Date: Wed, 29 Apr 1998 07:32:56 -0500 (CDT) From: "Paul T. Root" <proot@horton.iaces.com> To: techsupport@nordicdms.com Cc: wjv@cityip.co.za, freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: DPT RAID controller support Message-ID: <199804291232.HAA10800@horton.iaces.com> In-Reply-To: <19980428215538430.AAA192@mail.nordicdms.com> from Dave Walton at "Apr 28, 98 02:55:38 pm"
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In a previous message, Dave Walton said: > This brings to mind something that's been puzzling me about RAID. > Whenever someone posts a question here about what RAID controllers > are supported, the standard answer is "DPT". Now, by my > understanding, the way those are set up is something like this: > > You have a bunch of drives in a box. They are all plugged into the > RAID controller. The RAID controller is plugged into a slot in the > computer. The operating system must specifically support that RAID > controller. This is 'software' RAID > That arrangement strikes me as rather inflexible and prone to > compatibility problems. It seems better to do it this way: > > You have a bunch of drives in a box. They are all plugged into the > RAID controller, which is also mounted in the box. The RAID > controller makes the array appear as a single large SCSI device, > and is connected to any standard SCSI controller in the computer. > The operating system only needs support for whatever SCSI > controller is used. And this is 'hardware' RAID > So... Am I right that this is a better way to do things, or is there > something important that I am missing? Does anyone have any > experience with hardware of that design that they can recommend? I believe that Clarion is a hardware RAID box. There probably are many others. It all depends on where you want to control things. The problem with 'hardware' RAID is you still need to have a controlling program on your host. The advantage is that it provides the processing off load from the server. I guess something like a Network Appliance gets you away from even that. I've heard a lot of good things about it, but haven't used one myself. -- "We reproach people for talking about themselves; but it is the subject they treat best." --Anatole France (1844-1924) To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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