[WriteLog] Writelog file concerns

Jerry Flanders jeflanders at comcast.net
Tue Jan 28 14:37:00 EST 2003 

My system needs either: Ultra ATA/100, Ultra ATA/66, Ultra ATA/33, EIDE, 
and/or Fast ATA-2 compatible drives. The MB is an ECS  P4VXAD  ( 
http://www.hardwaresite.net/p4vxad.html ), and the RAID controller is the 
"Promise FastTrak 100-Lite" . It supports Modes 0 and 1.

Jerry W4UK

At 09:13 1/28/03 -0500, sysop at bfdin.com wrote:
>Will RAID work on IDE drives?  I thought it was for SCSI only?
>
>- Bill N3LLR
>
>RI>Just a couple of comments, although the documentation for any RAID
>RI>controller should point a lot of this out.
>
>RI>1) RAID stands for Redundant Array of Individual Disks.  There are several
>RI>   different types of RAID schemes, the most common being the following
>RI>        RAID 0 - striping data across 2 or more disks
>RI>        RAID 1 - mirroring data across 2 disks
>RI>        RAID 5 - striping data across disks, with parity (min of 3 disks).
>RI>   I could go on here, but realistically, this is what you tend to run
>RI>   into the most on the market place.
>
>RI>2) For the home user the cheapest, most hassle-free would probably
>RI>   be RAID 1, or mirroring.  Cheap - because you only need one more disk
>RI>   to do it.  Hassle-free - because if you had to you can "break" a "mirror
>RI>   set" and use the surviving disk alone.  If you replace a disk that 
>breaks
>RI>   the controller will "rebuild" the mirror set when the new disks is put
>RI>in.
>RI>   This can be time consuming (hours if you are also using your machine),
>RI>but
>RI>   at least in the end you have "protected" data again.
>
>RI>3) STAY AWAY from RAID 0.  This is simple striping.  Think of it this way,
>RI>   your two 6GB drives are combined into a single 12GB drive (as far as 
>your
>RI>   operating system is concerned), but the controller "stripes" the data
>RI>   across the two surfaces in chunks of, let's say, 32K bytes.  If you lose
>RI>   one drive you have a lost ALL your data.  Striping is most often 
>done for
>RI>   (READ) performance.
>
>RI>4) Some good info can be found at:
>RI>http://www.compinfo-center.com/stor/raid.htm.
>
>RI>I should also mention that some people would argue with me that RAID 5 is a
>RI>better way to go, since you get good READ speeds and slightly more storage
>RI>for the $buck.  And their arguments are very valid in a lot of
>RI>circumstances.
>
>RI>However, for the home user RAID 1 is better because even if the controller
>RI>were to break there is at least a chance that the one of the disks can just
>RI>be put on the default controller of the mother board.
>
>RI>Cheers,
>RI>-ricK7log
>
>
>RI>-----Original Message-----
>RI>From: writelog-bounces at contesting.com
>RI>[mailto:writelog-bounces at contesting.com]On Behalf Of Jerry Flanders
>RI>Sent: Tuesday, January 28, 2003 3:26 AM
>RI>To: Julian Cleak; writelog at contesting.com
>RI>Subject: Re: [WriteLog] Writelog file concerns
>
>
>RI>The last motherboards I purchased (in Sept 2002) had RAID capability
>RI>built-in. I haven't implemented it (my luck with HDs has been pretty good
>RI>over the years), but it is there in some modern motherboards for those who
>RI>feel it is helpful. Price for this MB was similar to the others the dealer
>RI>had in stock, so the RAID feature had no real extra cost (other than the
>RI>price of the additional HD required to make it all work).
>
>RI>RAID has several features, among which is redundant data storage on the
>RI>second HD- a single failing HD will not necessarily shut you down. Details
>RI>at:
>RI>http://www.msi.com.tw/html/e_service/techexpress/tech_column/raid/raid_1.htm
>
>RI>Jerry W4UK
>
>RI>At 10:52 1/28/03 +0000, Julian Cleak wrote:
>RI>>Hi Bill
>RI>>
>RI>>In my limited experience of Computers the two most unreliable 
>components in
>RI>>the base unit are the PSU and the HDD, different makes have different
>RI>common
>RI>>faults.
>RI>>Fuji for example have a nasty habit of not being recognised by the system
>RI>>bios where as Seagate go into clunking mode, Maxtor drives seen to just
>RI>spin
>RI>>up and stay running with no access to them. These are just some of the
>RI>>problems we get here in the uk. We have tried lots of different
>RI>manufactures
>RI>>from lots of different suppliers but seems to make no difference. 1 yr
>RI>seems
>RI>>to be the critical time of operation hear. I did a report to our buyers
>RI>>when tenders were due for renewal and our records showed that 78% of HDD
>RI>>failures happened within 2 months of being 1 yr old.
>RI>>I think that the only answer to the HDD problem is to make regular backups
>RI>>and, or fit a second HDD and keep duplicate files. I always tell our
>RI>clients
>RI>>that we can replace the programme files but the data files can cost up to
>RI>>1000 to retrieve, a CD-RW is about 30.
>RI>>
>RI>>              Best of Luck
>RI>>
>RI>>                      Julian
>RI>>----- Original Message -----
>RI>>From: "Bill Turner" <w7ti at dslextreme.com>
>RI>>To: <kk9a at arrl.net>
>RI>>Cc: "'WriteLog'" <writelog at contesting.com>
>RI>>Sent: Monday, January 27, 2003 6:18 PM
>RI>>Subject: Re: [WriteLog] Writelog file concerns
>RI>>
>RI>>
>RI>> > On Mon, 27 Jan 2003 16:07:25 -0000, <kk9a at arrl.net> wrote:
>RI>> >
>RI>> > >What happens if my hard drive fails?
>RI>> >
>RI>> > _________________________________________________________
>RI>> >
>RI>> > This isn't quite the answer to your question, but I believe the best
>RI>> > solution is not to have a hard drive failure in the first place.
>RI>> >
>RI>> > HD's are so inexpensive anymore, I think the best medicine is to 
>replace
>RI>> > them every couple of years or so before they get to the point of
>RI>> > failure.  Modern HD's are amazingly reliable - when they are new.  I
>RI>> > have had a couple of HD crashes in my ten years of computing, and they
>RI>> > were both on drives that had several years of use on them.  HD's 
>seem to
>RI>> > be good for around 3-5 years of ordinary use, so change them every two
>RI>> > years or so and you should be ok.
>RI>> >
>RI>> > Incidentally, there are removable HD fixtures now that allow you to 
>swap
>RI>> > a HD in about ten seconds.  I just bought several of them on eBay for
>RI>> > $6.99 each.  Put all your contesting software on a new HD and only use
>RI>> > it for contests.  Something to think about.
>RI>> >
>RI>> > 73, Bill W7TI
>RI>> >
>RI>> >
>RI>> > _______________________________________________
>RI>> > WriteLog mailing list
>RI>> > WriteLog at contesting.com
>RI>> > http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/writelog
>RI>> >
>RI>>
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>
>
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>
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>
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