Opinions - RAID 10 vs. RAID 5

[randers4]

I'm trying to decide which to implement. I use RAID 5 now but am rebuilding my system. I realize that RAID 10 requires extra drive(s) but I'm willing to do it if the performance gain is there. Anyone tried both have an opinion?

I'm not a gamer but I do work with Photoshop a lot with large files (15-100 megs), as well as MS Office products. Board is GA-EP45-DQ6 w/4 GB DDR2.
Bob

[Lsdmeasap]

Re: Opinions - RAID 10 vs. RAID 5

I am not sure what would be best for you. I actually have not used either myself, I use RAID 0 and a second array of RAID 1 to place backups.

Maybe I should be looking into RAID 5? I just like the speed of RAID 0 and since I do have a RAID 1 backup and a additional Backup drive not in RAID I have been thinking of going 3 or 4 disk RAID 0 and dropping the Backup RAID 1.

I can link you to some great info that may help you decide though, it has pro's and con's of each. You may have already read this info but since no one had replied I thought I should at least give you some thoughts and info >>>

RAID Level 5
RAID Level 5

RAID Levels 0+1 (01) and 1+0 (10)
RAID Levels 0+1 (01) and 1+0 (10)

Summary Comparison of RAID Levels
Summary Comparison of RAID Levels

TONS of info at that site, if you have not been there before it may for sure help you decide what's in your best interest

[mv2devnull]

Re: Opinions - RAID 10 vs. RAID 5

I have experience only about hardware RAID5 on servers, and software&fake RAID1 in several places. Both have saved the day, when a disk has broken. Speed has always been secondary concern.

In theory, RAID1 reads faster than single disk. Therefore, RAID0 over two RAID1 arrays should read faster than RAID0 from two simple disks. And RAID0 (and RAID10) writes faster than RAID5, as it does not have to compute the checksums.

ICH10R, as fakeraid, does the computations in CPU, doesn't it? And does not have dedicated cache. So uneducated guess is that RAID10 can really be faster.

RAID10 is more redundant than RAID5 too. So the only downside of RAID10 compared to RAID5 is that from 4 drives, RAID10 uses 2 for redundancy, while RAID5 needs only one. And RAID5 you can make from only 3 drives, while the RAID10 needs 4.


One more note:
The help of Intel Matrix Storage Console describes the conversion of existing 4-disk RAID10 into RAID5. Therefore, you have the option to create RAID10, test it, and if it looks bad compared to past RAID5 experiences, revert to 5.

[randers4]

Re: Opinions - RAID 10 vs. RAID 5

Thanks for the input. I've been using RAID 5 and the performance seems slow...not much better than a single disk. I'm sold on the redundancy so I wouldn't do RAID 0. I'm considering RAID 10 for added speed but didn't want to spend the extra $$ for the 4th disk unless others said they really see a big difference vs. RAID 5. I assume RAID 10 performance is very similar to RAID 0.

Bob

[srode1]

Re: Opinions - RAID 10 vs. RAID 5

Raid 5 will read faster than it writes - especially when you get beyond the cache on the HDD. I haven't seen much difference in speed but haven't tried 10, 0, or 0+1. If you want real speed a RAID card with battery back up and onboard cache is the way to go.

I've use RAID 5 for a few years and been very happy with it - Also have 2 other drives I use for storage of critical files - probably overkill but I don't want to take any chances with digital video / photos that would be gone for good. I also use one drive for reading video and one to write to and one for the OS - on paper it's a good layout. The RAID 5 is my read from drive.

might want to create another small partition when you rebuild to add a second OS later, or replace your existing OS without having to do a complete rebuild. I left 30GB as a bootable array unused within my RAID 5 when I built it the last time. Its bootable even though I have the current OS on a single drive outside the array.

Another thing to consider - you have 6 SATAs to play with - if you do RAID 10 there's 2 left to play with. An optical drive on one and another big HDD (1TB) on the other would be a good way to go incase you have the array crash / get corrupted - you can back up your files on the TB drive periodically and if you have a crash that can't be recovered you have most of your stuff on the TB drive.