# raid 0 setup really slowing down...



## smashed_99cbr (Mar 22, 2010)

I have a Raid 0 setup on my HTPC, it has been up and running for a few months, over the last few weeks things have been going very very slow... esp deleting things and accessing stored data

it is setup as follows:

1.5TB Seagate 5900RPM 32mb buffer x (3)

the this divided into 2 containers

#1 256GB:

this container is used for booting, OS and primary programs

#2 (about) 4tb

this container is used for storage movies, TV, Music, and recording of TV (3 digital over the air feeds and 3 analog cable feeds)  as well as an FM radio feed...


My guess is that as the storage/recording container get more and more full the hard rives are being forced to jump back and forth between the Boot/OS container and the storage/recording container

so what should I do?

the system specs are as follows:

CPU: Intel q8200 @ 2.8GHz

Mobo: Abit IP35 Pro

RAM: 2 x 2GB DDR 800 and 2 x 512MB DDR 800 

Video: ATI 4650 512MB

Tuner Cards: Hauppage HVR-1600 (x2) Hauppage HVR-2200  (both are dual tuner cards, the later has FM tuner as well)

Hard Drives: listed above

Optical disc: Sony 2x Blu Ray reader

sound card: cheap USB card with optical audio outs

Remote: Snapstream Firefly (RF)

OS: Windows Vista x64

Tuner Program: Snapstream Beyond TV


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## Meow9000 (Mar 22, 2010)

ooh i dont know, maybe a defrag :shadedshu

sarcasm aside, just clean up any junk on the drive that you dont need.


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## 95Viper (Mar 22, 2010)

Update to the newest raid drivers:Intel rapid storage technology

Clean out junk: ccleaner

And, check for errors, then, defrag!

Edit: Meow9000 beat me to the defrag part.

Edit 2: Maybe run a virus scan or two, for sh*tz and grins.


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## smashed_99cbr (Mar 22, 2010)

95Viper said:


> Update to the newest raid drivers:Intel rapid storage technology
> 
> Clean out junk: ccleaner
> 
> ...




I will try the drivers...

its gets defraged  twice a week

it has 0 errors

no need for virus scans this machine does not download anything  nor does it surf the web


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## AsRock (Mar 23, 2010)

smashed_99cbr said:


> I will try the drivers...
> 
> its gets defraged  twice a week
> 
> ...



You check that though ISM ?. All so you could try this for de-fraging.

Start\Programs\Accessories\Command Prompt ( right click and run as administrator )

And type Defrag -b -c -w -v

-b = boot files
-c = Defrags all volumes
-w =  full defrag regardless of there size
-v = more detailed analysis


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## DirectorC (Mar 23, 2010)

Put your system on a separate physical drive than your storage.

I recently went from a partitioned RAID0 setup to a 74GB Raptor for OS and the RAID0 for storage.  File operations such as extracting RARs and such are still silly fast, and now map loading in COD4 is faster than it ever was because I no longer have the heads moving back and forth while reading/writing data that I'm Seeding.  It's like night and day.  For a user like me with a data volume that is being written/read to and from 100% of the time, using one drive for OS and another drive for data works out better than a split RAID0.


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## newtekie1 (Mar 23, 2010)

It could be a drive going bad, RAID0 has to wait on the slowest drive, so if one is going bad it will degrade the entire RAID arrays performance.

And it saddens me to see that much space in RAID0...I hope you are backing that up somewhere...


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## AsRock (Mar 23, 2010)

DirectorC said:


> Put your system on a separate physical drive than your storage.
> 
> I recently went from a partitioned RAID0 setup to a 74GB Raptor for OS and the RAID0 for storage.  File operations such as extracting RARs and such are still silly fast, and now map loading in COD4 is faster than it ever was because I no longer have the heads moving back and forth while reading/writing data that I'm Seeding.  It's like night and day.  For a user like me with a data volume that is being written/read to and from 100% of the time, using one drive for OS and another drive for data works out better than a split RAID0.



+2
So true thats why i like 2 Raid 5's( 3 disks each ) over Raid 1+0  System on 3 and games on the other kicks ass.


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## smashed_99cbr (Mar 23, 2010)

newtekie1 said:


> It could be a drive going bad, RAID0 has to wait on the slowest drive, so if one is going bad it will degrade the entire RAID arrays performance.
> 
> And it saddens me to see that much space in RAID0...I hope you are backing that up somewhere...




you must not know who I am... I have more hard drive space available than anyone you know...  lol  

http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd259/smashed_99cbr/DSCF1012.jpg


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## newtekie1 (Mar 23, 2010)

smashed_99cbr said:


> you must not know who I am... I have more hard drive space available than anyone you know...  lol
> 
> http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd259/smashed_99cbr/DSCF1012.jpg



I know, I've been tempted to buy from you many a time(and I probably will the next time you have some 5900RPM 1.5TB drives).

If your selling them, you aren't using them.   Like I said, I just hope you have all that backed up properly.


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## smashed_99cbr (Mar 23, 2010)

newtekie1 said:


> I know, I've been tempted to buy from you many a time(and I probably will the next time you have some 5900RPM 1.5TB drives).
> 
> If your selling them, you aren't using them.   Like I said, I just hope you have all that backed up properly.



I use the same drives I sell...


