Hardware ride vs software?

Question

ASUS

I raise a file-washer on a fryakha. Motherboard Asus m3n78-vm. The question arose what kind of ride to use (RAID 1): software (in the freight) or hardware (in the motherboard)?

Answer 1

Better software, or separately put a hardware controller. Trust raids on the motherboard is not worth it.

Answer 2

For low-end systems, it is better to use software. As KerLaeda wrote, a normal hardware raid is expensive. The reliability of the fake raid is doubtful. I have been using md on two servers for over a year - the flight is normal. Judging by the manuals, this restoration is quite simple and predictable.

Answer 3

Motherboards usually have fake-raid installed, it is not known how it distributes data. If the motherboard or system is covered, it will be quite problematic to recover data. I would choose software. Besides not the fact that built-in raid frya recognizes.

Answer 4

in terms of reliability, yes, an external hardware raid controller from some well-known vendor is better. but it’s better to take a couple - so that if one dies, you can quickly raise the array and not wait until a replacement arrives. Software in this regard is more flexible - you can always put the screws in another machine and assemble it there.
in terms of performance - the difference is usually imperceptible - modern processors count quite quickly.
one more argument in favor of the hardware one - if one of the screws dies, then on the hardware one, as a rule, it is quietly knocked out of the array. with software, options are possible - I had cases when one screw with burnt electronics introduced the core into such thoughtfulness that I had to put out the machine. those. with hot-swapping on the hardware, everything is much better (if the controller supports and there are baskets)

Answer 5

Normal raid controllers start at $10,000. rub, everything before that is semi-software imperfections, which once every couple of months will give you an array. The controllers built into the motherboard are the same, no reliability. So think seriously, if you only need speed at the expense of reliability, then you can build on the built-in controller, if you also need reliability, think about whether the gain in speed is worth 10-20 thousand. rubles per controller in your case? After all, you can take high-speed HDDs like Raptor and normal SSDs for this amount.

Answer 6

Of course, hardware. Hardware is always better in performance/reliability than software.

Answer 7

Gentlemen, is it still the best solution 100% to buy a separate (not sewn into the motherboard) RAID'a?
Are you 100% interested?

Answer 8

The motherboard is not a hardware raid, but a fake.
Hardware raids make sense for offload mathematics - RAID5, RAID6. Mirrors and strips are best done soft.

Answer 9

If the motherboard has a real RAID, hardware is better.
If the motherboard is semi-software-semi-hardware (fake RAID) - it depends on the drivers: theoretically, the software should work more slowly than fake, and the software is more stable.

Answer 10

In any case, use the hardware !
A year ago, we had a software server on one production server, and our system administrator had a lot of “fun” with him until they installed a scarf for the possibility of a hardware one)

Answer 11

Hardware raids are for a very, very, very narrow niche, to be honest, I can hardly imagine for which one.
A software raid is, firstly, easier, and secondly, it is safer. if something dies in you, then you calmly restore it, and if your raid controller dies, then there will be problems.
Thirdly, normal raid controllers are quite expensive. And the difference in speed will be noticeable only if you have some kind of Celeron-800 as a server.
And yes, in no case do not use fake-raid. these wonderful devices have absorbed all the shortcomings of both solutions ...

Answer 12

NVidia's raid is quite good, but in your situation (fbsd) it will probably be easier to make a software one.
The only advantage of a “hardware” raid over a software one is the ability to boot in case of loss of any hard from the array. On a software raid, for this, at least you will need to manually install the bootloader on the second disk, otherwise you may find yourself in a stupid situation - everything is intact, both the OS and data, but you cannot boot.

Answer 13

The raid built into the motherboard in non-top models usually represents software squalor. Well, as a rule, I do not know what is there on your asus.
Based on my experience, I will say that the gmirror software raid in Fra is a little inferior to some hardware ones. Unless it has a battery and a separate processor and memory.
However, in these raids that go on board, often there is also neither a battery (any way), nor a processor or memory.
And here the question arises. Will the FreeBSD drivers grab it correctly? And if so, will it be possible to see individual disks behind this raid? How to monitor the status of a hardware raid?
These are all the questions that do not arise when using gmirror.
I am for gmirror.

Answer 14

The raid built into the motherboard is USUALLY just a microprocessor for processing some specific operations (XOR and other checksum checks)
.
For myself, I chose a software raid. In terms of speed, it is not much slower than not only the motherboard, but also the true-hardware one (especially if there are few screws).
And I'm calm.
Not so long ago, a friend of half a peter traveled around in search of “just such a” controller, which he burned down.
Although this is all garbage, if you set a goal, you need to take a separate data storage system, which will figure it out on its own, and with a guarantee

Answer 15

I have experience of using gmirror for about 4 years and md for about 3.
I also used hardware raid on one file storage.
The main advantage of software raids is that you don’t have to think about what will happen if the controller dies. In terms of speed, as mentioned above, the difference is not particularly noticeable.
The very operation of software raids is very simple and does not require personal care.
In general, I am for a software raid.

Answer 16

Program.
1) it’s not a fact that the frya will see your disks separately with the hardware one - you won’t see when one of the disks
dies 2) the mother dies - you have to look for exactly the same.
Between a separate board and software, the choice is still in the direction of the board, for which there is a second replacement.

Answer 17

in your case it is definitely worth using a software raid. although I don’t see anything wrong with using a fake-raid from the mother for the mirror - no matter what happens to the mother, the infa on the screws will still be available without a raid. but there is no point in fake-raiding, this will complicate the work of the OS with screws, and the percentage will load like a software raid