Render Disk for Workstation: 256GB 840 Pro vs RAID 0 128GB 840 Pro vs ASUS RAIDR Express 240GB?

[LeMonarque]

I already have a 256GB 840 Pro for my operating system and applications. I'm looking to expand my disk setup to make working as efficient as possible.

I want a separate drive for rendering and exporting footage to, and I'm looking at a capacity in the 256GB range. My question is if using either two 128GB 840 Pros or an ASUS RAIDR Express 240GB will be faster for rendering than a single 256GB 840 Pro.

I do not worry about data safety as I also plan to have a separate drive for holding raw footage and a long term storage drive for holding assets and finished projects, which will also serve as a nightly backup drive.

The disk setup I want to have is:

OS and Apps: 256GB 840 Pro

Raw Footage for Current Project: 250GB or 500GB 840 EVO (simply holds the footage for any given project)

Media Cache: 120GB 840 EVO

Render/Output: 2x128GB 840 Pro or ASUS RAIDR Express 240GB or 1x256GB 840 Pro

Long Term Storage & Backup: Western Digital Red 1TB (lower capacity to reduce the usage time per drive; ie MTBF-conscious)

 

[FireWire2]

It's not the HDD you need to look at

It is the entire path that feeds the data.

ASUS RAIDR Express 240GB has a bandwidth of 10Gb/s (PCIe x2 Gen2) equivalent to Thunderbolt port. That is pretty good, provided your system has a PCIe Gen2 with more than 2x lanes

You need to find out the what is the host that 2x 128GB will connect to, how many lanes/bandwidth it offers.

If your intend to use 2x SSD in Marvel 98xx, then forget it, it is only good for a SINGLE SSD, which max out 500MB/s, also does your SATA port is SATAIII or not, w/o enough bandwidth for entire path, you use one or two SSD, it will not any different

 

[LeMonarque]

It is the entire path that feeds the data.

So essentially the trifecta of APP > SOURCE > OUTPUT drives/arrays should ideally all be the same speed to prevent a bottleneck?

 

[choucove]

It is the entire path that feeds the data.

So essentially the trifecta of APP > SOURCE > OUTPUT drives/arrays should ideally all be the same speed to prevent a bottleneck?

I don't really know the specifics on what software you are utilizing, and I'm not really a rendering expert, but generally the concept would be that you want your temp file or scratch disk to be as fast as possible. The rendering our output disk will also benefit from having an improved speed. However, what FireWire2 is saying is if you wish to put in two Samsung 840 Pro SSDs in RAID 0, but you only have an onboard controller that is SATAII speed or unable to handle the throughput of those drives in RAID 0, then it would not be beneficial at all as the host bus being used just doesn't have the throughput to utilize the drives. The same thing with the PCI-Express SSD. Do you have a spare PCI-Express 2.0 or 3.0 slot that is at least X2 width physically and electrically? If not, then that option isn't going to be the way to go either.

With all other things equal, I would personally lean more towards the ASUS RAIDR. I've never used it myself, but the product overall has the throughput capabilities of doing everything that two Samsung 840 Pro 128 GB SSDs could do in RAID 0 except without the need for additional RAID configuration. However, there would also be nothing wrong with doing the two Samsung 840 Pro drives in RAID 0.

 

[FireWire2]

It is the entire path that feeds the data.

So essentially the trifecta of APP > SOURCE > OUTPUT drives/arrays should ideally all be the same speed to prevent a bottleneck?

I don't really know the specifics on what software you are utilizing, and I'm not really a rendering expert, but generally the concept would be that you want your temp file or scratch disk to be as fast as possible. The rendering our output disk will also benefit from having an improved speed. However, what FireWire2 is saying is if you wish to put in two Samsung 840 Pro SSDs in RAID 0, but you only have an onboard controller that is SATAII speed or unable to handle the throughput of those drives in RAID 0, then it would not be beneficial at all as the host bus being used just doesn't have the throughput to utilize the drives. The same thing with the PCI-Express SSD. Do you have a spare PCI-Express 2.0 or 3.0 slot that is at least X2 width physically and electrically? If not, then that option isn't going to be the way to go either.

With all other things equal, I would personally lean more towards the ASUS RAIDR. I've never used it myself, but the product overall has the throughput capabilities of doing everything that two Samsung 840 Pro 128 GB SSDs could do in RAID 0 except without the need for additional RAID configuration. However, there would also be nothing wrong with doing the two Samsung 840 Pro drives in RAID 0.

Couldn't explain better 🙂