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## smashed_99cbr (Mar 23, 2010)

DirectorC said:


> Put your system on a separate physical drive than your storage.
> 
> I recently went from a partitioned RAID0 setup to a 74GB Raptor for OS and the RAID0 for storage.  File operations such as extracting RARs and such are still silly fast, and now map loading in COD4 is faster than it ever was because I no longer have the heads moving back and forth while reading/writing data that I'm Seeding.  It's like night and day.  For a user like me with a data volume that is being written/read to and from 100% of the time, using one drive for OS and another drive for data works out better than a split RAID0.




I was thinking about doing a pair of West Dig 2tb Green drives in raid 0 for storage and a single 500GB Samsung Spinpoint F1 for the boot drive...


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## DirectorC (Mar 23, 2010)

smashed_99cbr said:


> I was thinking about doing a pair of West Dig 2tb Green drives in raid 0 for storage and a single 500GB Samsung Spinpoint F1 for the boot drive...



That's a pretty good idea.  Though the verdict is still out on whether Green drives are OK to RAID.  Because of the way they work, they may not play well in RAID configurations.  It's all FUD from what I understand, but believable FUD.


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## newtekie1 (Mar 23, 2010)

DirectorC said:


> That's a pretty good idea.  Though the verdict is still out on whether Green drives are OK to RAID.  Because of the way they work, they may not play well in RAID configurations.  It's all FUD from what I understand, but believable FUD.



Yeah, the WD green drive don't play nice in RAID, or at least they didn't.  The way WD parks the heads so much, caused some RAID controllers to incorrectly detect the drive as failed.


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## Asylum (Mar 23, 2010)

Never under stood why people get these 1tb drives and raid 0 them in the first place.
Get you a couple of fast 300gig drives and raid 0 them for OS and games and then set you up a 1tb drive for back up and storage if you need that much space.
Then you have a fast system and plenty of storage.


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## newtekie1 (Mar 23, 2010)

Asylum said:


> Never under stood why people get these 1tb drives and raid 0 them in the first place.
> Get you a couple of fast 300gig drives and raid 0 them for OS and games and then set you up a 1tb drive for back up and storage if you need that much space.
> Then you have a fast system and plenty of storage.



Because we need 2TB or space or in the OP's case 4TB of space...


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## DirectorC (Mar 23, 2010)

newtekie1 said:


> Because we need 2TB or space or in the OP's case 4TB of space...



No real reason to have it all in RAID 0 though.  RAID 1 or 5 I could see.


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## smashed_99cbr (Mar 24, 2010)

DirectorC said:


> That's a pretty good idea.  Though the verdict is still out on whether Green drives are OK to RAID.  Because of the way they work, they may not play well in RAID configurations.  It's all FUD from what I understand, but believable FUD.




well I (4) West Dig Green 1TB drives in Raid 0 for a little over a year... it was fast and never gave me any issues


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## DirectorC (Mar 24, 2010)

smashed_99cbr said:


> well I (4) West Dig Green 1TB drives in Raid 0 for a little over a year... it was fast and never gave me any issues



Nice!  But you need to bring this info to prominence because every time there is a mention about Green drives in RAID the above FUD is brought up.


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## smashed_99cbr (Mar 24, 2010)

Asylum said:


> Never under stood why people get these 1tb drives and raid 0 them in the first place.
> Get you a couple of fast 300gig drives and raid 0 them for OS and games and then set you up a 1tb drive for back up and storage if you need that much space.
> Then you have a fast system and plenty of storage.




right I actually go thru close to 4tb recording on my HTPC in around 1 month... after that I have to start deleting recorded shows...  maybe you dont need that much space but try recording 6 video streams at one time (3 digital / 3 analog cable) and storing music and movie backups...  then tell me you dont need that much space

if i had my way I would have more space


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## DirectorC (Mar 24, 2010)

LOL, I think the medical community would refer to you as a 'hoarder' 

I go through terabytes too, but 90+% of movies I watch are deleted sooner than later, and almost 100% of shows are deleted days after they are DL'd.  I have no need to keep around terabytes of crap I've already seen.


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## Asylum (Mar 24, 2010)

smashed_99cbr said:


> right I actually go thru close to 4tb recording on my HTPC in around 1 month... after that I have to start deleting recorded shows...  maybe you dont need that much space but try recording 6 video streams at one time (3 digital / 3 analog cable) and storing music and movie backups...  then tell me you dont need that much space
> 
> if i had my way I would have more space



You ever heard of a dvd?


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## newtekie1 (Mar 24, 2010)

DirectorC said:


> Nice!  But you need to bring this info to prominence because every time there is a mention about Green drives in RAID the above FUD is brought up.



Just because it hasn't happened to you, that doesn't make it FUD.  I've seen it with my Highpoint controller, it does happen.  WD even released a firmware fix to help the issue, though it doesn't totally solve it.

If you look around hard enough you can find, not only news reports of the problem, but RAID controller manufacturers confirming it.


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## smashed_99cbr (Mar 24, 2010)

Asylum said:


> You ever heard of a dvd?



yes... actually I have... I own the original of everything I have


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## smashed_99cbr (Mar 24, 2010)

can Intel Matrix Raid do JBOD?


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## XZero450 (Apr 8, 2010)

Yes, Intel Matrix RAID will do JBOD.


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