SATA Raid Controller Card ?

[DeadPenguin]

I am in the process of putting together an AMD 64 box.

Here is the hardware I have so far:

AMD64 3000+ 939
MSI K8N NEO2 Platinum
1gig (2x512) Kingston 3200 DDR400
(2) WD 250 gig SATA drives
eVGA e-GeFORCE 6800 (not ultra)
Nec ND3500a (DL DVD)
Floppy.
Antec server case w/ Antec 400W PS
(Generic mouse, keyboard, monitor (Dell 17" CRT))

My friend just downloaded and burned a copy of FC3 64 for me to DVD.

Here is my question.

I believe I am ready to install now, but I think I am going to go with a SATA raid contoller card vs. on mobo sata. Everything I read said most mobo sata contollers are junk, and it's just another way for mobo makers to add percieved value. Is there a worthwhile difference between card vs. mobo sata controller?
I heard onboard sata uses computers cpu. Controller cards have chips that handle these processes. So, is it worth it to pay $142 for a escalade 8006-2kp pci -> SATA controller card, or just go with the one I already have?

My next question:

I did not include a sound card in my original plans, but after reading many threads on onboard sound I am reconsidering. I have also had problems in SUSE 9 in the past with onboard sound. It hummed all the time.
I am looing at a Creative Labs Audigy 2 ZS Platinum. Again, is it worth it to throw down $150, or use what I already have?

I have my box pretty much put together, and don't want to rush through the last part(install). I have basically exhausted my funds for this project. So I have a couple weeks to decide this. Time to hit up Ebay.(out of beer money and lunch money.)

I just want to get this right. I have used linux for a year or 2, but never have strayed far away from M$. This computer is my attempt to break my M$ habit.

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks,
Blair

[macemoneta]

Whether you use an onboard RAID or PCI RAID controller makes little difference. In most cases, you actually want to use software RAID.

RAID0 (stripe) and RAID1 (mirror) have almost no CPU impact; disk I/Os are simply distributed to the two drives. RAID5 has a small CPU impact because the xor values have to be determined for each write.

The problem is that most RAID cards have very small CPUs on them. Performing the xor operations can actually bottleneck at the card (unless you paid a lot for the card - usually more than most people pay for their PCs). As a result, using the main CPU (your AMD64) with software RAID provides much improved I/O. In fact, many of the low-end (motherboard, PCI card) RAID controllers are actually doing this in the driver which runs on your main CPU - so the "hardware" RAID is really just non-standard software RAID.

Software RAID has many advantages over "hardware" RAID. The drives can be moved from machine to machine, even if the controllers are different. This is especially handy with external drives (Firewire, USB, external SATA), but also important when your controller dies and you find out that the manufacturer no longer makes that specific model. You have better control and monitoring capability over the array during system operation (using the mdadm command and the info in /proc/mdstat). The system can better schedule both normal I/O and rebuild operations, because it has a view into what is currently happening on the system.

In short, save your money and use software RAID. :)

[jpmills]

I setup an A64 3200+ on an Asus A8V Deluxe with single SATA drive (VIA Chipset), You might have problem with onboard raid, just a fact. The onboard raid is usually more software than hardware raid. You could try raid with the onboard setup but you will probably need to go to a PCI card.

[jpmills]

http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjgxLDQ= Look part of the way down the page for CPU Utilization.

You will lose between 20-25% of your CPU to handle to raid array

[DeadPenguin]

Thanks macemoneta and jpmills.

Just reading my post and realized I forgot an important bit. I want to use Raid 0.
Using sata on mobo in Raid 0 will I see 2 250gig drives or 1 500 gig drive?
(leaning towards sata on mobo now.) :)

Is there a good tutorial here or anywhere for installing FC3 64 on SATA drives in raid 0 config?

With the sound card. I could always just add it later? correct?
and, bear with onboard sound until I get the cash to add sound card.

I am also looking for a good tutorial/how-to on nvidia egeforce 6800 card.
Looking for what I have to do to get it set up and running.

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks.

Regards,
Blair

[macemoneta]

If you use software RAID0, you will see two hard drives. You will configure the RAID during the installation process. If you are using a controller, you will configure the RAID in the controller BIOS, and Linux will see a single 500GB drive. A good document to keep handy is the Software RAID HowTo (http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Software-RAID-HOWTO.html). Keep in mind that all necessary tools will be installed as part of the Fedora installation.

