GA-X58A-3UDR & RAID your experience, please

[no1ninja]

Hi guys,


Just ditched my GA-P55M-UD2, for the GA-X58A-3UDR. I had my 2 X 1TB drives in RAID 1, for redundancy. (intel raid)


The new setup read it just fine and booted up Win7, however, it is slow as molasses (yes the raid re-built itself, I waited and waited... still garbage). My Windows Disk score went from a "5.9", to a "4.3". My friends single IDE drive on P4 AGP system gets 4.6. I re-installed the drivers and no change in performance. I took out intels Rapid Storage Service, no change.


What are my options with this board? I think I will try RAID 0, since RAID 1 is such a disappointment. Which one is best, so I don't have to re-install my system multiple times. (Also if you can tell my why RAID 1 bites the big one on this board, I am all ears. Would love to just tweak it and keep it in RAID 1).


Is this board a lemon? I can still exchange it... I like gigabyte do they have RAID 1 that works?

 

[bilbat]

Please try a pass through the RAID & 'FakeRAID': Speed vs Data Security topic in the 'sticky'
; RAID1 writes will be slower than a single drive in a 'FakeRAID' setup...

BTW - the RAID hardware, software, and RAID BIOS (AKA 'option ROM') have nothing to do with GB - purely Intel products (and be glad of it!) - and are the fastest 'FakeRAID' on the market...

 

[no1ninja]

I have read that, still does little for me in terms of my problem (I have set up RAID at least 10 times now, without issues). I am mainly intrested in anyone that has this board what their experiences are with Intel RAID 1. Do I have a faulty motherboard, or is this a driver, rom isssue?

Just to give you an idea of what I am dealing with. I networked my i5 with my i7 on GLan network with no traffic to move over my files. I am getting 5Mb/sec reads from the RAID 1 setup. The system is unusable while the copy over the network takes place. The i7 has 6GB installed, and it is crippled by a simple 5Mb/sec copy.


I know Stock Intel RAID is slow compared to other options, but this is not even functional. I just don't understand how gigabyte can realease this crap and even call it RAID. Also keep in mind I went from one Intel Raid to another, byt the same manufacturer. The newer boards implementation is 1/10th the speed at best. That means there is SOMETHING WRONG.


So please if you have the X58A-3UDR, and these are not your experiences with intel RAID 1, let me know so that I can return this board, instead of waiting till some driver guy gets his act together.

Look at the above this is just ridiculous. To start IE or Firefox, takes 5 minutes during this simple copy, where only READING takes place. RAID 1 should be good at reading.

Okay, I just copied and pasted this to Word so I can spell check it. To start word took 5 minutes. To do a simple CTRL-V took 3 minutes from the time I executed the command to the time the text apeared in WORD. Inserting a cursor at spelling mistake took 2 minutes reaction time. This is a brand new i7, 6GB tripple channel. What a piece of crap! (at least intel RAID 1).


Below is an i5 NOT in RAID, single drive SATA, recieving the stream. It doesn't even flinch with the load. This is just for comparison

(BTW, the throughput is obvious, but look closely at the response times of the most active tasks... not looking all that good.)

I think I will do a clean re-install to see if the issue gets solved, that will give me chance to test out all the RAID options on this MB, I will let you guys know what I find. I am still hoping to hear about RAID experiences from users of this board. Thanks.

 

[no1ninja]

Bilbat, thanks for the reply, I did not mean to sound like a dick. Just frustrated with the new MB, need to check the bios still, maybe reflash it just in case there is corruption somewhere.

Lol, problem is I started this copy, and did not stop it, just went to sleep thinking the thing would be done, I wake and there is still 14 hours of wait, lol.


Again, problem could always be driver related, perhaps the new driver did not cleanly install or maybe there correction/adjustment values that don't translate too well from mb switch. (I am just making up bs excuses for the thing, hoping I will find the solution. If I returned everything that gave me setup problems, I probably would be using a mac by now, and I hate macs. Rather know how something works, and tweak it, than use something that intentionally keeps me stupid for my own protection.)

 

[no1ninja]

(...some comic relief/rant while I work this thing out)


Notice when we copy files over in windows 7, the OS does a calculation based on the current throughput to tell you how long the operation will take. This is quite nice, as I can be told 4 hours and 12 minutes for instance.

