LinuxQuestions.org
Download your favorite Linux distribution at LQ ISO.
Go Back   LinuxQuestions.org > Forums > Linux Forums > Linux - Server
User Name
Password
Linux - Server This forum is for the discussion of Linux Software used in a server related context.

Notices


Reply
  Search this Thread
Old 06-19-2008, 07:49 AM   #1
odyssey84
Member
 
Registered: Dec 2004
Posts: 50

Rep: Reputation: 15
SATA RAID card for home server


Greetings,

I have an old P3 dual 1 Ghz workstation that I'd like to make into a server (file, login, print). The motherboard only has IDE support so I'm looking at a SATA RAID controller card (RAID 0 or 1) to work with Ubuntu or OpenSuse.

Any suggestions for which card would work?

Thanks,

Scott
 
Old 06-19-2008, 12:39 PM   #2
kenoshi
Member
 
Registered: Sep 2007
Location: SF Bay Area, CA
Distribution: CentOS, SLES 10+, RHEL 3+, Debian Sarge
Posts: 159

Rep: Reputation: 32
Personally I use LSI Megaraid for that purpose. They come in all flavors (PCI, PCI-X, PCI-E), and range between 150 - 400.

Or you can always go Adaptec.
 
Old 06-29-2008, 11:34 PM   #3
synpse
LQ Newbie
 
Registered: Mar 2004
Location: Pennsylvania
Distribution: CentOS
Posts: 28

Rep: Reputation: 15
I went the cheap route, and used Software RAID. The card was about $25

Compaq Proliant DL 380 (G1), (4) x 500Gb SATA drives. RAID5 = ~1.34TB
Dual 733mhz P3, 1GB RAM

[root@redhat ~]# lspci
03:06.0 RAID bus controller: Silicon Image, Inc. SiI 3114 [SATALink/SATARaid] Serial ATA Controller (rev 02)

[root@redhat ~]# hdparm -t /dev/sdc
/dev/sdc:
Timing buffered disk reads: 162 MB in 3.03 seconds = 53.52 MB/sec
[root@redhat ~]# hdparm -T /dev/sdc
/dev/sdc:
Timing cached reads: 836 MB in 2.00 seconds = 417.49 MB/sec

[root@redhat ~]# hdparm -t /dev/md0
/dev/md0:
Timing buffered disk reads: 212 MB in 3.00 seconds = 70.58 MB/sec
[root@redhat ~]# hdparm -T /dev/md0
/dev/md0:
Timing cached reads: 816 MB in 2.02 seconds = 404.92 MB/sec
 
Old 07-27-2008, 09:30 PM   #4
CCThomas
LQ Newbie
 
Registered: Jul 2008
Posts: 4

Rep: Reputation: 0
I second the software raid route - once you use a particular vendor's hardware raid solution, you may be locked into it, and the features (or lack of features) which that solution provides.

I've used a pair of non-RAID Promise SATA300 TX4 cards (PCI) to run 8 Seagate SATA II drives in a software RAID5 array, and they have worked very well. I don't know how their performance compares against other RAID5 setups, and it will vary widely based on a number of factors, but, just to have _something_ for comparison:

% hdparm -t /dev/md0
/dev/md0:
Timing buffered disk reads: 346 MB in 3.01 seconds = 114.90 MB/sec

% hdparm -T /dev/md0
/dev/md0:
Timing cached reads: 578 MB in 2.00 seconds = 288.75 MB/sec

I pretty much used all the default settings from the guides for setting up software raid (via the mdadm tool), and for creating the filesystem on md0. I don't know how much faster I might be able to make it go, but I don't really care, because it's fast enough for what I'm using it for - storing and playing my DVD collection, which only needs at most, 10Mbit/sec anyway.

I've only had one incident: one day, all of the drives attached to one of the cards failed. I don't know if one drive had a fault, and took the whole card with it, or whether the problem originated in the card itself. But it failed in a way that no data was lost - the kernel detected the problem and immediately halted the array. I was able to reboot, run the command to reassemble all the drives back together (mdadm --assemble --update=resync /dev/sda /dev/sdb ..., I think), and it all came back up fine.

Last edited by CCThomas; 07-27-2008 at 09:35 PM.
 
  


Reply


Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is Off
HTML code is Off



Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Help! with 3Ware SATA RAID Card combilli Linux - Hardware 3 06-14-2007 11:18 PM
what sata card do i need for raid 0 Paridoth Linux - Hardware 2 12-13-2005 01:41 PM
What SATA Raid card for Suse 9.3 TongueTied SUSE / openSUSE 4 09-12-2005 02:21 AM
Sata Hardware Raid 1 Controller Card???? kartheekpn Linux - Hardware 2 05-03-2005 01:40 AM
SATA RAID card MrJoshua Linux - Hardware 4 06-11-2004 10:49 AM

LinuxQuestions.org > Forums > Linux Forums > Linux - Server

All times are GMT -5. The time now is 12:42 AM.

Main Menu
Advertisement
My LQ
Write for LQ
LinuxQuestions.org is looking for people interested in writing Editorials, Articles, Reviews, and more. If you'd like to contribute content, let us know.
Main Menu
Syndicate
RSS1  Latest Threads
RSS1  LQ News
Twitter: @linuxquestions
Open Source Consulting | Domain Registration