You can certainly use the MB sound card, and install another if needed. Make sure to play with the alsamixer after boot; many people think their MB sound is poor, when actually some features are disabled by default (3D, Bass/Treble boost, etc.). Take some time to play with the controls (avoid overdriving the PCM channel, to avoid distortion).

When you install the nVidia driver, if you have a problem, take a look at this post at the nVidia forum (http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=473554&postcount=1).

[DeadPenguin]

You have been a great help.
I will try the mobo sata, and ob sound.

Some of the info for the software raid how to went over my head.

I have done a bunch of linux installs on various machines. This is just the first sata/raid install.

Looking for an a->z tutorial like ->http://shilo.is-a-geek.com/slack/intro0.html
I used shilo for most of my slack 10 installs.

I have seen some very promising threads in here, but they all seem to trail off at the part I need.

Thanks,
Blair

[macemoneta]

Unfortunately, I don't have a machine handy to create a step-by-step for the RAID install. Perhaps someone else could provide that for you.

Alternatively, you can simply boot the install disk, and read the online help in the manual partitioning section of the procedure, and experiment with various configurations. That way you will become familiar with the process. At that point in the install, you can always hit the back button to undo your configuration and start over until you are satisfied. :)

[DeadPenguin]

I got computer together, and setup.
I started the install.
At boot prompt I hit enter, and it went to installing.
First error I got was can't find hard drives.
It had me check for drivers.
It showed forcedeth, gig net, ans sata_nv.
I checked done.
From there the normal anaconda x screen opens and you choose lang. etc.
I get to choose install --workstation--server.
I try to manually partition disks after that , and install crashes asking for reboot.

I am stuck here.

Thanks for your help.

Blair

[macemoneta]

I believe for that motherboard you need to select sata_nv (nVidia SATA).

[DeadPenguin]

I believe for that motherboard you need to select sata_nv (nVidia SATA).
Install loads it after boot prompt.
It shows me the devices I have and driver.
Anaconda starts, and crashes when I try to partition with disk druid.

Regards,
Blair

[macemoneta]

When you boot the install disk, at the boot prompt enter:

linux noapic nolapic

That appears to have worked for another person with the same motherboard with a SATA install of FC3.

[cybrjackle]

This will show you how to get "grub" to let you use /boot in a raid, your box wont initally boot :D

http://www.fedoraforum.org/forum/showthread.php?p=159030

worked for me and I even shutdown and pulled a drive, booted up, shutdown, pulled the other and plugged the other one in and it still boots on each drive :D


$ cat /proc/mdstat
Personalities : [raid1]
md1 : active raid1 sda2[0]
156135616 blocks [2/1] [U_]

md0 : active raid1 sdb1[1] sda1[0]
152512 blocks [2/2] [UU]

[cybrjackle]

When you boot the install disk, at the boot prompt enter:

linux noapic nolapic

That appears to have worked for another person with the same motherboard with a SATA install of FC3.

I can confirm that, same mobo and that is what I do! :rolleyes:

[DeadPenguin]

Thanks macemoneta and cybrjackle.

I will try it out tonight.

Thanks again,
Blair

[v_lestat]

FC 3 64bit will not see the nv sata raid nope nope.

you need to make the drives SATA only not SATA RAID in your bios. then if you still want raid create a software raid with disk druid during setup. it will then work 100%

you may or maynot need to do that noapic nolapic i cant confirm that i havent needed to, but i do know if you try to install it on a raid set hat you created with the nvidia raid bios utility hen it wont work. it will only see 2 drives, and when you try to install it will either not work and crash or it will run then when you reboot you wont have any linux, since the drives are actually raid, and linux installed it on one drive instead of spreading it across 2 drives.

just a heads up.

[DeadPenguin]

I am still stuck.
I am missing something.
I have been through the bios at least twenty times.
I enabled SATA1 and SATA2.
I enabled/disabled raid on sata1&2.

I loaded "linux noapic nolapic" @ boot prompt.
ocpi1394 driver loads.
sata_nv driver loads.

skipped media check.
I got error message. Can't find hard drives do you want. load drivers.
did first couple steps in anaconda.
Got to disk druid. It still doesn't see sata disks...crashes.

What am I missing?

Best Regards,
Blair

[v_lestat]

SATA 1 and 2 are the ports at the bottom of your motherboard. SATA 3 and 4 are the ones closest to the cpu. (as far as i can remember maybe its the other way around)
so go into your bios and enable SATA 3 and 4.

just look at the mobo which ports do you have the sata drives plugged into ?

