RAID0 or RAID1

S

satrop

Guest
Hi all,

So here's the question, well a few. I have a Mac Pro, Quad 2.6, 5GB ram, running latest Leopard. Three internal drives, boot (stock) 250GB, 2nd bay 500GB and 3rd bay 750GB.

Question 1, which cohuld make the other questions pointless. I want to do a RAID, I've never done it before. Do the first two have to be the same size??
I hear a lot of horror stories about lossing all data. can I RAID0 the two smaller drives and RAID1 them to the 750GB?

Any help on this matter would be great. Do I go for speed or space? I work a lot in Photoshop on huge files! Larger than GB sometimes!!???

Thanks all!

For get all of that! I don't have a RAID card!!! So what about striping?
 
Joined
Jun 14, 2007
Messages
574
Reaction score
4
Points
18
Location
Toronto
Your Mac's Specs
2xiMac24 w Parallels 6 (1x White, 1x Aluminum), iPhone 3GS with iOS5
Short answer is yes to all he questions.

Best idea for speed is max the ram to 16gb. I would never raid the boot drive but I would mirror it to protect the applications just in case.

As for Raid, I would add another, even 5 if you can to get the 750's to a RAID 5 setup which is the best long term strategy. It will protect the data in case of a drive failure. Tough thing is to back it up as it get large.

I would use the 500GB as the scratch drive for Photoshop only - nothing else. Finally think battery backup to drive this beast and add more fans.
 
Joined
Mar 3, 2008
Messages
945
Reaction score
16
Points
18
Location
Annapolis, MD
Your Mac's Specs
Macbook, 2.2 GHz, 4GB RAM
satrop,

I'd say if you're worried about data loss at all, don't do a RAID0. I agree with Chillbear that upping the RAM is your best bet for speed. RAID1 is good for backup, but I think externals are just as good... also, if you don't have a 7200RPM hard drive, that option would speed you up as well - or a 500GB Velicoraptor at 10,000RPM (sp?)...

As for backup, I use 2 externals, one with Time Machine and one with SuperDuper (bootable backup). I back up every day or two, but with sensitive Photoshop data, let TM run full time, take a SuDu every day in addition.

Noel
 
Joined
Jul 14, 2008
Messages
675
Reaction score
22
Points
18
Location
Scotland, UK
Your Mac's Specs
nMP 6-core/32Gb/D700/512Gb: rMBP 15" 2.3GHz/16Gb/512Gb: iPhone 6 128Gb: iPad Air 2 128Gb: NEC PA322U
Question 1, which cohuld make the other questions pointless. I want to do a RAID, I've never done it before. Do the first two have to be the same size??
I hear a lot of horror stories about lossing all data. can I RAID0 the two smaller drives and RAID1 them to the 750GB??

I setup a RAID0 on the last PC I build with two 160Gb 7,200rpm drives giving 320Gb space. Now to setup a RAID the drives have to be (or very close) to identical ie. Same size space, cache, bus speed, spindle speed & manufacturer. You cannot setup ANY RAID array with three different sized drives - unless Mac RAIDs are different from PCs although I doubt it.

Since HDD's are so cheap now a days, I'd recommend buying 3x 500Gb drives and going for RAID5 (speed and redundancy), but if you don't want to buy a RAID card and the Mac Pro supports (RAID0/1) I'd get 2x 1TB drives and RAID1 'em - this way if one goes down you've got a back up and it also 'theoretically' doubles read speed. You could use one of your older drives for a scratch disk.

HTH.
 
OP
S

satrop

Guest
Thank you for your advice people! But I have gone off the idea of doing this via RAID. What are peoples opinions on ding "striping"??

I would strip the two smaller drives and then TM to the bigger 750 drive!
 
Joined
Jul 14, 2008
Messages
675
Reaction score
22
Points
18
Location
Scotland, UK
Your Mac's Specs
nMP 6-core/32Gb/D700/512Gb: rMBP 15" 2.3GHz/16Gb/512Gb: iPhone 6 128Gb: iPad Air 2 128Gb: NEC PA322U
What are peoples opinions on ding "striping"??

So long as it's a female I'm good with it. ;D

Joking aside, 'striping' aka. RAID0, Is what I setup on my PC with the 2x 160Gb drives.

Same principles apply, buy two (or more) identical drives however, since you get NO redundancy (why this is considered RAID, should be AID!) you will gain the speed/space of two (or more) HDDs running as one. You'll find reading/writing your 1Gb+ .PSD files faster than just one HDD on its own. The more drives the more space and speed you'll gain.

However, smaller files you won't notice any any improvement. Files are split 50/50 over the drives so the two drives work together to access them faster.

Just remember your Mac Pro must support RAID0 to work or you'll still need to buy a (usually) expensive RAID controller for it.

HTH you out some.
 
OP
S

satrop

Guest
OK one more question. Say I RAID0 (stripe) the two smaller disk's, on of which is the boot. Can I TM backup to my other third disk?
 
Joined
Jun 14, 2007
Messages
574
Reaction score
4
Points
18
Location
Toronto
Your Mac's Specs
2xiMac24 w Parallels 6 (1x White, 1x Aluminum), iPhone 3GS with iOS5
If all you are trying to do is get a larger drive by striping, you are heading down the wrong path. A failed "striped" drive I believe will cause a loss of data. If you want big, buy big and then Mirror it or back it up using TM. You are attacking the issue trying to save money and that issue will bite you in the back end and suddenly money will not be the issue.

If you are a pro or want to be one, think RAID5 and get a card.
 
OP
S

satrop

Guest
Nop, not trying to go for bigger space, that is obvious to got get a bigget HDD when they are so stinking cheap! No, what I am trying to do is have faster read wright speeds. All my HDD are running at 7200RPM, boot drive 250Gb, second drive 500GB and third 750GB, I do understand that having the two smaller drives stripe will decress the size of the second larger drive but its a trade off I am OK with untill I get another 500GB HDD. But I am a little confused now, because on the mac, a.k.a apple, website it says, you can RAID0 the boot drive if you have Leopard. I tryed this last night and no joy. So as for right now I am gonna give up! Boooo!
 
Joined
Jun 14, 2007
Messages
574
Reaction score
4
Points
18
Location
Toronto
Your Mac's Specs
2xiMac24 w Parallels 6 (1x White, 1x Aluminum), iPhone 3GS with iOS5
To increase the read write speed to a drive is still slower than using all in RAM speed. As mentioned you will notice the speed if you max the RAM but I am betting you cannot feel the difference in regard to the read/write operation. You have to up the FSB speed and again that is via an installed card if one exists.

Buy the Raptor drives (10,000 rpm) with the largest internal buffers and then you will get a bang but with only 7200 rpm I would bet you are wasting your time.

Raiding your startup drive makes no sense because I would NEVER use the startup drive as one of the working drives for Photoshop.
 

Shop Amazon


Shop for your Apple, Mac, iPhone and other computer products on Amazon.
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon and affiliated sites.
Top