[SOLVED] Raid0 question

[asbury2098]

Hey all. I bought this pretty nice gaming desktop from a guy, and I didn't know it at first, but it appears he had a 4TB ssd split into 8 partitions with Raid0. The only reason I figured that out was because I accidentally undid it. At first all I saw was one, half TB drive. So, I'm trying to put it back the way it was. It was definitely much snappier before. There is also a 1TB m2 drive. I don't think that was part of the RAID0 setup, but I could be wrong. Doesn't seem like it would make sense though to raid a 4tb drive with a 1tb drive. The 4tb drive is still partitioned into 8 partitions, but only recognized by Windows as one drive, except in Disk management where it sees all the partitions. While I work in the IT industry, I'll admin PC builds aren't my strong suit, so any advice would be helpful.

 

[USAFRet]

Please show us a screencap of your Disk Management window.
This is a very weird, and unnnatural, config.

 

[USAFRet]

We'll go into the "Why this is a seriously bad idea" later.

 

[asbury2098]

Please show us a screencap of your Disk Management window.
This is a very weird, and unnnatural, config.

It's not letting me insert a local picture. I know the downside of Raid0, but this is my performance machine I had a lot better performance before. I have a screen shot, I'm trying to figure out how to attach or insert it.

 

[asbury2098]

This is concerning Disk2 primarily. Disk 1 is the 1TB SSD.

 

[USAFRet]

Upload your image to imgur.com, and post the BBCode link here.

 

[USAFRet]

OK, and which drive is which?
Give us a full rundown.

 

[asbury2098]

Disk2. You can see the one labeled SSD-Boot-512. I didn't realize it when I got this computer that the drive was actually several partitions on a 4TB drive, I believe to have been setup in RAID0. When I reimaged the computer, I lost that setup. It was certainly snappier before, and I only ever noticed one half TB partition before I imaged it. So, I think it was Raid0 among the various partitions. Maybe it was radi0 over the two drives, but that seems like it would have been dumb.

 

[USAFRet]

And that Disk 2 is NOT in any RAID config. It simply has a bunch of small (~500MB) partitions, left over from previous failed installs.
And that is only a 512GB drive. Not 4TB.

This is one of the many reasons why a full wipe and reinstall is strongly recommended with any used system.
Gets rid of whatever idiocy the previous user did.


Now...Disk 1 appears to be RAID 0 across 2 partitions in a 1TB. Similarly a bad idea.
What is the unseen Disk 0?

 

[asbury2098]

The Disk 2 is psychically a 4TH disk. It's the JMicron disk. Ho9nestly, I wished I hadn't had wiped it. I usually agree with you and want a fresh wipe, but he had it setup nicely. Plus a bunch of licensed VMware as well. And you can see he renamed it with Raid0, leaving me to believe that's what he had setup.

 

[asbury2098]

I'm sorry, the JM drive is the 1TB drive. i guess maybe the C drive was raided with 2 partitions of the TB drive.

 

[asbury2098]

You're right. I was reading that wrong. Those are 500Mb, not Gb. Wasn't paying close enough attention.

 

[asbury2098]

So If I wanted to Raid 0 these two drives, what's the best way? I can a data backup to my nas for critical data.

 

[USAFRet]

A full wipe and reinstall with a used system brings several benefits.

• Undoing any idiocy the previous user did. Like this thing. That is a seriously messed up config.
• Getting rid of ANY potentially hazardous data any previous user did. Not just the seller, but anyone who ever touched it. You'd be surprised at what people have in their system.
• Verifies any software installs and licenses.

Full wipe and reinstall, of all drives.

 

[USAFRet]

And back to your original supposition of a RAID 0 across partitions of a single physical SSD (and for the benefit of future readers who may come across this)

No. Not even a little bit.
A SATA III SSD bumps up against the max throughput of that SATA connection. Striping across multiple partitions does not make it faster.
It only increases the fail potential.

Even across multiple physical drives, RAID 0 + SSD rarely brings any user facing benefit.

 

[asbury2098]

Then why was it so snappy before? This guy says he was a 25year life long professional, and he seemed to have done a nice job when setting this computer up. I goofed when I was having trouble with an application not having all the proper permissions, so I ran one of those programs which gained permission, not really understanding what it was doing. Well, that make it worse because now I had the permissions and not the computer. So I wiped it. I'm telling you, this thing was snappy, especially loading applications. They are considerably slower at loading at least now. Like I said, I know more about building and securing networks than PC performance optimization.

 

[USAFRet]

"snappy" doesn't count until we see actual performance numbers.

As far a "he seemed to have done a nice job "....he may talk a good line, but all those 500Mb partitions gives lie to that.
That config should never happen.

Labeling a drive or volume "RAID something", with no RAID involved?
Again, no. Simply leads to confusion, as we see here.

The Disk 1 with 2 partitions with the same drive letter X? Seemingly striped?


Multiple things wrong with that setup. A system should never be passed to a new user looking like that.


Finally, for a used system...I don't care what the previous owner said he did or did not do, or what supposedly comes with it.
Some of the things I've seen on a 'used system' would make your short and curlies even curlier.
The very first action needs to be a full wipe and reinstall.

 

[popatim]

I'd be willing to bet he was using HDD caching or Tiered storage on a good chunk of the SSD but it's hard to tell after it's borked what was going on.