mikamav Posted June 9, 2007 Share Posted June 9, 2007 I put up a new post with these questions at the AVS Forum where I post often, but later realized I might get more info in the unRAID thread there and here. Sorry if you are seeing this more than one time. Please let me know what you think. 'm rebuilding my HTPC this weekend and also for the first time, trying out a NAS. Initially this will be in the form of Lime's unRAID, but if that doesn't work as expected I'm not opposed to a hardware RAID card. Anyway, I have a nice case for lots of hard drives for the NAS, but I have many older PATA drives (250's, 300s, one 500GB.) I ordered two SATA 500GB drives for the HTPC internal storage, thinking I'd maybe use them with my sole 500GB drive as a third to make a 1TB RAID-5. However, the drive I own is PATA, so it was suggested to use a PATA to SATA adapter and this should work w/ RAID. So here's the main thing I'm wondering- am I better off using the two SATA 500GB drives I ordered to make the NAS larger and faster instead of in the HTPC? Maybe convince myself to buy two more to make a true SATA array, 1.5TB or so, and use it for everything until I need to expand? With the unRAID I can grow the array in the future. I had originally planned to make the faster on-board SATA storage directly in the HTPC for live recordings, HD and SD, from my tuners, and then the slower PATA or mixed drives unRAID NAS for DVD rips and other archived storage. However, maybe I can record across the network to the unRAID NAS, especially if it is larger and all SATA? My HTPC mobo, ASUS P5B DELUXE P965 775, can support RAID 5. So I thought to use three 500GB drives, one converted from IDE to look SATA to the controller. Hopefully that would work, but am I better off just storing everything on one large unRAID NAS? Are they fast enough (all gig-E network here) to record HDTV and stream other HD or a DVD rip at the same time? The thought of not having to transfer those shows I decide to keep long term to separate storage is appealing. However I'm not sure about the performance hit. I have read the unRAID monster thread, but I'm still not clear what the consensus is regarding real-world use limitations. Also, how would any of this differ if the unRAID was PATA or mixed? I'd love to have just one huge array, using like four 500GB SATA drives on the NAS motherboard (GIGABYTE GA-945GZM-S2 945G 775) , and then maybe four of my left over PATA drives (two 300's and two 250's, say) attached to Promise ULTRA133TX2 PATA hard drive cards. Is the parity drive's speed separate from the others in an unRAID? In other words, if I have to mix drive types, am I better off sticking to almost all SATA and then using one PATA for parity- would that help speed over a true mix and match? I could use my 500GB PATA for parity on four 500GB SATAs- that might work.... Sorry for the rambling. If people feel this is better as a reply to the unRAID thread then it should be moved, but I thought this was beyond just the scope of unRAID as I'm considering using the ASUS SATA-RAID. By the way, I read that Vista does not support RAID 5 without a hack? I assume this is software RAID, and since I'm taking about using the ASUS mobo RAID controller that does not apply? Sorry for so many questions. Any help appreciated. Link to comment
mikamav Posted June 9, 2007 Author Share Posted June 9, 2007 Thanks. So are you suggesting that the slower write speeds of the unRAID might be too slow to record multiple TV shiows (some HDTV, some std def) at once? I want to have at least 750MB to 1TB (formatted) with some protection for the recordings. Hence my original thought of three 500GB drives in RAID 5 (a little less then 1TB formatted.) However if the unRAID is fast enough to keep up, I'd prefer to have a 2TB single NAS unRAID for archiving AND recording. So I"m not sure which way to go. Link to comment
Billped Posted June 9, 2007 Share Posted June 9, 2007 no. But that will ensure that you dont need to open the HTPC for a while, limiting your time spent on hardware fiddling. The only thing you need is to add drives to the unraid as needed. The drive in the HTPC will give you something to compare with. Assuming you have giga ethernet between the machines with a decent switch, I dont think speed will be an issue. Cant remember the bandwith requirement of HDTV, but as it can be broadcasted with DVB-T it is hardly larger than G-ethernet. But try it out, and let us know how it goes. /Rene IIRC, OTA or Blu-Ray HDTV needs something like 20Mbit/sec. Bill Link to comment
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