>> argh...i missed the raid5 on 3ware part. > > Ah. No, I am using RAID0 since this is just scratch space for editing > large uncompressed video files. Man a 3ware for RAID0? :D I cannot wait for port multiplexer support on libsata (or is it libata?) in Centos 5. An elcheapo AHCI or whatever SATA controller + Linux software raid will own 3ware cards on a price/performance basis :D > > Disks are so cheap and high enough capacity now that I don't even bother > with RAID5 anymore. I still don't think (even if I was using RAID5) > that I would stray from the "vendor supported" ext3 filesystem. > Not when you need that fileserver to serve. I'd go with JFS. XFS is too risky even if the code was not iffy. ext3 + 3ware RAID5 arrays is that bad. IIRC XFS was somewhere like 4-5 times faster than ext3 and no, i am not talking about 3ware 75xx/85xx boards. I am talking 3ware 95xx boards with onboard RAM.