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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