Now I decided to copy 420GB on a system that was throughputting 5MB/sec. The algorithm came up "About 1 Day". (you can see this in my first pic) WTF??? What the hell does that mean, how does this help me, how about 25 hours, and 42 minutes? That is way more useful information. Why does Windows have to be like a mac and treat you like a dummy. What programmer over thought this simple analysis?

What if I copied 4 terabytes would the algorithm come out and say "Dude, this will take forever".


LOL, rant off....

 

[bilbat]

Ahh - don' worry - I well know how frustrating it can be when something just refuses to work! Just for a vague idea of the 'neighborhood' you should be in, here's a pair of VR's in RAD0:

and a pair of WD RE3's in RAID1:

on an ICH9R... Am in the middle of a garage sale, and a basement flood, so will be a couple hours 'till I can get a look at this, and try to suggest some t'shooting steps...

 

[no1ninja]

Thanks, that gives me hope.

(I am 8 hours away from being able to do anything with the machine, I started this copy and just don't want to stop it. I know I can probably just attach it to the i5 directly, but at this far in, I am not going to take any chances just in case. Want my data secure first than, I will try every raid mode possibe with my 2 x 1TB Segates 7200.11's, reimage the bios, fresh install, maybe i will even sacrifice a small rodent.)

 

[jaquith]

@bilbat ~ I am seeing serious issues with the UD3R MOBO with ANY Intel RAID configurations - period!!! (assuming OP meant "UD3R as a typo vs 3UDR" which I never heard of..)

 

[The_OGS]

I have Gigabyte EX58-UD3R, a magnificent mobo.
It has many SATA on the Intel X58.
But:
To run a RAID1 mirror with 2 HDs, I recommend you use the 2 Gigabyte SATA2 connectors.
They will run hardware RAID1, and you can access the Gigabyte RAID BIOS at POST (press <Ctrl-G> to enter RAID setup utility).
I know you've been using the Intel, and you're used to it... but you're saying it's not working.
Does your X58 use ICH10R?
It should be the same Intel Matrix Storage drivers...
Note that you require either 32-bit or 64-bit ones.
Try the Gigabyte controller and its setup that is integrated with your system BIOS.
Regards

 

[Hard Line]

I have that same board with an i7 930 I have raid 0 2x sammy 500GB drives ( waiting on a new 2TB drive for "1" however my throughput is very good on the intel controller. max 270 min 170 avg 230 13.5ms access time although the burst rate says over 3000 ( i think it has got to be a glitch) The_OGS : does the gigabyte controller have higher throughput?

 

[apache_lives]

The_OGS that will result in worse performance, the Intel controller is king.

To the OP - backup all your data, de-raid the drives, do a zero-write to all the drives and make that RAID array from the ground up again (also perhaps do a full surface scan test on the hdd's too)

There is no problems with Intel RAID, and Gigabyte motherboards.

Also take note RAID1 protects against hardware failure, it doesnt protect against virus's, corruption, deletion etc - far better off with a seperate backup etc.

 

[extremepcs]

I have the same board, but 2 Intel SSD's in raid 1. No issues, and Win 7 disk score is 7. something (machine is at work right now)

 

[jaquith]

I had to RMA (10), yes TEN, with the GA-X58A-UD3R (rev 2); SSD SATA_0 + RAID 1 SATA_2-3. Plus I've seen just in Tom's 4-5 RAID issues with this MOBO.

Question @The_OGS & @Hard Line which version (1 or 2)??

 

[bilbat]

Please 'point me at' some of these problems; I'd like to look for similarities and possible causes... Just doesn't make any sense to me 'cause an ICH is an ICH, and Intel's gotten 'pretty good at 'em!' I think I mentioned before - I just wonder, due to the XHD thing, if GB s'ware has 'dipped their fingers' in the option ROM code. Have to look at a couple other mfg's manuals. I tried a search at TweakTown, didn't find anything - don't know that I've seen anyhting at Extreme, either - but, usually looking at more outré things, there.

 

[bilbat]

Please 'point me at' some of these problems; I'd like to look for similarities and possible causes... Just doesn't make any sense to me 'cause an ICH is an ICH, and Intel's gotten 'pretty good at 'em!' I think I mentioned before - I just wonder, due to the XHD thing, if GB s'ware has 'dipped their fingers' in the option ROM code. Have to look at a couple other mfg's manuals. I tried a search at TweakTown, didn't find anything - don't know that I've seen anyhting at Extreme, either - but, usually looking at more outré things, there.

