Two 4GB HDDs making a RAID... is this a good idea?

[Titanion]

I am putting an old system together using old parts, but the Soyo K7V Dragon has onboard RAID. The best of the extra drives I have are 2 4GB HDDs and one 6 GB HDD. I am very tempted to put my os, likely XP, on the two 4 GB HDDs. Any advice here?

<font color=red><b>To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n.</b></font color=red>
John Milton, <i>Paradise Lost</i>, II 262-263

 

[dhlucke]

You might as well make a RAID array out of two floppy disks.



No, seriously, realize that a RAID 0 array has no redundancy and if one drive fails the whole thing will go. So be wary of putting important info on there. If you're just after speed you might as well try it out.

_________________________________________
<font color=red><b>ElectroDwarf loves Americans!</b></font color=red>

 

[Titanion]

This system is only for a 3rd gaming rig on my LAN... I would hate for it to crash... but it would be no big loss... I could put my OS on a 6 GB drive, then use 2 4GB drives on a RAID... then I could install a few games on the RAID... will the RAID help me out at all here?

Here are 4 of the HDDs I am working with:

Seagate Medalist 4321 model st34321a 4.3GB 5400rpm

Maxtor N256 model 83201a6 [7-21-97] 3.2 GB 5400rpm

Maxtor N256 model 9680d4 [10-29-98] 6.8 GB 5400rpm

Western Digital Caviar 34300 model ac34300-oolb [3-11-98] 4304.2 MB 5400rpm


Is it OK to use the Seagate and the Western Digital in a RAID, even though they are different manufacturors?

<font color=red><b>To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n.</b></font color=red>
John Milton, <i>Paradise Lost</i>, II 262-263

 

[flamethrower205]

Yes, but realie performance will be limited to the slowest.

The one and only "Monstrous BULLgarian!"

 

[Titanion]

Hmmm... not sure I comprehend. I think all these drives are 11 ns and 5400rpm... There will be a lot of bottlenecks in this system... Duron 750, GF2, PC2100 Ram. Should I take a chance and put the os on a RAID with 2 HDDs or just install the os on a regular drive? How will I gain with the RAID?

And, if I do not put the os on a RAID, but still build one and put gaoimes on it, will it be worth it?



<font color=red><b>To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n.</b></font color=red>
John Milton, <i>Paradise Lost</i>, II 262-263

 

[afterdark]

No matter which way you cut it, it's going to preform like a pile of [-peep-].

I'd do the RAID thing just for the hell of it. It might be the difference between 30 and 28 seconds to load IE.

 

[Titanion]

Ya, that is what I think, too, the just for the hell of it part. It might make the whole process a little more fun...

Should i put my os amd most demanding games on the RAID, and then just put other stuff on the regular IDE? Os should I put my os on the regular IDE and my games on the RAID; this way my page file could be on a the RAID, as well.

I wish I knew more about hard drives and RAIDs and the way they truly affect performance of both os and games...

<font color=red><b>To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n.</b></font color=red>
John Milton, <i>Paradise Lost</i>, II 262-263

 

[sjonnie]

I wish I knew more about hard drives and RAIDs and the way they truly affect performance of both os and games...

And you'd be darn suprised too. Take a look at <A HREF="http://www.hardwaretech.info/guides/configure_bench_raid.php" target="_new">this review</A> over at <A HREF="http://www.hardwaretech.info/[/url" target="_new">hardwaretech.info</A>


<A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/myanandtech.html?member=114979" target="_new">My PCs</A>

 

[Titanion]

BTW, with HDDs between 3 and 6 GB, should I leave them Fat32 or NTFS?

<font color=red><b>To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n.</b></font color=red>
John Milton, <i>Paradise Lost</i>, II 262-263

 

[pIII_Man]

definitly fat 32...

why dont u make an array with 4 drives...the smallest drive would take presidence...but still i think it would quicken up quite a bit. And flamey you are sorta right...but you have to realise that even if the array is limited by the slowest drive, the array theoretically will be 2x as fast as the slowest drive, which is probably faster than even his fastest drive.


If it isn't a P6 then it isn't a procesor
110% BX fanboy

 

[Titanion]

Well, I do have another 4 BG drive I could pull out of a different computer that is currently a slave... and that would give me 4 HDDs reading as 4GB 5400 rpm each... but yikes, the the history of these drives is wanting... I am not sure of where some of them came from... for I have a way of collecting this crappy computer shi#, and that would sure increase the chance of HDD failure... Hmmm...

If my os is on the 6GB drive and I build an array with the two 4GB drives and put my games there, will that improvethings a little... is that were load times would be increased...

Would putting my page file on the RAID improve things as well?

<font color=red><b>To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n.</b></font color=red>
John Milton, <i>Paradise Lost</i>, II 262-263

 

[Titanion]

I would love some feedback on some of my specific questions here about page file, os, and gaming... regarding the varous options with a RAID using 4GB HDDS...
I will be building this system when my motherboard comes in this week. Thanks.

<font color=red><b>To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n.</b></font color=red>
John Milton, <i>Paradise Lost</i>, II 262-263

 

[p05esto]

Where does a person even find 4GB drives? It's been like 7 years since drives were that small. I think XP takes 5 gigs of space it self. I remember hen the Whole macintosh OS was less that 3MB and applications fit on a floppy or two. Computers sucked back then.... One could smoke a whole joint just waiting for Photoshop to launch.

 

[Titanion]

XP is 1.71 GB on my computer here at work. My 4GB drives have been collected over the years... My os will likely be put on a 6GB drive... with 2 4GB drives setting up a RAID... but I still am seeking useful advice, despite the age of the hardware I am using...

I have 3 80GB drives on my best computer... but this one is going to be set up for friends to play LAN games on... I am using the extra parts I have around...

<font color=red><b>To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n.</b></font color=red>
John Milton, <i>Paradise Lost</i>, II 262-263

 

[HammerBot]

Forget about RAIDing such slow drives. RAID is good for large files. For small files it may even be slower than a single drive. I highly doubt that you would feel any significant speed increase if you put the OS on such a RAID.
The only way you really can be sure, is to try it out. But I don't think its worth the effort.

<i><b>Engineering is the fine art of making what you want from things you can get</b></i>