Current software for managing aac arrays is available at adaptec. Asus pike 2008imr can be backward compatible with existing 1. Unlike the pike 1068e, the pike 1078 is a hardware raid controller might not be important with dual e5540 processors. Software raid uses a tiny truly tiny bit of core cpu time in exchange for better performance. The raid can be implemented either using a special controller hardware raid, or by an operating system driver software raid. Lsi sas 2108 raid controller information and listing. Raid controller choices hardware vs software community.
But with budget favoring the software raid, those wanting optimum performance and efficiency of raid will have to go with the hardware raid. The following listing is for the raid controllers and hbas based on the lsi sas 2108 sas 2 and sata iii raid controller. It recognizes all of the sata ports on my board and was user friendly. But with budget favoring the software raid, those wanting optimum performance and. Additionally, hardware assisted software raid usually comes with a variety of drivers for the most popular operating systems, and therefore, is more os independent than pure software raid. The individual physical drives in a hardware raid set are not exposed to the os at all. It is fakeraid, but a class above the other fakes and much faster than any built in parity raid in windows. Raid 0, raid1, raid 10, raid 5, raid 50, raid 6, raid 60 and jbod. Here are some tips on raid levels and some feedback on the software vs.
Hardware raid offers better reliability compared to software raid. In other raid configs it also allows for the array to be rebuilt with less of a performance hit on the os. Lsi 2008 sas megaraid configuration utility users manual. Regarding raid1e and 10 the main difference between 1e and 10 is that 1e uses an odd number of disk for providing protection, where as 10 uses an even number of disk. Would you know it that the software raid was 2x faster than the cards onboard setup. Benefits and drawbacks of hybrid, hardware assisted software raid. You have a choice of either hardware or software when configuring your raid controller.
A straightforward guide to hardware raid, hbas, software raid and. Therefore if you want performance and the capability to sustain multiple drive failure at the same time you should investigate hardware raid solutions. To understand hardware raid arrays, you need to know about how a raid stores its data on each drive. Pike 2008 card in z9pad8 asus mobo so i frankensteined an old pc into a home server as proof of concept for myself. Apr 28, 2017 raid will protect you against hardware failure, but you should still be using backup software to protect you aginst file corruption, file deletion and virusransomware. Hardware raid and implications for the future duration. Scott lowe responds to a techrepublic discussion and one members raid dilemma. It is a way to virtualize multiple, independent hard disk drives into one or more arrays to improve performance, capacity and reliability. In a hardware raid setup, the drives connect to a raid controller card inserted in a fast pciexpress pcie slot in a motherboard. Hardware raid presents logical disks that are already configured to the system or the san, mirrored and ready to go. If anything they should be advised to increase ram and be done with it. It combines multiple inexpensive, small disk drives into an array of disks in order to provide redundancy, lower latency maximizing the chanc.
First off, thank you all for your comments whether they were directly for my original questions or a pointer for software vs hardware raid. What is the difference between a software and hardware raid. Linux kernel software raid, lxer, syndicated linux news, 0, 07152008 03. Install esxi with asus pike 2008 vmware communities. Solved pike 2308 hardware raid seems okay but im not sure.
The typical stumbling block is the boot behavior on disk failure. Raid 0, raid 1, raid 1e, raid 10 and passthrough nonraid supported raid modes. Hardware beats out software substantially in output for parity raid, with hardware being 66% faster for block output and 20% faster for rewrite performance in a 256kb chunk raid6. A software raid is free but does carry some overhead on the server and may be less reliable under certain circumstances. My experience with hardware and fake hardware raid is that as long as you stay with the same vendor, the raid metadata will be recognized ive seen this when moving drives between various hp, areca and lsi hardware raid controllers, and with intel, amd and even via hostraid i was pretty surprised when i connected a 250gb hard drive from some old amd desktop box to a hp g1 microserver, and. Thanks in advance for your time and checking my findings. Software raid, as you might already know, is usually builtin on your os and unlike a hardware raid, you will need to spend a little extra on a controller card.
