From: Lee W centos-list@unassemble.co.uk
Has anyone had any experience of using the Promise FastTrak SX4000 or SuperTrak SX6000 IDE RAID Controllers under Centos (if it matters I'm using version 4). I've seen it listed on linuxcompatible.org as working but would prefer to find out any first-hand experince before I buy.
Avoid the FastTraks. Most are FRAID (Fake/Free RAID), 100% software with 0% GPL drivers.
The SuperTraks are a "true hardware" microcontroller+DRAM solution with GPL drivers. Unfortunately, they use mega-yesteryear i960 microcontrollers not able to keep up with today's drives.
When you want ATA and RAID-5, I recommend the LSI Logic with "x" in the product model to indicate XScale (superscalar StrongARM) microcontrollers.
If not, can anyone suggest another make of RAID Controller that will support upto 4 IDE RAIDS (preferably with support for RAID 5). And is also available in the UK.
Is there any consideration driving RAID-5? For a majority of applications, RAID-0+1 tends to be better.
I prefer 3Ware Escalade 7506/8506 series cards for RAID-0+1. They use a 64-bit ASIC and SRAM (static RAM).
The 9500S series is still maturing, although they should eventually show outstanding performance. They add a large amount of DRAM to the existing ASIC+SRAM approach of the earlier Escalades.
-- Bryan J. Smith mailto:b.j.smith@ieee.org
Bryan J. Smith b.j.smith@ieee.org wrote:
From: Lee W centos-list@unassemble.co.uk
Avoid the FastTraks. Most are FRAID (Fake/Free RAID), 100% software with
0% GPL drivers.
The SuperTraks are a "true hardware" microcontroller+DRAM solution with GPL drivers. Unfortunately, they use mega-yesteryear i960 microcontrollers not able to keep up with today's drives.
Thanks for the heads up
Is there any consideration driving RAID-5? For a majority of applications, RAID-0+1 tends to be better.
No, just another toy to play with. I'm currently looking a playing with Software RAID but would like to have H/W as well.
I prefer 3Ware Escalade 7506/8506 series cards for RAID-0+1. They use a 64-bit ASIC and SRAM (static RAM).
The 9500S series is still maturing, although they should eventually show outstanding performance. They add a large amount of DRAM to the existing ASIC+SRAM approach of the earlier Escalades.
I'm certainly liking what I have seen of the 3Ware card's so far. Their site lists quite a few distros as supported, including RHEL 3 which from a simplistic guess would also mean that Centos 3 (and possibly 4) would also be supported.
Regards
Lee
On Tue, 10 May 2005 at 8:17pm, Lee W wrote
I'm certainly liking what I have seen of the 3Ware card's so far. Their site lists quite a few distros as supported, including RHEL 3 which from a simplistic guess would also mean that Centos 3 (and possibly 4) would also be supported.
The nice thing about the 3wares are that the drivers for the 7/8xxx series have been in the kernel for a very long time (2.2 days, IIRC), and the 9xxx drivers have been in for a while as well. That's one reason they tend to be so well trusted. As another vote of confidence, I've got 5 TB on 7xxx series controllers in production and another 5.5TB on 9xxx controllers in testing right now.
I use 8500-8 3ware controllers, but I have seen a number of controllers with faulty SATA connectors that cause the RAID to go outof sync....
Other than that software wise they are great...
P.
Joshua Baker-LePain wrote:
On Tue, 10 May 2005 at 8:17pm, Lee W wrote
I'm certainly liking what I have seen of the 3Ware card's so far. Their site lists quite a few distros as supported, including RHEL 3 which from a simplistic guess would also mean that Centos 3 (and possibly 4) would also be supported.
The nice thing about the 3wares are that the drivers for the 7/8xxx series have been in the kernel for a very long time (2.2 days, IIRC), and the 9xxx drivers have been in for a while as well. That's one reason they tend to be so well trusted. As another vote of confidence, I've got 5 TB on 7xxx series controllers in production and another 5.5TB on 9xxx controllers in testing right now.
Peter Farrow wrote:
I use 8500-8 3ware controllers, but I have seen a number of controllers with faulty SATA connectors that cause the RAID to go outof sync....
Now that you mention it, that is really my only gripe with SATA in general.
<peeve> The connectors (especially the male cable ends) are so bloody fragile...
Even when you know this and are extra careful, one slight bend in the wrong direction and SNAP...the connector cracks. I think if they made them out of eggshells, they would be substantially stronger. 8-( </peeve>
But once you manage to get things together, it's such a simpler/cleaner solution than IDE (even rolled IDE cabling) or internal SCSI cabling.
Cheers,
C
Peter Farrow wrote:
I use 8500-8 3ware controllers, but I have seen a number of controllers with faulty SATA connectors that cause the RAID to go outof sync....
On Wed, 2005-05-11 at 06:31 -0400, Chris Mauritz wrote:
Now that you mention it, that is really my only gripe with SATA in general.
3Ware _does_ offer 4-port concentrators that help reduce this issue, at least at the card. It's one of the main reasons they introduce it, and 3Ware continues to be one of the _few_ (only?) vendor that offers a better connector.
<peeve> The connectors (especially the male cable ends) are so bloody fragile... Even when you know this and are extra careful, one slight bend in the wrong direction and SNAP...the connector cracks. I think if they made them out of eggshells, they would be substantially stronger. 8-( </peeve>
I do agree with you. I sure wish they could have put the male side on the _cable_ instead of the board/drive. The thinner "male" end is more likely to break than the bigger "female."
But once you manage to get things together, it's such a simpler/cleaner solution than IDE (even rolled IDE cabling) or internal SCSI cabling.
At least until SerialSCSI is finalized. ;->
Bryan J. Smith wrote:
3Ware _does_ offer 4-port concentrators that help reduce this issue, at least at the card. It's one of the main reasons they introduce it, and 3Ware continues to be one of the _few_ (only?) vendor that offers a better connector.
You mean the multilane connectors? Yeah, those are sweet. A friend of mine has just used those cables with multilane drive cages to make some really "fat" 12 drive arrays using Seagate 400gig SATA drives. They look a bit like the old high density external SCSI connectors (like the old Buslogic/Mylex boards used to have "back in the day").
Cheers,
C
On Wed, 11 May 2005 at 9:21am, Chris Mauritz wrote
Bryan J. Smith wrote:
3Ware _does_ offer 4-port concentrators that help reduce this issue, at least at the card. It's one of the main reasons they introduce it, and 3Ware continues to be one of the _few_ (only?) vendor that offers a better connector.
You mean the multilane connectors? Yeah, those are sweet. A friend of mine has just used those cables with multilane drive cages to make some really "fat" 12 drive arrays using Seagate 400gig SATA drives. They look a bit like the old high density external SCSI connectors (like the old Buslogic/Mylex boards used to have "back in the day").
They are, in fact, Infiniband style connectors.
On Wed, 2005-05-11 at 09:23 -0400, Joshua Baker-LePain wrote:
They are, in fact, Infiniband style connectors.
Yep. Don't know why, but when I think "Infiniband," I keep wanting to write "HyperTransport" or "Lightning Data Transport" (the R&D name for HT), which I know is wrong, so I didn't know what to call them. Thanx.
-- Bryan
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Bryan J. Smith -
Bryan J. Smith <b.j.smith＠ieee.org> -
Chris Mauritz -
Joshua Baker-LePain -
Lee W -
Peter Farrow