Raid0 (2x120) vs 1x240

[kemperkipie]

Hi, im looking for best performance and speeds.
Should i take

1x240GB Mushkin Deluxe
or
2x120GB Mushkin Deluxe RAID0

Other option might be OCZ Revodrive 3 120GB??

Price is no issue

 

[psaus]

Other option might be OCZ Revodrive 3 120GB??

By far the fastest. More complicated to configure, but by far the fastest (and most expensive. )

 

[psaus]

1x240GB Mushkin Deluxe
or
2x120GB Mushkin Deluxe RAID0

Sorry, too hasty in my initial reply; of these two, the RAID 0 iteration would be faster than the non. But that comes with nuances of RAID-0 (e.g., if one drive goes, you lose all data). But I wouldn't say 2x faster than 1*240GB drive, but somewhere in the 1.5x area...

 

[kemperkipie]

1,5x is good enough for me. But does the RevoDrive really outperform that? Revodrive is €330 in my country, and the Muskins €170..
http://www.alternate.nl/html/product/Solid_State_Drive_2,5_inch_SATA/Mushkin/MKNSSDCR120GB-DX/570395/?tn=HARDWARE&l1=Harddisks&l2=Solid+State+Drives&l3=SATA&l4=2%2C5+inch
http://www.alternate.nl/html/product/Solid_State_Drive_PCI_Express/OCZ/RVD3-FHPX4-120G/577941/?tn=HARDWARE&l1=Harddisks&l2=Solid+State+Drives&l3=mini-PCIe+%2F+PCIe

And would TRIM be supported? on which setups?

 

[neon neophyte]

RevoDrive 3 has trim

 

[psaus]

RevoDrive will blow others away, but that's because it's piped through PCI, which is natively designed for faster transfer. SATA has all kinds of addressing and prep overhead that is no longer needed.
So yes, Revo will run those numbers.

Downside: not the easiest to configure and heavily reliant on 3rd party drivers to function.
Can you elaborate what this storage pool is to be used for? SQL crunching, OS, Gaming, other...

TRIM; it's a marketing thing these days. Yes it's useful, but if the storage controller has a decent garbage clean-up mechanism, it's not needed. One could look at it as a way for a company to take the easy way out of garbage clean up and wear leveling and just let the OS control it. (Not a good idea)

Revo and non-RAID configs will leave TRIM intact in the correct OS. RAID-0 and 1 drives will not likely continue to support (unless you use a dedicated RAID card that explicitly says it supports TRIM passthrough).

EDIT: SATA gen3 addressed the overhead problem a little, gen4 is addressing this much more, but SATA has a long way to go (at current state) before it handles NAND ideally.

 

[maxinexus]

Revo is the way but make sure you can configure it so it is bootable.

 

[kemperkipie]

I'm going to use it for Gaming, mostly..

Going to build the PC next month, when ivy bridge is released.
Specs would be:

i7 3770k
Corsair H100 looped liquid CPU cooler
Asus Sabertooth z77
GTX 680 4GB Phantom (or maybe another 4gb variant)
G-Skill 16GB 2133 Mhz
1050W XFX Black edition (To be sure i'm ready to handle SLI for any card in the next few years)
Zalman Z11 Plus

Will it be hard to make it bootable at this system, and how should i be doing that?

 

[kemperkipie]

Ok, i've done some research myself, and found out that booting a RevoDrive takes longer than a single SSD due to Driver loading times or something.. And since booting is pretty important to me (Can't leave pc on all day) i'm just going for RAID0 now..
2x120GB Mushkin 120GB will do it?
And what are the exact cons of RAID0?? I've heard it doesnt support TRIM when u use RAID0, so is that really noticeble? or should i look out for something when using it?

 

[psaus]

If money isn't an object, I'd buy both the 240GB SSD x1 and use that as your OS drive. Then I'd use this Revo as the platform to run your games and apps from. Windows running off of Revo as a boot drive works... for the most part. But ideal performance would be to isolate your OS and your apps on different storage pools. But this is extremist.
If you want to install this Revo as an OS drive, it's best to follow the instructions on the first couple pages of this manual
http://www.ocztechnology.com/res/manuals/revodrive3_manual.pdf

Not rocket science. You can do it if you can read PDF files.

I am suggesting not to load the OS on the Revo mainly because MSFT didn't design the OS to communicate to primary storage over PCI in this way. Don't get me wrong, it works. Just my ultra-conservativness showing. Plus the SSD + PCI is even faster.

 

[psaus]

And what are the exact cons of RAID0?? I've heard it doesnt support TRIM when u use RAID0, so is that really noticeble? or should i look out for something when using it?

Yes, if you use an onboard motherboard RAID configuration, you will almost certainly lose TRIM. But as I stated in an earlier post here, TRIM isn't terribly important with decent SSDs. If you're looking at these SSDs, you'll be fine.
But the biggest problem is if there is a problem with one of the drives, you lose all data in the RAID bunch. I'd suggest going with 1x 240GB. Or if you do the RAID-0, then backup your C: nightly to an external HDD or a 1TB+ spindle. Not the easiest if you're not leaving your system on all the time...

Consider sleep mode for W7, instead of cold booting every time.

 

[leo2kp]

You would lose all of your data too if that single drive died. The risk of losing all your data on a RAID-0 array is only slightly higher because now you virtually double the risk of a drive going bad, but SSDs are generally more reliable than a mechanical HDD. I've personally had four PCs with a RAID-0 array, three of them with mechanical HDDs, and never had a problem. Maybe I've had good luck, but the important thing is to make sure you have a backup, and nightly backups are not required. Just copy your important data on a separate drive and you'll be fine. Most of us don't care if we lose the OS. Just reinstall if something happens.

 

[leo2kp]

Also do some research on SATA controllers using SSDs in RAID-0 before you decide what to do. Last time I checked (with my last build about a year ago), the Marvel SATA3 controller didn't play well with SSDs in RAID-0. The drives would constantly drop. And performance was ****, too. The Intel SATA2 controller was still faster, so I am using that.

 

[neon neophyte]

i dont even suggest using a marvel controller for one drive lol
they really arent very good

 

[kemperkipie]

I'm not going to store highly important data on the RAID0 Config, so IF 1 of the drives fails (which i hope isn't most likely going to happen) i don't really mind losing data on that drives.
I have a NAS at my home for storing important data, which will also has a weekly back-up, and beside that, i have another 500GB HDD for storing data, and music/video/document on my pc.

And for controller.. i'm not sure, im using Sabertooth z77 which has this build-in RAID controller.... will that work properly?

 

[hefox]

TRIM will be the biggest con in your case. I suggest buying 2xSamsung 830 instead. I bought few and I didn't have any problem and are really reliable. A few also 2 Corsair Force 3 (Sandforce) which I have time to time freezes so make sure you update to the latest firmware and hopefully it will be fine.