RE: IDE hardware RAID
-Original Message- From: Frank Joerdens [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Monday, March 13, 2000 9:02 AM To: Chris Mauritz Subject: Re: IDE hardware RAID On Mon, Mar 13, 2000 at 08:40:57AM -0500, Chris Mauritz wrote: I'm going to start using them for applications where the data is expendible (mp3 jukebox comes to mind) where I just want a cheap RAID 0 array to hold a big chunk of bits. Another good application might be large web farms where the data on any one web server can go poof without any problems and you can then stripe a pair of inexpensive IDE disks for better throughput on a budget. When you're talking 10's or 100's of servers, the savings adds up. With 40gig ATA66 drives going for under $300 these days (and 10gigs in the $100 range), it seems like a no brainer in that kind of situation. I'd never use it on a busy database box, but the economics are quite compelling in certain situations. You're only referring to the RAID 0 option you have with these devices. What about RAID 1 and 10? I think particularly the latter is a good option for low-end low-cost servers that still require some redundancy. It depends on what you're looking for. RAID 10 is generally the best solution if you need redundancy AND speed. If you need redundancy and maximum storage capacity, RAID 5 wins out. If you need just speed, RAID0, and if you need maxuimum redundancy, then RAID1. Here's an example, using 9GB disks. 4 disks for all solutions. RAID 10 gives you ~18GB of storage, a mirror of two stripes (or is that a stripe of two mirrors?). RAID 5 gives you ~27GB of storage. RAID 0 gives you 36GB of storage, and RAID 1 gives you 9GB of storage (unless you assume a true mirror, in which case it gives you 9GB of storage with 2 hot spares). You can invent layouts of other RAID combinations for speed and or redundancy, but those are the biggest ones. If you have a RAID 10 array comprised of 4 disks (i.e. a mirrored striped pair), the likelihood of losing the entire array (i.e. either one from each mirrored pair, or both from either plus one from the other, or all 4 failing simultaneously) - if my probability theory is not entirely rusty - is (2n+1)squared divided by n to the power of 4 if the probability of losing a single disk is the inverse of n (how do you write this stuff properly using just ascii?) You don't. :) How this: [(2n+1)^2]/(n^4) which approaches the inverse of n squared if n is large enough; which means that since n is pretty big (the probability of one of today's IDE drivers failing is pretty low), RAID 10 is not significantly worse than RAID 1 in terms of inherent redundancy, whilst being significantly faster. Greg
Re: IDE hardware RAID
On Mon, Mar 13, 2000 at 08:40:57AM -0500, Chris Mauritz wrote: I'm going to start using them for applications where the data is expendible (mp3 jukebox comes to mind) where I just want a cheap RAID 0 array to hold a big chunk of bits. Another good application might be large web farms where the data on any one web server can go poof without any problems and you can then stripe a pair of inexpensive IDE disks for better throughput on a budget. When you're talking 10's or 100's of servers, the savings adds up. With 40gig ATA66 drives going for under $300 these days (and 10gigs in the $100 range), it seems like a no brainer in that kind of situation. I'd never use it on a busy database box, but the economics are quite compelling in certain situations. You're only referring to the RAID 0 option you have with these devices. What about RAID 1 and 10? I think particularly the latter is a good option for low-end low-cost servers that still require some redundancy. If you have a RAID 10 array comprised of 4 disks (i.e. a mirrored striped pair), the likelihood of losing the entire array (i.e. either one from each mirrored pair, or both from either plus one from the other, or all 4 failing simultaneously) - if my probability theory is not entirely rusty - is (2n+1)squared divided by n to the power of 4 if the probability of losing a single disk is the inverse of n (how do you write this stuff properly using just ascii?) which approaches the inverse of n squared if n is large enough; which means that since n is pretty big (the probability of one of today's IDE drivers failing is pretty low), RAID 10 is not significantly worse than RAID 1 in terms of inherent redundancy, whilst being significantly faster. - Frank -- frank joerdens joerdens new media e: [EMAIL PROTECTED] heinrich-roller str. 16/17 t: +49 30 44055471 10405 berlin f: +49 30 44055475 germanyh: http://www.joerdens.de pgp fingerprint: _ || | hockey savagerysouthward recover | | playhouse breakaway quiver Atlantic | | sugar disable befriendpositive | | Geiger company seabird Atlantic | | prowler amusement commenceMontana | ||
IDE hardware RAID