For hardware raid, that cpu can be in a disk array or in a raid controller. Jul 06, 2011 reasons for using software raid versus a hardware raid setup. Soft possibly the longest running battle in raid circles is which is faster, hardware raid or software raid. If you really must run raid 5 on a windows machine that doesnt perform like shit you have two choices. Comparing hardware raid vs software raid setups deals with how the storage drives in a raid array connect to the motherboard in a server or pc, and the management of those drives. Additionally, hardwareassisted software raid usually comes with a variety of drivers for the most popular operating systems, and therefore, is more os independent than pure software raid. The asus website provides updated information on asus hardware and software products. Raid redundant array of independent disks is one of the popular data storage virtualization technology. What are the pros and cons of using the hardware raid card, vs the software raid. A redundant array of inexpensive disks raid allows high levels of storage reliability. I bought this thing hoping to use its hardware raid but also open up the 8 unusable ports on my asus mobo. It plugs right into the pike slot and very easy to set up with the disc. Is the kernel driver needed for this raid system available in the default kernel.
May 24, 2005 scott lowe responds to a techrepublic discussion and one members raid dilemma. Optional pike 2008 8port sas ii are available for sas raid support pike card enables ondemand upgrade, and allows customers to invest on basic skus for current use reduce qualification resource and inventory management efforts multiple io solutions are available without occupying slot 6 in 1u chassis. Heavy processing can cause some pieces of data to be delayed by a small amount of time. Windows software raid vs hardware raid 10 posts arlesterc. The biggest positive for hardware raid is the os is presented the array as one disk. A raid can be deployed using both software and hardware.
Vulnerability to disk corruption is less than with hardware raid there is a reason that the biggest, most critical systems use software raid and hardware raid is for small, primarily windows systems. Ensure the card is completely inserted into the card slot, and the heatsink latch. Hardware raid resides on a pcix or pcie controller card, or on a motherboardintegrated raidonchip roc. Nas or desktop hdd for raid 1 or windows software raid hi, i want to buy two new hdd for my raid 1 mirror in desktop to store my data. This is a software raid solution that is less efficient. Hbas based upon controllers such as the lsi 1068e and sas2008 can. A software raid can also be affected if the host computer is heavily loaded. As with all hardware paritybased raid controllers, the computation of the parity and the strip size are the two most important considerations. Thats just the software raid subsystem benchmarking a number of different. Software raid means that the raid is handled by the general purpose os and hardware raid means that the raid is handled by a special purpose satasas controller card that runs its own os, cpu, memory, etc.
Align the golden fingers of the raid card with the pike raid card slot. Hardware raid 5e vs 6 vs 10 for home media server hardforum. This allows the raid adapter to deal with bad sectors and the best way to write data and read data. Raid will protect you against hardware failure, but you should still be using backup software to protect you aginst file corruption, file deletion and virusransomware. Thats general it stuff though, not terribly splunkspecific.
Jan 10, 2008 the biggest positive for hardware raid is the os is presented the array as one disk. Its worked great these last 6 months as a virtualization server as i have plex, calibre server, and a file server on it in software raid. Controller cards can be easily swapped out for replacement and upgrades. Hardware redundant array of inexpensive disks raid and software raid are two main ways for setting up raid system. Linuxbased software raid is regarded as mature and very usable. In a hardware raid setup, the drives connect to a special raid controller inserted in a fast pciexpress pcie slot in a motherboard. Walks through the steps of installing a serverbased sas raid controller on. Raid 0, raid 1, raid 1e, raid 10 and passthrough non raid supported raid modes. In the forums we have maintained a lsi controller mapping between lsi controllers and their oem counterparts. It is always recommended to use hardware to manage raid vs. In the disk manager in 2008, you get raid 0, 1, and 5. The asus pike 2008 allows you to create raid 0, raid 1, raid 10 and.
Installing the lsi sas controller in a desktop part 1 youtube. Software raid is typically a higher total performance solution, because the bandwidth of commodity processors grows much faster than custom raid solutions. Software raid on windows tends to have a reputation for working well enough for redundancy, but not working well performancewise, but from my research it looks like it is usually raid 5 in software with windows that you really take a hit. My experience with hardware and fakehardware raid is that as long as you stay with the same vendor, the raid metadata will be recognized ive seen this when moving drives between various hp, areca and lsi hardware raid controllers, and with intel, amd and even via hostraid i was pretty surprised when i connected a 250gb hard drive from some old amd desktop box to a hp g1 microserver, and. But the real question is whether you should use a hardware raid solution or a software raid solution. Hardware raid and software raid are both important storage tools that we use with our systems. Offloads raid tasks from the host system, yielding better performance than software raid. Ive been hoping other people would post with some experience, because im in the middle of a decision and am leaning toward software but just basically fear the unknown. Any raid is software raid all hardware raid cards have cpu running raid software unless you know of a chip that has raid functionality in its electrical design no programmable romflash, otherwise its software again. Sas raid card status led lights up and blinks to indicate that the card is working normally optional pike 2008 8port sas ii are available for sas raid support pike card enables ondemand upgrade, and allows customers to invest on basic skus for current use reduce qualification resource and inventory management efforts. Mar 09, 2014 similar help and support threads thread.
