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

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?

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...

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.)

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...

@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..)

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?

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)

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 - 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.

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.

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.

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 ) 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!!

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

(These are stock scores no RAID, just so I can compare)

This is what I am working with, I am hooking up 2 exact models of the Segate on the left. I tested the Samsung because I just bought it last week (so it should represent the latest). The segates are a year old.

Samsungs have nice burst rate, and the CPU and temps are low for those that want to OC, but the segate curve looks nicer.

Should I be worried about the warnings?

(will post RAID scores soon)

I'll try them soon - many thanks! I assume HT is off...?

TEST 2:
Marvell RAID 1 – 2 x ST3100340AS (1TB) (64K stripe - connected @ GSATA 6/7)
GA-X58A-UDR3 Rev 2.0, Bios “FA”, i7-930, 3x2GB@ 1333
Windows 7 x64 Ultimate (all updates - and drivers installed)

Notes: Again easy install, windows found the partition, although driver was on stick just in case.

Boot up: 24 seconds from “starting windows” to logon screen. (weird as the scores in hd tune suck, this may mean this implementation still can be made more efficent) (tested the bootup at least 3 times to make sure)



CONCLUSION [stock single drive(Mb/s) / RAID 1 (Mb/s)]):

Min Speed: -80.3% [49.2/9.7] (this result doesn’t mean much, as the min speed is rare)
Max Speed: -38.8% [109.5/67.1]
Average Speed: -40.3% [85.8/51.3]

Access Time: +0.5 ms [13.4/12.9]
Burst Speed: – 4.7% [85.9/81.9]
CPU Usage: -8.0% [8.5/0.5] (this is actual system CPU saved)

TEST 4:
Intel RAID 1 – 2 x ST3100340AS (1TB) (??? stripe - connected @ SATA 0/1)
GA-X58A-UDR3 Rev 2.0, Bios “FA”, i7-930, 3x2GB@ 1333
Windows 7 x64 Ultimate (all updates - and drivers installed)

Notes: Easy install. No option to change stripe, just using default RAID 1.

Boot up: 33 seconds from “starting windows” to logon screen.



CONCLUSION [stock single drive(Mb/s) / RAID 0 (Mb/s)]):

Min Speed: -57.5% [49.2/20.9] (this result doesn’t mean much, as the min speed is rare)
Max Speed: -0.3% [109.5/109.2]
Average Speed: -24.5% [85.8/64.8]

Access Time: -0.9ms [13.4/14.3]
Burst Speed: – 31.5% [85.9/58.8]
CPU Usage: -7.8% [8.5/0.7] (this is actual system CPU saved)

Actually, that is with HT ON lol and eist on.. uses 40 watts on my desktop and 130 watts under load.. ( i think it uses more at load though)


Anybody tell me how to post a pic like you guys? i wanna show my raid performance on the ops board and never figured out how to post a pic THX

Interesting, specs with your SATA 2 HDD {ST3100340AS} running on everything EXEPT *Intel which its designed to run on.

*SATA2_0 ~ SATA2_5 = Intel
GSATA3_6 ~ GSATA3_7 = Marvell {TEST 1, TEST 2}
GSATA2_8 ~ GSATA2_9 = Gigabyte

{TEST 3, TEST4} ~ I don't know what you mean by "GSATA 1/2" w/o "guessing."

Bottom-line, you are running "bizarre" though "interesting" tests; meaning running "SATA2 HDDs" on SATA3 controllers in "compatibility mode."

little too late...

http://photobucket.com/ ; setup a free account ; upload pic ; click on thumb nail ; copy image url
Under Forum editor, click "insert image" button 6th from left ; paste url

Those are impressive results, but I find it odd that you got a negative CPU score, did the intel controller somehow do extra crunching for the chip that did not ivolve disk activity, lol.


I am starting to question HD Tunes ability to report on anything more than average rates. I think a more practical benchmark is needed to determine how good these RAID arrays hold up in practical environments.

Transfer rates are great, but what about multitasking? How good are these arrays when multiple requests are made. I would think that RAID 1 would look a little better. Just using HD-Tune for these tests, makes RAID 1 look like a joke. Yet the boot up time on test 2 was real.


Its hard to believe HD-Tune, that none of the RAID 1 implementations "read" faster than a single drive. This has to be wrong.

Dude read my posts. I do a complete re-install for every test. Re-build the array. Do all the windows updates, and load all the drivers.


I honestly don't know how you can just change raid 0 to raid 1 in the bios, it involves a lot more than that. You should know this, the tests in HD TUNE clearly show the capacity and RAID device used. I have no magic wand.


Your posts are starting to be very confrontational, and you keep talking down to me as if I am an idiot, and using magic tricks that you and I both know are imposssible.


Sorry if you think that my tests are pointless. To me they are not, I want to see what the raid modes on this board can do with my drives. Maybe someone can be saved the headaches in a similar configuration.


RAID 1 can offer a READING advantage, this is not a difficult concept. The data is storeed on two drives and can easily be retrived in tandem. RAID 1 should have a reading advantage over a single drive.

(BTW, I am 37 and have been employed in the industry since 17. I have bougth houses, cottages and cars with my PC skills. So spare me your judgmental tone about my capacity.)

If you care to link us to an app that you feel would be accurate to test our theories, please by all means do so as I am curious about the results.. I still can't get over a burst speed of over 3k!! lol

Also as for the cpu usage, ever since my core 2 e7200, I have had a negative number there. maybe the resources of current gen cpus are so high, that there is practically no overhead

Here is my results with Atto ( I just happened to have it.. ) I also included crystal disk bench as well

Got some WD 1TB 3.0 SATA "black edition" drives. I realize the firmware on these babies means that they do not always play nice with raid, so far had no problems and they are fast. They were 89 CAD instead of the 65CAD for the 1TB at the same capacity but SATA 2.0.



Considering the 2.0TB cost me 178CAD, that is quite impressive for 2 mechanical 7200 rpm drives.

The money is worth more now for sure, but a lot of our industry counts on a low dollar to be competitive with you guys. So even though the economy is doing better than the US, most of us still remain weary.

I know stratford very well, as well as the festival. There is some cute girls there for sure.