Has anyone played with the FastTrak66 Ultra ATA/66 RAID Card (info at http://www.promise.com/Products/ideraid/ft66page.htm)? Is anyone working on a driver for Linux (I've seen that the FreeBSD people are at it)? I think the idea of having IDE HW RAID is pretty cool. They even provide an IDE hotswap kit. Any support for Linux on the horizon? - Frank -- frank joerdens joerdens new media e: [EMAIL PROTECTED] heinrich-roller str. 16/17 t: +49 30 44055471 10405 berlin f: +49 30 44055475 germanyh: http://www.joerdens.de pgp fingerprint: _ || | hockey savagerysouthward recover | | playhouse breakaway quiver Atlantic | | sugar disable befriendpositive | | Geiger company seabird Atlantic | | prowler amusement commenceMontana | ||
Re: IDE hardware RAID
At 12:00 13.03.00, Frank Joerdens wrote: Has anyone played with the FastTrak66 Ultra ATA/66 RAID Card (info at http://www.promise.com/Products/ideraid/ft66page.htm)? Is anyone working on a driver for Linux (I've seen that the FreeBSD people are at it)? I think the idea of having IDE HW RAID is pretty cool. They even provide an IDE hotswap kit. Any support for Linux on the horizon? I've got one of these cards lying around for testing. Current status: No linux driver available. Future prospects: According to an anser I got this weekend from promis support, a driver for redhat 6.1 will be released within the next 30 days. Original mail from support: --- From: "Steve Pedroza" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: "'Martin Bene'" [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: Fasttrak66 support for Linux? Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 10:06:28 -0800 Message-ID: 000101bf8abb$5be7d260$[EMAIL PROTECTED] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook CWS, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0) Importance: Normal In-Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 X-UIDL: 71604175b56439602d5fe7f68846fb34 Hi, We will be releasing Linx 6.1 drivers in about 30 days. --- Also worth a look: http://www.3ware.com - they've got hardware IDE Raid (0/1) controllers for 2 / 4 / 8 Drives (= 2/4/8 seperate channels). They already have linux support (Driver source included with card, driver source also included in 2.2.15pre kernels and updates included in Andre Hedricks IDE patches. I'm currently testing these as well. Setup of raid devices is done using the controller bios. Positive: Performance is nice, handling of failing disks worked flawlessly so far, drivers in kernel + available as source. Monitoring tool available to get the current status of the raid devices + Event notifications (Reconstruction finished, drive failed..). Rebuilding of mirrors runs as background operation during normal system operation. Negative: The monitoring tool is currently very basic and not available in source, I'd have liked to add a few things. There's an issue with recovery from power failure/reset that support is still working on, will hopefully be resolved shortly(?) Bye, Martin "you have moved your mouse, please reboot to make this change take effect" -- Martin Bene vox: +43-316-813824 simon media fax: +43-316-813824-6 Andreas-Hofer-Platz 9 e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 8010 Graz, Austria -- finger [EMAIL PROTECTED] for PGP public key
Re: IDE hardware RAID
Another amusing thing about those controllers (once a driver becomes available) is the cheap hack to turn the cheap $35 dual channel ATA66 controller into the $130 dual channel RAID card by adding one resistor. Details at: http://www.geocities.com/promise_raid/english.htm I'm going to start using them for applications where the data is expendible (mp3 jukebox comes to mind) where I just want a cheap RAID 0 array to hold a big chunk of bits. Another good application might be large web farms where the data on any one web server can go poof without any problems and you can then stripe a pair of inexpensive IDE disks for better throughput on a budget. When you're talking 10's or 100's of servers, the savings adds up. With 40gig ATA66 drives going for under $300 these days (and 10gigs in the $100 range), it seems like a no brainer in that kind of situation. I'd never use it on a busy database box, but the economics are quite compelling in certain situations. Cheers, Chris - Original Message - From: "Martin Bene" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: "Frank Joerdens" [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, March 13, 2000 7:38 AM Subject: Re: IDE hardware RAID At 12:00 13.03.00, Frank Joerdens wrote: Has anyone played with the FastTrak66 Ultra ATA/66 RAID Card (info at http://www.promise.com/Products/ideraid/ft66page.htm)? Is anyone working on a driver for Linux (I've seen that the FreeBSD people are at it)? I think the idea of having IDE HW RAID is pretty cool. They even provide an IDE hotswap kit. Any support for Linux on the horizon? I've got one of these cards lying around for testing. Current status: No linux driver available. Future prospects: According to an anser I got this weekend from promis support, a driver for redhat 6.1 will be released within the next 30 days. Original mail from support: --- From: "Steve Pedroza" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: "'Martin Bene'" [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: Fasttrak66 support for Linux? Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 10:06:28 -0800 Message-ID: 000101bf8abb$5be7d260$[EMAIL PROTECTED] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook CWS, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0) Importance: Normal In-Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 Hi, We will be releasing Linx 6.1 drivers in about 30 days. --- Also worth a look: http://www.3ware.com - they've got hardware IDE Raid (0/1) controllers for 2 / 4 / 8 Drives (= 2/4/8 seperate channels). They already have linux support (Driver source included with card, driver source also included in 2.2.15pre kernels and updates included in Andre Hedricks IDE patches. I'm currently testing these as well. Setup of raid devices is done using the controller bios. Positive: Performance is nice, handling of failing disks worked flawlessly so far, drivers in kernel + available as source. Monitoring tool available to get the current status of the raid devices + Event notifications (Reconstruction finished, drive failed..). Rebuilding of mirrors runs as background operation during normal system operation. Negative: The monitoring tool is currently very basic and not available in source, I'd have liked to add a few things. There's an issue with recovery from power failure/reset that support is still working on, will hopefully be resolved shortly(?) Bye, Martin "you have moved your mouse, please reboot to make this change take effect" -- Martin Bene vox: +43-316-813824 simon media fax: +43-316-813824-6 Andreas-Hofer-Platz 9 e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 8010 Graz, Austria -- finger [EMAIL PROTECTED] for PGP public key
RE: New(?) IDE hardware RAID device
ok, I feel REALLY dumb now. I guess that's what I get for writing email after 11:00 PM. http://www.ami.com/hyperdisk/hyperdisk.html Sorry about that. Greg -Original Message- From: James Manning [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2000 11:12 PM To: Gregory Leblanc Subject: Re: New(?) IDE hardware RAID device [ Wednesday, February 9, 2000 ] Gregory Leblanc wrote: A friend of mine just sent this to me what? nothing was attached that I could tell and no url.. James
RE: New(?) IDE hardware RAID device
At 09:08 AM 2/9/2000 -0800, you wrote: ok, I feel REALLY dumb now. I guess that's what I get for writing email after 11:00 PM. http://www.ami.com/hyperdisk/hyperdisk.html Tiger direct sells this... they have an internal card that goes between the on board controller and 2 drives to make them HW raid-1, and they have one that fits in a 5.25" drive bay with all the electronics in it... Both are about $250.00 for the controller... you still have to supply drives. Kind of steep considering Linux does it in software for free, and there are only 2 drives allowed to their raid card. === David Cooley N5XMT Internet: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Packet: N5XMT@KQ4LO.#INT.NC.USA.NA T.A.P.R. Member #7068 We are Borg... Prepare to be assimilated! ===
RE: New(?) IDE hardware RAID device
-Original Message- From: David Cooley [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Wednesday, February 09, 2000 11:10 AM To: Gregory Leblanc Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: New(?) IDE hardware RAID device At 09:08 AM 2/9/2000 -0800, you wrote: ok, I feel REALLY dumb now. I guess that's what I get for writing email after 11:00 PM. http://www.ami.com/hyperdisk/hyperdisk.html Tiger direct sells this... they have an internal card that goes between the on board controller and 2 drives to make them HW raid-1, and they have one that fits in a 5.25" drive bay with all the electronics in it... Both are about $250.00 for the controller... you still have to supply drives. Kind of steep considering Linux does it in software for free, and there are only 2 drives allowed to their raid card. True, but even with the nifty patches that RedHat has supplied, you can only boot from RAID 1. I was thinking you could grab two cards like this, and create RAID-0 arrays on both, and then mirror those using Linux software RAID 1 to give you a nice RAID 10 redundant, fast drive array. It does sound a bit expensive though... Greg
Re: New(?) IDE hardware RAID device
On Wed, Feb 09, 2000 at 11:26:20AM -0800, Gregory Leblanc wrote: True, but even with the nifty patches that RedHat has supplied, you can only boot from RAID 1. I was thinking you could grab two cards like this, and create RAID-0 arrays on both, and then mirror those using Linux software RAID 1 to give you a nice RAID 10 redundant, fast drive array. It does sound a bit expensive though... You can boot off of non-RAID 1 arrays, you just need to finese things a little bit. For instance, make /boot a RAID-1 array and point LILO at it. You can then make a RAID-5 or 10 array for / and everything else. It should be able to boot up without any problems. -- Randomly Generated Tagline: They can always run stderr through uniq. :-) -- Larry Wall in [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: ide hardware raid
