From owner-freebsd-fs Fri Nov 6 16:40:28 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id QAA01268 for freebsd-fs-outgoing; Fri, 6 Nov 1998 16:40:28 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-fs@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from magicnet.magicnet.net (magicnet.magicnet.net [204.96.116.9]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id QAA01263 for ; Fri, 6 Nov 1998 16:40:26 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from bill@bilver.magicnet.net) Received: (from uucp@localhost) by magicnet.magicnet.net (8.8.6/8.8.8) with UUCP id TAA14802 for freebsd-fs@freebsd.org; Fri, 6 Nov 1998 19:35:46 -0500 (EST) Received: (from bill@localhost) by bilver.magicnet.net (8.9.1/8.9.1) id TAA27229 for freebsd-fs@freebsd.org; Fri, 6 Nov 1998 19:42:15 -0500 (EST) From: Bill Vermillion Message-Id: <199811070042.TAA27229@bilver.magicnet.net> Subject: Re: RAID1 Software vs Hardware In-Reply-To: from Christopher Nielsen at "Nov 6, 98 01:35:51 pm" To: freebsd-fs@FreeBSD.ORG Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1998 19:42:15 -0500 (EST) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL38 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-freebsd-fs@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Christopher Nielsen recently said: > On Fri, 6 Nov 1998, Bagnara Stefano wrote: > > Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1998 17:35:58 +0100 From: Bagnara Stefano > > To: freebsd-fs@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: RAID1 > > Software vs Hardware ^^^^^ > > I need to implement a simple raid1 with 2 9gigs SCSI HDD. I . > > Ineed a inexpensive solution ... so i was thinking about a . > > Isoftware raid1 s it possible? is it too slow? the system will . > > Ibe only a mail server . > Your really not going to see very good performance with RAID if > you're using only two spindles (i.e., discs). You might want > to try going with 4 4G discs, if possible. The question of > performance is directly related to exactly how much I/O you're > going to be shoving through the discs. "Only a mail server" > doesn't really provide enough information, IMHO. I've found that I get a 50% throughput increase (typical)when running RAID 0 with 2 drives. RAID 0 is always the fastest, but any failure will stop you dead. RAID 1 will give no increase in some areas, and writes are slower, but it will boost the read throughput if different files are being accessed, just as if you load balanced multiple single disks.. A good bet is a small boot drive, and then put the stripes on a pair of larger drives. Thus you have the recovery tools in place to restore after a disaster. Otherwise you have to go back to square one and install the OS. Not a big problem in a 2 drive mirror - but still a safety factor. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-fs" in the body of the message