[DeadPenguin]

SATA 1 and 2 are the ports at the bottom of your motherboard. SATA 3 and 4 are the ones closest to the cpu. (as far as i can remember maybe its the other way around)
so go into your bios and enable SATA 3 and 4.

just look at the mobo which ports do you have the sata drives plugged into ?

I checked the mobo when I was installing the drives. I made sure I used SATA1-2.
:confused:

[v_lestat]

I checked the mobo when I was installing the drives. I made sure I used SATA1-2.
:confused:


ok well then switch the drives over to 3 and 4 and enable 3 and 4 in the bios.

and remember dont enable raid only sata.

what types of drives did you have ?

another option is that you can download a partitioning program that runs from dos or look for Bart's Boot CD 5 or 6 also known as Hiren's Boot cd. there are some of the best dos based partitioning programs in there. a couple of them do support ext3 and swap.

go in create your partitioning like you want, that way when linux boots up it actually see's a drive with partitions.

one thing ive noticed about the stupid worthless nvidia sata is that unless the drives are partitioned they are not even seen. this happened to me with windows XP and took me an entire day of fooking around trying to get it to work before i realised that maybe i should just go ahead and partition and format the drives with another program ( hiren's boot cd) then go into XP setup.
The minute i did that, BAM! xp saw the drives and worked like a charm.

ever since then i quit using the stupid nvidia sata controller. its just total junk.

go to ebay and buy a cheap sata controller card. preferably a promise TX2 or silicon image one. they can be had for anywhere from $20-$50 the sil controller card can be had for around 20.
linux should have no issues see'ing the drives. but still it wont work for sata raid as far as i know.

[DeadPenguin]

ok well then switch the drives over to 3 and 4 and enable 3 and 4 in the bios.

and remember dont enable raid only sata.
Ok. I have had it both ways in bios just to check. I will make sure IDE RAID disabled.


what types of drives did you have ?
Western Digital wd2500jd 250gig SATA (2)
I would like to use raid 0 (striping)


another option is that you can download a partitioning program that runs from dos or look for Bart's Boot CD 5 or 6 also known as Hiren's Boot cd. there are some of the best dos based partitioning programs in there. a couple of them do support ext3 and swap.

I will save this for a last resort.


ever since then i quit using the stupid nvidia sata controller. its just total junk.

I am not sure if they are junk or not. All I know is I can't get FC3 to see my sata drives.


go to ebay and buy a cheap sata controller card. preferably a promise TX2 or silicon image one. they can be had for anywhere from $20-$50 the sil controller card can be had for around 20.
linux should have no issues see'ing the drives. but still it wont work for sata raid as far as i know.
I just lost an auction for a 3ware escalade 8006 tonight by a $1.01. :mad: (crappy sniping software.)
Probably going to get the 8006 from newegg if I can't figure this out by the end of next week. Just don't want to spend the $'s. Seems a waste if board already has the capability.
I saw a Promise S150 TX2 plus on EBAY that looked like would work.

Forgot to say "Thanks"

Thank you.
Blair

[cybrjackle]

I am looking at my MSI K8N NEO2 Platinum BIOS right now and I will tell you what I have selected.


Standard CMOS Features
IDE Third Master {my sata drive]
IDE Fourth Master {my sata drive}



Integrated Peripherals
[i]Onboard Device[/b]
RAID config >> Everything is DISABLED
SATA1/SATA2 >> Enabled
SATA3/SATA4 >> Enabled

[v_lestat]

IDE Third Master {my sata drive]
IDE Fourth Master {my sata drive}

no your SATA drive is not IDE 3rd and 4th master its SATA 3/4

IDE is IDE like your cdrom or an IDE hard drive. UNLESS MSI foolishly calls them IDE

I have a brand new MSI NEO Platinum - the Socket 754 not 939 sitting right here still in the box, and i havent even opened it yet cuz this DFI has been working pretty good. but maybe today after work ill give it a try and see what happens. i just have all my water cooling stuff to move around and i dread messing around swapping mobo's with all my water stuff there.
My DFI also has the IDE Primary master/slave ide secondary master/slave then sata 1/2 sata 3/4
all of them can be made into raid.
just make sure IDE RAID is OFF and SATA RAID is OFF make sure the SATA is first hard drive in the hard drive list and also 1st boot device. now if msi is anything like the dfi setup it took me an entire day to get the nvidia controller set up and its because the way you have to set it in the bios is totally different from any other setup ive ever seen.