Terry Ewing wrote: Hello, I'm an administrator in a co-location facility and recently we had a customer come in to replace a raid card. The only catch was the RAID card was IDE. This was on an NT box, but I was wondering: 1) what IDE RAID cards are out there now. What is known about them. 2) What is the status of Linux support for IDE RAID cards. Thanks! - Terry Ewing [EMAIL PROTECTED] Deepwell Internet Services Hi, I'm currently checking out a couple of PCI controllers by PROMISE Technology (the FastTRAK and the FastTRAK66). The nice thing about them is that, if coupled with their "hot-swap" disk box, they allow you to remove/add a disk while the system is up and running. I couldn't find any other PCI/IDE card supporting hot-swapping. If anybody knows about them, I'd be interested too. Up to now I managed to use them succesfully on NT (:-( while when used with the current linux driver, I didn't find out how to enable the hardware-RAID. - Antonio -
Re: ide hardware raid
check out www.zero-d.com They make an eide internal uw scsi external raid box that looks pretty cool. -sv
Re: ide hardware raid
RAIDZONE www.raidzone.com is a full function RAID solution thatruns under Linux (and Windows NT) using IDE (Ultra ATA) disk drives. RAIDZONE features include: 1) Full Hotswap/HotSpare support. RAIDZONE includes SMARTCANenclosures that provide complete monitoring and control of individualdisk drives. Under software control any given drive can be powereddown for removal and replacement without affecting the operationof any other drive. The SMARTCAN includes sensing circuitry to detectthe removal and the re-insertion of a drive and can thus automaticallyre-energize the slider unit. 2) Support for drive level RAID0, RAID1, RAID5 and RAID10. 3) RAIDZONE BIOS provides support for bootstrap of all supported RAIDlevels. 4) Expandability. Current RAIDZONE technology will allow you to configurea 40 disk drive Linux server. Using the 37GB IBM Ultra ATA 66 disk drivesthat's not too shabby. Current non-production hardware (that exists today)increases that limit to 80 disk drives. Other technology indevelopment will eliminate current limitations entirely. 5) Performance. Each disk drive has it's own bus-mastering data path tosystem memory. RAIDZONE only uses disk drives in their MASTER mode - NO SLAVES. Performance is limited by contentionfor PCI memory bandwidth and (at least under Linux 2.2.X) thedouble copy that takes place between the system buffer cacheand user space. Under Windows NT we have observed sustainedsequential read throughput of greater than 110Mbytes/sec. Bonnie numbersfor a 7-way RAID5 using 31GB IBM (7200 rpm) drives in a Intel 440BXmotherboard with dual 450Mhz PIIIs are 30Mbytes/sec writing and70 Mbytes/sec reading. 6) Administration: RAIDZONE includes a Java based GUI formonitoring and configuring the RAIDZONE disk sub-system.This can be used locally or remotely over the network. 7) Price. When compared to other full function SCSI based RAID solutionsRAIDZONE has a cost advantage due to the lower cost of Ultra ATA 66 disk drives versus SCSI disk drives with similar performance and capacity. Steve Cooper [EMAIL PROTECTED] Directory of Software Engineering,Consensys Computers Inc. -Original Message-From: Terry Ewing [EMAIL PROTECTED]To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED]Date: Wednesday, December 01, 1999 6:18 PMSubject: ide hardware raid Hello, I'm an administrator in a co-location facility and recently we had acustomer come in to replace a raid card. The only catch was the RAID cardwas IDE. This was on an NT box, but I was wondering:1) what IDE RAID cards are out there now. What is known about them.2) What is the status of Linux support for IDE RAID cards.Thanks!
Re: scsi channels (Was: ide hardware raid)
On Wed, Dec 01, 1999 at 04:20:49PM -0800, Alvin Oga wrote: they have scsi-2 raid cards from adaptec... 1-channel($430) and 3-channel($650) raid controllers.. a dumb question... what are the channels used for ??? scsi channels are different scsi busses, you use them for load balancing. btw, i doubt any of these card will work with linux :( L. -- Luca Berra -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] Communications Media Services S.r.l.
ide hardware raid
Hello, I'm an administrator in a co-location facility and recently we had a customer come in to replace a raid card. The only catch was the RAID card was IDE. This was on an NT box, but I was wondering: 1) what IDE RAID cards are out there now. What is known about them. 2) What is the status of Linux support for IDE RAID cards. Thanks! - Terry Ewing [EMAIL PROTECTED] Deepwell Internet Services
Re: ide hardware raid
hi all "raiders" just was at the pc store in the duilding I'm in.. they have scsi-2 raid cards from adaptec... 1-channel($430) and 3-channel($650) raid controllers.. a dumb question... what are the channels used for ??? have fun raiding... alvin http://www.linux-consulting.com/Raid/Docs/raid_hw.txt ( change the filename for other raid docs and comments and resources ) Terry Ewing wrote: Hello, I'm an administrator in a co-location facility and recently we had a customer come in to replace a raid card. The only catch was the RAID card was IDE. This was on an NT box, but I was wondering: 1) what IDE RAID cards are out there now. What is known about them. 2) What is the status of Linux support for IDE RAID cards. Thanks! - Terry Ewing [EMAIL PROTECTED] Deepwell Internet Services
