RAID system recommendations/war stories

Bill McGonigle bill at bfccomputing.com
Mon Sep 11 12:42:01 EDT 2006


On Sep 11, 2006, at 10:45, Michael ODonnell wrote:

> So we're thinking maybe we don't trust Promise gear anymore
> and we're wondering what other low-end, reasonably priced
> RAID units people are using with Linux, as well as what to
> stay away from.  Thanks.

I can't imagine using low-end RAID cards.  I've never had one not 
destroy itself.

For mission-critical stuff I've been using 3Ware 9550-sx cards (~$400) 
in JBOD mode with Linux Software RAID-1 on it.  Full-time writes 
consume about 12% of one of the cores of a 3.2GHz Xenon 5500 (in a 
dual-dual-core system) at about 80MB/s throughput (SATA-II, NCQ, 16MB 
cache).  Works good for e-commerce types of database loads (with plenty 
of RAM for cache at the OS and DB levels).

For home stuff I use cheaper cards but also Linux RAID.  I've had 
plenty of drives give up the ghost, but the last time I had drive 
corruption with Linux RAID was c. 2001.

And when (not if) the RAID controller goes up in smoke on a Friday 
afternoon, I can sleep well knowing I can move the drives over to a 
COTS SATA controller and limp along over the weekend.  Non-standardized 
RAID wrappers are the bane of the hardware solutions.

If you can afford two of everything and nearline backups, none of the 
above likely applies.

-Bill

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