im telling you fellas even windows XP wouldnt see the hard drives unless i actually manually went and partitioned them with a different piece of software, once i did that,, bam there they were. no more problems. but i had SEVERE speed issues with the nvidia ports so i said screw it and went back to my promise TX2plus controller. the nvidia raid game me about 2/3 the performance as the promise controller. and to be honest, the best sata i have seen yet is the Silicon Image 3114 controller that is on my ASUS K8N-E Deluxe. really fast and everything see's it, including linux. the only Sil SATA cards i saw on ebay are the 3112 chipset which should work just as good.
Also maybe look for one of the highpoint controller, those are suppose to be good.

[DeadPenguin]

I don't think I set my sata's in Standard CMOS Features.

I will try that tonight when I get home.

Do I need to turn APIC off in BIOS? or just pass the "linux noapic nolapic" @ boot prompt? (or both)


I don't need to modprobe anything at the boot: prompt?

I see what looks like a firewire module load then sata_nv when I start install.

I am not on a network(not connected to the internet), but do i need to pass forcedeth now to get gig networking working for later?

I am sorry to be a pain. I just want to get this up and running.
I think I have read every MSI k8n,sata,raid,amd64 thread on this forum, and I can't find anything.

Thanks,
Blair

[v_lestat]

nah no need to turn APIC off but you can try, it wont hurt, APIC only tells windows and other operating systems that support APIC that it can use IRQ's higher than 17 or 15 one of those. anyways if you have it on and load windows then go into device manager you see you have IRQ's as high as 25 and higher depending on how much hardware you have. it wouldnt hurt to turn it off.

you have to set the sata in the mobo bios, and set them as only sata rememeber tell it all raid options are disabled.

[DeadPenguin]

v_lestat
I must of missed you last post while I was responding to cybrjackle.

ok.....
Cybrjackle has the same exact mobo I have. I will try any bios config he is kind enough to pass to me.
Because he has his working and I don't..........

Why would I want my hard drive as the first boot device?

I like Floppy-->cD/dvd-->HD.

Partitioning with outside software is my last resort.(ie. when everything else fails.)

A controller card is probably in the cards. Thank you for the brand suggestions.

Thanks for your help.

Blair.

[DeadPenguin]

nah no need to turn APIC off but you can try, it wont hurt, APIC only tells windows and other operating systems that support APIC that it can use IRQ's higher than 17 or 15 one of those. anyways if you have it on and load windows then go into device manager you see you have IRQ's as high as 25 and higher depending on how much hardware you have. it wouldnt hurt to turn it off.

you have to set the sata in the mobo bios, and set them as only sata rememeber tell it all raid options are disabled.
I will disable ide raid in bios.

Thanks,
Blair

[v_lestat]

penguin -

i mistyped what i meant to say about boot device

make the hard drive your installing linux to be the first hard drive. of course hd isnt your first boot device. floppy then cdrom then hd.

there is a section for setting which hard drive is first in the hard drive boot order just make that the first hard drive, or rather make the sata drives the first in the hard drive list.

really unless you have other drives you dont even need to mess with it.

one thing the nvidia controllers DONT like is if you have made a raid stripe with drives before and then you disable the raid and try to use them as single drives. not everyone has this issue but ive seen it plenty of times.

thats why i mentioned using a 3rd party app to totally reformat the drive or repartition the drive, if you delete the MBR and MFT or reformat the MFT this will erase any ghjosting records of a raid or other partitions, then partition the drive the way you want, even if its 1 big partition and format it any way you want, then just see if linux sees it. then tell linux to partition and format the drive the way you want.

[cybrjackle]

IDE Third Master {my sata drive]
IDE Fourth Master {my sata drive}

no your SATA drive is not IDE 3rd and 4th master its SATA 3/4

IDE is IDE like your cdrom or an IDE hard drive. UNLESS MSI foolishly calls them IDE

Thats amazing, I didn't know you were looking at my computer, glad you think you know what I have and what I don't :eek:

Anyway, that is how the MSI reads it, but I could see how you think you know what your talking about :p

[v_lestat]

wel considering i have had 3 msi boards in the last year 2 of which were pentium 4 and ALLLLLL msi bios's are the bloody same.

but hey you ask for help and im throwing you suggestions since you cant get it thru your rather thick skull that the nvidia sata is crap, fedora core 3 dont work with the nvidia sata unless you do some serious jacking around with scripting the drives and forcing fedora to see it.

well you go ahead and sit there and fight with the stupid nvidia **** controller.

or

spend a few bucks and buy a sata controller that is worth a crap and that fedora supports.

or

keep asking for help and not listening to what people are telling you.

sata is NOT IDE not in any bios i have ever seen and not in any of the other msi bios's i have ever seen. its calls SATA and only SATA if it is ide then maybe you should look at other bios's oh and btw look around there is a modded bios with a different SATA firmware that probably will work better.
or not,, keep pissing around with that stupid mobo and stupid fedora.. best off waiting for the next fedora core,, every 6 months or so,, its only another 3 months off.

