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1. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
JSS1138 Dec 4, 2012 9:03 AM (in response to tikigod19)Here's what I'd do.
C: SSD
D: Projects (WD)
E: Scratch (media cache) (WD)
F: Media (Baracuda)
G: Exports (WD)
I: Images (from Encore) and Backup (WD)
This spreads the load out pretty nicely, so that you're never reading and writing on the same drive at the same time. If you need more space and/or speed for media, I'd recommend a RAID 3 controller card and adding more hard dives, don't take drives out of the arrangement above for that.
Use another computer for personal things, not your edit rig.
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2. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 4, 2012 9:26 AM (in response to JSS1138)would you not use raid anywhere for speed?
I'm not sure what it meant by projects.. would I need a whole 1TB for thsi? Similarly, Exports... I turn about 150gb of footage into an 11gb exports folder but I don't keep them on the local machine so not sure if 1TB wouldnt be overkill for this..
I do however need more than just the 1TB for Media, but I like the idea of using the baracuda for this. I suppose I could always keep the footage elsewhere and copy it to the baracuda before I start a week long edit.
I basically already have an external backup system that I like for backup, images, exports so would like to use as much of the internal space for media as possible as I currently have about 3TB of media on my PC, that's why I thought spreading this accross 4 drives instead of my current 3 would lighten the load and speed things up.
I do agree with the personal stuff.. to be honest it's mainly just music that I use for video that I was talking about. Pictures and movies are all kept on a laptop but if I had the space on the PC I'd probably use it just as a backup of all of these things.. wouldnt need much more than 30GB for this.
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3. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
Harm Millaard Dec 5, 2012 1:47 AM (in response to tikigod19)For speed I would use raid in the following configuration:
C: SSD for OS & programs
D: 2 x WD Raid0 for media and projects
E: 2 x WD Raid0 for media cache & previews
F: Velociraptor for documents, miscellaneous and exports.
Jim is not very fond of raid0, well neither am I, but sometimes you have only limited choices with the number of disks available and the lack of a dedicated raid controller to configure a parity raid. And with your backup schedule, mainly for your D; drive in this setup, you have covered the risks of data loss on the striped arrays.
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4. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 5, 2012 2:14 AM (in response to Harm Millaard)thanks Harm, looks more like what I'm after. Although I'm starting to realise if I have 2x 3TB USB drives backing up future editing projects that might not get touched for 3 months, it's possibly a waste having them on the PC as well. I was going to suggest getting another 2x1TB drives as I think I have 2 ports free, however with what I've just said in mind maybe this would be overkill. If I just copy a few weddings at a time to the D drive in your suggested set up, then I'll still have huge amounts of space free. Maybe buy another USB3 drive to have a triple backup.. can never be too backed up! (other than in the toilet department)
In your suggested set up would the D and E show as 2x 1TB each or 1x 2TB each?
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5. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
Harm Millaard Dec 5, 2012 5:01 AM (in response to tikigod19) -
6. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 5, 2012 5:04 AM (in response to Harm Millaard)ok Harm, no need to show off
Ok then so if I were to grab an extra 2 identical discs I could have a 4TB D drive for media and projects, leaving a 2TB theoretical drive for cache & previews? Is this advisable? Is it doable? Does it all come down to how much space I need..
I suppose if I do that then there is a larger chance of losing everything if one of the 4 discs fails, compared to 1 of 2 discs failing.
I was previously advised RAID10 but still don't know the difference between that and RAID0.. and yes, I've read the link you're about to post Harm.. I think I'm just simple?
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7. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
Harm Millaard Dec 5, 2012 5:23 AM (in response to tikigod19)Not at all. Raiding is not a simple thing to understand and almost all of us come from a simple home PC and have never worked with raids. I have tried to explain the various raid levels in this article:
RAID10
The RAID level for paranoids in a hurry. It delivers the same redundancy as RAID 1, but since it is a multilevel RAID, combined with a RAID0, delivers twice the performance of a single disk at four times the cost, apart from the controller. The main advantage is that you can have two disk failures at the same time without losing data, but what are the chances of that happening?
http://forums.adobe.com/message/2445490#2445490
The major drawback of a raid10 is the cost. Each 4 disks give you the capacity and speed of 2 disks in raid0. If you are willing to spend the money, I would use the D: drive to create a raid10, since that is the volume most critical to data loss, drive E: can be recreated as needed by PR. But be aware that you may run out of connections on the same controller. For a raid10 you need 4 identical connections on the same controller. You can't mix Intel and Marvell based connections.
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8. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 5, 2012 5:37 AM (in response to Harm Millaard)ok.. i think I'm getting it. So RAID10 is basically the same as RAID0 speed wise, but it has the redundancy of the set of mirrored discs hidden away in the background. If therefore the ONLY advantage of 10 over 0 is to get tha extra backup should something fail then I think I'm ok with RAID0 and I'll buy another USB external. I'd benefit from using the 2 remaining motherboard slots/case space to turn my D drive from a 4TB RAID0 drive to a 6TB RAID0 drive. Am I along the right lines with that? Appreciate your help as ever.
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9. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
Harm Millaard Dec 5, 2012 8:07 AM (in response to tikigod19)Raid10 only buys you extra redundancy over raid0, not speed.