The raid cards are called hardware raid when they contain hardware dedicated to raid functionality and as such they do. Under software raid, that configuration is performed in the. Difference between hardware raid and software raid. This chapter offers the pike 2308 sas raid card features and the new technologies it supports. One has the option with most intel server cpus and chipsets to use irst, or intel rapid storage technology.
This manual is written for system integrators, pc technicians and. It can either be performed in the host servers cpu software raid, or in an external cpu hardware raid. Just placing the pike card can immediately enlarge the capacity, improve the performance, and strengthen signaling, making it the great upgrade option for users. I would take a look at using windows software raid vs. Asus pike 6480 8port sas raid card it basically indicates that you cant connect sas drives without an optional sas controller.
One of the most popular server raid controller chip and hba controller chip out there is the lsi sas 2008. A hp server that i work on had two disks in a raid1 array, one of my colleagues added an extra disk and made it a raid5, the hardware raid device moved the data around as appropriate while the machine was running and the disk space was expanded without any downtime. Be careful to carefully consider how to cool your sas controller and sas. Ensure the card is completely inserted into the card slot, and the heatsink latch is completely hooked to the edge of the card slot. Hardware raid controller card option qnap nas community. Aug 28, 2017 hardware raid and software raid are both important storage tools that we use with our systems.
In order to manage a hardware raid set check status, rebuild, verifyscrub, expand, convert etc. What is a hardware raid protect your data with a raid array. I need some more space, so will remove the two old drives and setup another raid. The lsi embedded megaraid software utility supports up to eight sas or sata ports, providing an ef.
Raid 1e requires min of 3 disk, and raid 10 requires a min of 4 disk. Jun, 2016 comparing hardware raid vs software raid setups deals with how the storage drives in a raid array connect to the motherboard in a server or pc, and the management of those drives. Dec 21, 2005 for hardware raid, that cpu can be in a disk array or in a raid controller. Lets start the hardware vs software raid battle with the hardware side. Windows software raid vs hardware raid ars technica. Hardware controller has the advantage of the computation of the pari. Workstation or server motherboard with pike raid card slot. Configuration is still required, but that configuration takes place outside the system. So i get it and setup the raid from the card and ran benchmarks on it as raid 10. Benefits and drawbacks of hybrid, hardwareassisted software raid. Differences between hardware raid, hbas, and software raid.
Difference between software raid and hardware raid in high level is presented in this video session. Reasons for using software raid versus a hardware raid setup. There usually is a performance boost when using a caching controller. That is what the thread was about, mainly, will raid 1 benefit enough to justify the extra risk and investment for a hw controller. Raid stands for redundant array of inexpensive disks. The following listing is for the raid controllers and hbas based on the.
Also raid 10 should alleviate weaknesses that 5 has. Before raid was raid, software disk mirroring raid 1 was a huge profit generator for system vendors, who sold it as an addon to their operating systems. Comparing hardware raid vs software raid deals with how the storage drives in a raid array connect to the motherboard, and the. The problem i am having is finding software compatible with windows. Jul 07, 2009 a redundant array of inexpensive disks raid allows high levels of storage reliability. Today we dive into what the differences are and whe we choose them. Mar 06, 2018 it can either be performed in the host servers cpu software raid, or in an external cpu hardware raid. Feb 28, 2018 raid redundant array of independent disks is one of the popular data storage virtualization technology. A while ago i asked a question about my asus pike 2308 raid controller. Jul 15, 2008 hardware beats out software substantially in output for parity raid, with hardware being 66% faster for block output and 20% faster for rewrite performance in a 256kb chunk raid 6. It is used to improve disk io performance and reliability of your server or workstation. A software raid can be prone to data corruption, due to the fault of the raid software or driver that is being used. A hardware raid controller costs money but has no overhead on the server.
Another limitation of linux software raid is expanding raid groups. Then setup the card as sata only and configured software raid. Software raid is a type of raid implementation that utilizes operating systembased capabilities to construct and deliver raid services. The pike card does not do raid 6 from the document in i looked at. Hardware raid vs software raid windows 7 help forums. The reason i sought a hardware raid solution was due to the fact that for about 8 months i was running mdadm as a software raid 6 solution.