Re: Harddrive performance: Promise SATA RAID under Redhat 9

From: Nico Kadel-Garcia (nkadel_at_comcast.net)
Date: 12/10/03

  • Next message: Nico Kadel-Garcia: "Re: Using Suse packages in Redhat Advanced server" 
    Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2003 23:52:41 -0500

    "Ken Kauffman" <kkauffman@nospam.headfog.com> wrote in message
    news:BHjBb.49747$dO2.32554@lakeread03...

    > I agree that cost per dollar may provide the solution that is needed. My
    > understanding is that the IDE interface itself can't handle the concurrent
    > access that a SCSI bus provides and have consistently found that SCSI
    > outperforms in file system applications. I am interested in testing the
    > 3Ware solution now given your notes. The other things that is often
    missed
    > is that most SCSI hard drives themselves are manufactured for durability.
    A
    > typical SCSI drive is a single platter with fewer moving parts. The drives
    > tend to last significantly longer than their IDE counterparts. Again, it
    > all depends on your application. But being on 24 hour call for a data
    > center, I will not put IDE in a critical system. Also, does 3Ware have a
    > hot swappable/rebuildable solution for IDE?
    >
    > I'm not trying to be argumentative, I just am weighing the offering at an
    > enterprise class level.

    I've helped *design* a number of enterprise systems, and been the poor
    hardware/software interface specialist that some rather large data centers
    called when things went bad. Several vendors create hot-swappable IDE based
    systems, 3Ware makes high-quality IDE/RAID cards that a number of them use.
    SATA is increasing in popularity due to the simpler and smaller cabling,
    which makes a *BIG* difference for cooling and air flow in a densely packed
    system, although I haven't looked for hot-swappable SATA drives.

    In most cases, even a large RAID5 system has its bottle neck elsewhere, such
    as the network interface itself. The nominally higher RPM's of contemporary
    SCSI systems can help seek time a bit, but for streaming data or file
    transfers of even modest size, RAID5 is very much your friend.

    The reliability difference between IDE and SCSI has been evaporating for
    years: the IDE has really gotten quite good from reputable vendors, and
    after the IBM Deathstar debacle and other SCSI vendors committing similar
    errors, I'm more likely to trust redundant hardware/systems rather than SCSI
    reliability.

  • Next message: Nico Kadel-Garcia: "Re: Using Suse packages in Redhat Advanced server"

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