Raid controller needed for $4000 Z68 RAID 5 machine?

[peakjunkie]

Consultant age 50 building first machine for daily use which often includes video editing using CS5.5 and future-proofing.

1 x Corsair Obsidian 900D case
1 x Asus Maximus Iv Z68 board since it bests supports SLI (just released today)
2 x MSI GTX Twin Frozer III graphic cards (just released, factory overclocked)
3 x 2tb WD Caviar Black HDD
1 x Vertex 3 240gb Max IOPS SSD
16gb Corsair Dominator GT memory @ 2000mhz
1 x Corsair AX850 power supply
1 x Corsair H80 water cooler (for CPU)

This is obviously a fairly powerful system but RAID is something fairly new to me.

1. I just need about 4 tb since I have both local and remote Synology 1511+ NAS's for archiving and backup so figured 3 x 2tb in Raid 5 would work still nicely rather than 5 x 1tb drive.

Any opinions?

2. Any benefit in a RAID controller such as the LSI controllers recently on Tom's given the Vertex 3, large fast memory, etc.? The budget isn't fixed but I still want to be smart. I'm often working on large HD video files and can't afford hangs or lost time as it renders, etc.

With total respect for the expertise in these forums, I humbly seek any insights.

 

[mjmjpfaff]

im guessing it is gtx 590 and that would need an ax1200 psu. the board has a raid controller built in and will support raid5. how long do you think this to be future proofed for?

 

[peakjunkie]

Sorry GTX 570 (typo omission) and the CPU is 2600k (of course)

 

[peakjunkie]

Objective is maybe 3 - 4 year uage so I'm expecting Adobe to (finally) enable Creative Suite (CS) to take full advantage of SLI. Right now, there's conflicting information on how useful SLI is in CS but most everyone expects that to improve given how many people are employing it.

I've read some forum posters advocating RAID controllers strongly and poo-pooing the controllers on boards so thought I'd ask it straight out.

 

[mjmjpfaff]

oh good you are not one of those people that expect 6-8 yrs out of their build. onboard controllers work fine

the corsair obsidian is a hot box. get this case- http://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-Steel-Computer-Window-RV02B-EW/dp/B004BDOGSO/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1308190189&sr=8-6 it is cheaper at amazon because of free shipping.

for your mobo- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128493&cm_re=gigabyte_z68-_-13-128-493-_-Product x8/x8 will not bottleneck 2 570's

this is all you need for a cooler- http://www.amazon.com/Noctua-Heatpipe-Bearing-Cooler-NH-D14/dp/B002VKVZ1A/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1308190281&sr=8-1 the most quiet and best performing air cooler on the market.

lsi controllers? like ssd caching? dont do it raid configurations compete with those speeds.

 

[peakjunkie]

oh good you are not one of those people that expect 6-8 yrs out of their build. onboard controllers work fine

the corsair obsidian is a hot box. get this case- http://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-Steel-Computer-Window-RV02B-EW/dp/B004BDOGSO/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1308190189&sr=8-6 it is cheaper at amazon because of free shipping.

for your mobo- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128493&cm_re=gigabyte_z68-_-13-128-493-_-Product x8/x8 will not bottleneck 2 570's

this is all you need for a cooler- http://www.amazon.com/Noctua-Heatpipe-Bearing-Cooler-NH-D14/dp/B002VKVZ1A/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1308190281&sr=8-1 the most quiet and best performing air cooler on the market.

lsi controllers? like ssd caching? dont do it raid configurations compete with those speeds.

Thanks for the great suggestion on Silverstone. I hadn't considered that and tracked down reviews that show how phenomenal the ventilation is - especially in SLI. For the extra few bucks, I'm going to switch to Silverstone FT02.

Didn't get an answer yet from a RAID expert on whether to use a RAID controller card but I'l just go ahead and build and then measure the HDD performance and make up my mind then.

 

[mjmjpfaff]

sounds like a good idea

 

[peakjunkie]

Best answer selected by peakjunkie.