Low performance Raid

[Deleted User]

Hello,

Are you using Raid 0? I have not used this unit before, but looking on the website it has a card you slot into the system. Can you configure the raid via the card or software which the unit comes with?

Leo

[Allby Corry]

Hello Leo,

Yes I’m using Raid-0 with stripe made with Windows disk management.

And yes, can configure the Raid with the software which the unit comes with but I had tryed it and not see difference.

Maybe I’m not doing it correctly.

Cheers,
Allby

[John Pale]

with some SATA drives you need to move a jumper to get 3gb/s transfer rates

[Thomas Santopolo]

You definitely want to create the raid using the card. When you first start your computer, the card bios, just like your motherboard bios, should show up on your screen. From there you can configure your raid. If you have difficulties, call the manufacturer and they should walk you through it. Does the Norco unit have 4 separate sata connections? If not, it is using port multiplication and it really doesn’t raid well. The 300 MB/sec bandwidth of a single data cable through which the port multiplier connects will hold back simultaneous transfers as you add more drives to it.I attempted to use Port Multiplication once but could never get performance out of it. I now use a 4 Port Raid in raid 5 and get about 200 MB/sec. I am sure I would be closer to 350-400 MB/Sec in raid 0 (raid 5 mirrors data so if a drive fails, you don’t loose your data, but it slows performance).

[Allby Corry]

Thank you, Thomas.

I’ll try create a raid using the card.
The drives inside the unit are connected with 4 separate Sata cables but the connection to computer is only one cable via eSata.
This eSata card and cable is included with the unit and the manual say that I can get up 230MB/sec.

Thanks.
Allby

[John Pale]

Did you check for the jumper on the drives. If its not in place, it cuts the transfer rate in half…which is close to what you are seeing.

Might not be the problem, but its worth a look.

[Nicky Van der walt]

As far as I can see from the products web page, the 230mb/s they mention is burst speed, and not sustained transfer.

Am I correct in saying that is a PCI card?

I was never able to get much more than 120mb/s in a 4 disk RAID setup with PCI cards.

I now run a CALDIGIT raid card on a PCIx x8 card and I get around 230mb/s sustained transfer on 4 disk RAID5 setup.

[Allby Corry]

John,

The jumper on the drives are default no jumper, following the manual “no jumper 3.0GBps, with jumper 1,5GBps”.

[Allby Corry]

Nicky,

The controller card is a PCIe with the Sil3132 chip.

[Thomas Santopolo]

I tried the same kind of setup you have and could not get good performance. Port multiplication does not work well for speed. It would be best to have a 4 port card with a 4 port external raid.