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10. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 5, 2012 8:11 AM (in response to Harm Millaard)exactly what I wanted to know.. thanks.
One final question, is there any disadvantage of going for 6 discs on the D drive instead of 4? Is it likely to slow down with more discs? I like the idea of seeing one 6TB drive for my media files.
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11. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
RjL190365 Dec 5, 2012 8:43 AM (in response to tikigod19)Actually, a mirrored RAID is not for backups, but for extended uptime. A mirrored RAID will allow you to continue working on the PC if one of the disks suffers a catastropic failure. In a RAID "10" (actually, it should be labeled RAID 01) setup, if one or both of the disks in one RAID 0 pair fails, the other RAID 0 pair (if both of the disks in that array are still good) will remain functional.
On the other hand, the only potential disadvantage of going with a six-disk RAID 01, besides cost, would be (as Harm stated) the lack of sufficient SATA ports. In fact, you will definitely need a discrete hardware RAID card for this since you will need one of the Intel ports for an internal optical drive (if you have one), leaving you with only five available Intel-controlled SATA ports. Moreover, Marvell SATA controllers do not support the ATAPI protocol that's required of optical drives, rendering them suitable only for hard drives. And you cannot create a RAID at all (outside of the sluggish-performing Microsoft Windows OS-provided software RAID) across different companies' controllers.
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12. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
JSS1138 Dec 5, 2012 11:08 AM (in response to tikigod19)I'm not sure what it meant by projects.. would I need a whole 1TB for this?
That means Project files from PP, After Effects, Encore, etc. It also includes any images or audio to be included in the project. How much of that 1TB you fill will depend on how many projects you have going at the same time, how many images and audio files you have, etc.
would you not use raid anywhere for speed?
Depends on the media. For compressed camera media, a single modern drive is more than fast enough for even multiple streams. For the big league stuff - RED, Arri, BlackMagic Cinema camera, etc, - that's when I'd recommend the RAID 3 controller card. This also comes into play if you need more than 1TB for media. Don't take the other drives off that config to add to a RAID, get additional drives.
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13. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 5, 2012 12:26 PM (in response to RjL190365)thanks very much RjL190365, you are very knowledgable on RAID!
The motherboard I'll be using is Gigabyte GA-X79-UD5 as recommended by Alan Craven on my old thread which dried up because it:
"has 2 Intel 6Gbs ports, plus 4 Intel 3 Gbs ports, which can be "RAIDed". It also has 2 pairs of 6GBs Marvell ports which can be RAID0 or 1. A third Marvell port offers 2 eSATA ports on the rear panel. This allows you 10 internal drives, if you want 12, then a cheap 2 SATA port card can be added to a PCIe slot."
Now my full list of drives will be:
1x SSD (6gbps port), 1x Baracuda (6gbps port), 4x 1TB drives (the Intel 3gbps ports).
This leaves me with a couple of DVD drives that I'd like to connect... do these use SATA ports? If so will the Marvell ports be suitable?
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14. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
RjL190365 Dec 5, 2012 1:52 PM (in response to tikigod19)tikigod19 wrote:
This leaves me with a couple of DVD drives that I'd like to connect... do these use SATA ports? If so will the Marvell ports be suitable?
How old are your internal DVD drives? If they are more than about four or five years old, more often than not they use PATA ports. If so, then you will have to buy new DVD drives because new motherboards have no PATA ports at all.
As for Marvell, read what I stated in my previous post. DVD drives require ATAPI support in the SATA or PATA controller in order for them to work at all. On your motherboard, only the Intel SATA ports support ATAPI at all. The Marvell ports do not.
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15. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 5, 2012 2:01 PM (in response to RjL190365)They're quite new drives. Ok so if I want 4 hdd's on the 3gbps Intel ports then I can't connect my DVD drives without a sata pci card?
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16. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
RjL190365 Dec 5, 2012 2:12 PM (in response to tikigod19)In this case, you're stuck with the two SATA 6.0 Gbps ports for the DVD drives unless you want to use them externally using an external 5.25" drive enclosure and a USB 2.0 or better connection. And not all SATA PCI or PCI-e cards support ATAPI.
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17. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 5, 2012 2:22 PM (in response to RjL190365)So as I'm not using raid on my c drive, which is the 6gbps solid state drive or the 10-000 rpm drive can I use those two on the marvel Ports, leaving the 2 Intel 6gbps Ports for the DVD drives?
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18. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 6, 2012 1:23 PM (in response to tikigod19)would love to get your thoughts on post 17 RjL190365 as I'm just holding off on the purchase until I can clarify I'll have enough ports for my DVD drives too. If this whole thing is made easier by getting an external raid controller then I'm more than happy to look at that as an option, although I don't have a clue what they cost or which I'd need..
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19. Re: 1x SSD and 5x non SSD drives - where to put media cache?
tikigod19 Dec 22, 2012 1:45 PM (in response to tikigod19)well everyone, as you can read from my post here, I think I'm going to have to abandon the whole RAID idea after 2 days of trying to get it all sorted. This is exactly what happened when I attempted RAID last time I built a PC. Not remotely straightforward and certainly not doing what the motherboard manual says it should be doing.
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/294955-14-blue-screen-selecting-raid-intel-mode




