went a step further and opened a support ticket, and got told that the level of help I need is going to require me to pay for the premium support package option. No way in hell am I doing that after I just dropped $3600.00 on this thing.


Here is the thread on their forums I saw. The third post down by user 'classic_sam' lists the same EXACT steps I took to try and disable RAID 0, and the same issue he had, I am having. I make the changes, hit F10 to save it, and the laptop does a full power cycle as it would need to to apply the changes. But when the laptop boots back up, it goes right back into RAID 0 mode and boots into windows; completely ignoring the changes I made.

https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/Gaming...w-ngd_7d345670a00ccefad5b1d357c325ba3b&page=1

I also tried a simple boot from USB to try and re-install windows from scratch to see what that would do, but when it loads the setup screens, none of the SSD drives appear. It acts as if the USB drive is the ONLY drive on the system, and it won't let me do a clean install.

Do I have to physically remove one of the SSDs to make the BIOS remember my settings? That was suggested on a Redditt thread I saw, but the user was unsure if it would work because he had not tried it yet.

 

[liberty610]

Sorry for the bump, does anyone have any suggestions for me on how to disable this RAID setup on here? I have the laptop all setup, and my backup with Easeus To Do is in place. Just need to figure out why it won't save the RAID off settings in bios.

Should I physically remove one of the drives and then try to save the settings in the BIOS?

 

[USAFRet]

Sorry for the bump, does anyone have any suggestions for me on how to disable this RAID setup on here? I have the laptop all setup, and my backup with Easeus To Do is in place. Just need to figure out why it won't save the RAID off settings in bios.

Should I physically remove one of the drives and then try to save the settings in the BIOS?

Yes.
Physically remove.

 

[liberty610]

Thanks. I'll give this a whirl and see if I can get it out of RAID. Thanks!

 

[JayGau]

I had the same problem with a DELL server about a year ago. The drives were set to RAID 0 and I could not see them when trying to install a new OS (even after removing all the drives but one, or replacing it with another bran new drive). Nothing I was doing in the BIOS had any effects, the drives were just not there, but the server could boot to Windows without any issues.

Turned out that the computer had a separated RAID controller and I had to access it directly (with a different key combination than the regular BIOS) and disable the RAID on each drive from there. Then I could set it to AHCI in the BIOS and install the OS. Maybe your laptop is built like this, with its own RAID controller. If it's the case nothing you will do will work unless you figure how to acces it and remove the drives from the RAID configuration.