[DeadPenguin]

I am in the bios now, and I only see IDE Primary MASTER/SLAVE & Secondary MASTER/SLAVE.
I am guessing these are done by auto detect.
My secondary master is my DVD.
Still won't see hd's.
I enables sata3&4. Disabled ide raid.

I will try again if this doesn't work. I will play with knoppix.
And, maybe see what Gentoo(cringe) sees.

Feeling like I bit off more than I can chew with these sata drives. I should have stuck with PATA and spared myself the pain.

Thanks for the help.
Anything else I should be doing considering?

Thanks,
Blair

[DeadPenguin]

I am running MEPIS(liveCD). It's the newest one I had. I tried QTparted, and it didn't see any drives.
I am going to check my cable connections tomorrow night, and maybe switch the cables.

blair

[cybrjackle]

wel considering i have had 3 msi boards in the last year 2 of which were pentium 4 and ALLLLLL msi bios's are the bloody same.

but hey you ask for help and im throwing you suggestions since you cant get it thru your rather thick skull that the nvidia sata is crap, fedora core 3 dont work with the nvidia sata unless you do some serious jacking around with scripting the drives and forcing fedora to see it.

well you go ahead and sit there and fight with the stupid nvidia **** controller.

or

spend a few bucks and buy a sata controller that is worth a crap and that fedora supports.

or

keep asking for help and not listening to what people are telling you.

sata is NOT IDE not in any bios i have ever seen and not in any of the other msi bios's i have ever seen. its calls SATA and only SATA if it is ide then maybe you should look at other bios's oh and btw look around there is a modded bios with a different SATA firmware that probably will work better.
or not,, keep pissing around with that stupid mobo and stupid fedora.. best off waiting for the next fedora core,, every 6 months or so,, its only another 3 months off.

:rolleyes: If that was to me, thats pretty funny. My BIOS for whatever reason in that exact area says IDE blah blah blah, I know what it is and I know its pointing to my SATA hard drives. I'm not an idiot, I have been working in hardware for a very very long time so I can tell you I know what "MY" hardware has. On another side note, nv_sata has worked great for me. (/me knocks on wood) I have had no problems what-so-ever with it. If somebody is new to this stuff and they can not figure it out, yes by all means by an extra card. Anyway, I wasn't asking for help so I doubt your angry blurt was directed to me. :D

Another thing you should look at DeadPenguin is your BIOS version/updates. One thing I have noticed with 64 is that BIOS updates are rather frequent compared to any thing else I have ever owned.


v_lestat, take a chill pill, if a thread puts you in such a mood to come off angry and pissy, don't reply and move on with your life.

[DeadPenguin]

Cyberjackle. Thanks for all the input.
It turns out I am a jackass.
I changed the sata cables from the ones that came with drive for the ones that came witht he msi board. And FC3 saw the drives.
I have to go find a good tutorial on setting up a partition for raid 0.
I'll worry about the 3d video later once everything is up and running.

Thanks everyone for your help.
sorry I didn't check the sata cables sooner.
Blair

[DeadPenguin]

Dam I missed v_lestats last post thanks for quoting it.

By the way I am looking at the bios it say IDE......=)
v_lestat your last post doesn't seem in line with the spirit of these forums. I never stuck a gun to your head for help. As I learn from my mistakes I will be better able to help the people that fall into the same pitfalls. Oh well. I am sure this is lost on you. thanks for the input anyway. Cybrjackle sorry fopr wasting your time.
I am happy it's working.
Blair.

[cybrjackle]

Its all good DeadPenguin, I'm glad you got it working.

Check out this thread for getting software raid and /boot

http://www.fedoraforum.org/forum/showthread.php?t=26912&highlight=raid+%2Fboot

[DeadPenguin]

Thanks.
I will try it tonight.

Blair