 

[jaquith]

@bilbat - My observations so far seem to be the UD3R (rev 2) MOBO's with RAID issues. You've seen the posts here are well as I; I know Intel isn't the issue and not ALL GA MOBOs.

 

[Hard Line]

I have rev 2 of this board.. AND I am torturing the poor thing with my oc. lol I am using the xhd as well

 

[no1ninja]

You guys rock! It seems to be the environment, not the hardware.


I attached the drives to another gigabyte board with the same intel raid, and same issue. So I degraded the raid array, and booted with an alternate environment with a degraded drive as an add on.


The transfers are blistering NOW! It is an OS issue after all! Who ever suggested a virus, may be the prize winner. I run a tight ship, but no AV is perfect.


I am sorry for saying anything bad about Gigabyte boards. I seriously love them. They have been a god send to me, considering price and features. I used to be an Asus user, once I got my first gigabyte, never again! So this is such a relief its not the board. I will try the Gigabyte RAID first as it boasts 4x speed in RAID 0 on SATG 3.0 ports. I'll post my scores if that works out.


I have read in other places that I should avoid the Gigabyte Raid as its not as well tested and refined as the intel implementation, if anyone wants to comment on this, I would love to hear your opinions.

Thanks again, will post back with an update.

 

[Hard Line]

@no1ninja, have you or are you planning to oc? cuz this board got me so far to 4.3 and still have tons of headroom

 

[jaquith]

You guys rock! It seems to be the environment, not the hardware. So I degraded the raid array, and booted with an alternate environment with a degraded drive as an add on. The transfers are blistering NOW!

Glad to hear your smok'n!

Please explain exactly what you did?? Are you still in RAID 1? Are you still running the XHD/RAID in the BIOs? Did you bench something like ATTO?

Interested to know - thanks.

 

[jaquith]

@Hard Line - care to share your settings (BCLK...Voltages, etc). My UD3R's are for workstations. Currently @ 3.52 Ghz.

 

[bilbat]

GB boards are the best! Their s'ware - I wouldn't poke with a stick! (...sorry, GB...)

While back I was jabbering here with someone about splash screens; early on in my use of GB's, I had found some hilarious splash screens, and thought I had to have one! After tuning & using the system, found out - well - not so much... Wanna 'see' the post; splash is so brief, can hardly see it anyway; and - with it off, I can 'hit' the BIOS entry every time, with the splash on, I seem to miss it one out of four. (...might be purely psychosomatic - I'm still gettin' high on those "placebos" the doc prescribed for me [:bilbat:2] ) Anyhow, one of the regulars here said if I wanted a scare, I should look at the latest 'FaceWizard' - it has an @BIOS button (known 'board-killer'...) Month later, thought to actually take a look at it - started up, showed itself disabling some GB utilties I've never installed, and installing some 'system hooks'; whole thing scared me - especially the mention of @BIOS, so - killed it. Very next thing I launched gave me my first BSOD in, say, ten months!!

Yay, GB utilities!!

 

[no1ninja]

This chip is fast for me (i7-930) and I don't do anything that needs the extra clock. I also only have the stock fan, so at the moment no... but its good to know there is room to crank her up.


(lol, who am I kidding, I probably will be too curious not to try.... I just need to get a workable setup first so that I can know what this baby is capable of on stock)

 

[Hard Line]

sure.... 21x 205 1.296v everything else on auto. and I manually set up my ram ( mushkin redline enhanced 6-8-6-24 1T @ 1640 1.66v I iwll double check next time I restart, ( I don't do that often lol ) load temps are 75C under Prime/LinX with a Noctua D-14

 

[no1ninja]

Glad to hear your smok'n!

Please explain exactly what you did?? Are you still in RAID 1? Are you still running the XHD/RAID in the BIOs? Did you bench something like ATTO?

Interested to know - thanks.

No, no RAID. Nice thing about RAID 1 is that you can degrade them (split them) and use them as regular SATA drives.


So I just booted into a win7 partition that was running on standalone drive, and added in the degraded drive. The transfers are perfect now. Getting up to 200MB/Sec on DISK IO (that is combined read and write from a Samsung 1TB to a Segate 1TB).

Will run some tests with HD Tune and report them back to you guys.