I RULEZ

BonlainyT · Member Joined: 08 Jan 2003 Posts: 3942

Last Saturday I built a new machine for myself.....

P4 3.0Ghz processor
1 GB PC3200 RAM
nvidia 5900 card
120 GB HD (and soon I will put a 2nd 120 in and RAID 0 it)
DVD/CD R/RW combo
19" LCD monitor
WIN XP PRO

So far it is SWEET!!! I love building computers, such fun.
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Xecutioner Smith(retired) Dread Lord of Walkers
Bonlainy Trueheart(retired) Lord Protector of Walkers

tenri · Member Joined: 15 Sep 2003 Posts: 939 Location: Chicago IL

Sweet machine bon do i dare ask how much it cost to put to gether
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Tenri Death

Ya Ya i know shut up skinny necro boy Twisted Evil

Gryfndor · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 4:55 pm Post subject:

Near identical to mine Bon. I really think the RAID makes a big difference I highly recomend it. Very Happy

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Gryfndor 65 Wizard
Epiphone 65 Necromancer
Niche 57 Enchanter
Farzy 51 rogue
Nasgul 29 Shadownight

BonlainyT · Member Joined: 08 Jan 2003 Posts: 3942

About $1300 total, not counting software.
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Xecutioner Smith(retired) Dread Lord of Walkers
Bonlainy Trueheart(retired) Lord Protector of Walkers

tenri · Member Joined: 15 Sep 2003 Posts: 939 Location: Chicago IL

Nice price did some shopping i see Very Happy

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Tenri Death

Ya Ya i know shut up skinny necro boy Twisted Evil

Kanwer · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 6:59 pm Post subject:

RAID?!?!?
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"I might be a little bit loco, but it keeps me from losing my mind."

Kanwer Howlingwolf-Storm Warden-Retired

Sensei Boytoi-Retired

Mystyx Dreamz-51st Season Shadow Knight-Retired

tenri · Member Joined: 15 Sep 2003 Posts: 939 Location: Chicago IL

for lack of my own words i will cut and past some

Short for Redundant Array of Independent (or Inexpensive) Disks, a category of disk drives that employ two or more drives in combination for fault tolerance and performance. RAID disk drives are used frequently on servers but aren't generally necessary for personal computers.
Level 0: Provides data striping (spreading out blocks of each file across multiple disks) but no redundancy. This improves performance but does not deliver fault tolerance.

Level 1: Provides disk mirroring.
Level 3: Same as Level 0, but also reserves one dedicated disk for error correction data. It provides good performance and some level of fault tolerance.
Level 5: Provides data striping at the byte level and also stripe error correction information. This results in excellent performance and good fault tolerance.

maybe shiloch can do a better wording Confused

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Tenri Death

Ya Ya i know shut up skinny necro boy Twisted Evil

Shiloch Veneficus · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 7:36 pm Post subject:

Basically, RAID is just a simple way of using multiple disks together for speed and/or fault tolerance.

Personally, I think striping is a waste of time if you're not at least using 3 disks. The OS has to do quite a bit of overhead, and to effectively see the speed difference, you need three disks spinning instead of two.

Striping works like this:
HD1 ----------------------------------------
. . . v
HD2 ----------------------------------------

When you download s 20-meg file, it will "stripe" the file across multiple disks. So file X would end up looking like this:

HD1 XXXX---------------------------------
. . . .vvv
HD2 XXX----------------------------------

Then it will pick up where it left off and add file A across the disk, back and forth:

HD1 XXXXAAAA---------------------------
. . . . vvv vvvv
HD2 XXXAAAA----------------------------

The bad thing about disk striping is that if one of your disks goes bad, you're fucked. HD1 really only has half of the data, and it is unusable to you at best without HD2's counterparting data. Striping is, however, an extroadinarily fast way to use multiple disks together for speed. When you're able to write a file to your disk and three of them are writing rather than one, you end up with greater speed. The only real reason to use this method is for hardcore gaming where a LOT of loading takes place. EQ is one of these games, but frankly, disk striping is costly. Most of the EQ nerds are interested in two-boxing and need the second disk for their second machine. Razz

Disk mirroring is a hardcore fault-tolerance method. All it does is basically make the exact same writes to one disk as you do to the other. You end up with two EXACT copies of the same thing. If you have HD1 mirrored to HD2, and HD1 goes bad, you could physically take HD1 out, place HD2 in its place and keep going. This is beautiful for making a very fast recovery from a hard disk failure.

There are two bad things about disk mirroring:
1. Unless you're using a late-model version of hardware mirroring (where the SCSI/EIDE bus handles it at the system level -- where the mirror is invisible to the OS), disk mirroring is slow. Your system has to write two copies of everything you do. This carries over for downloading, copying, formatting, and deleting.
2. You're basically using up the life on two pieces of hardware for 1 set of data. In all cases where I've used disk mirroring, I've usually had one or the other disk fail, and the mirror saved me. However, this means you'd better buy two new disks because chances are the mirrored disk you're now using as a primary is just around the corner from dying. Its had the same number of spin hours on it as the first, so you'd better be ready to replace it as well.

Hard disks WILL eventually fail. They have recommended spin hours just like cars have miles. Once you get enough spin hours on there, it will just crap out. You can COUNT ON IT.

The different types of RAID are just different methods of combining the above. You use RAID when you're looking to achieve greater hard drive speed or live fault tolerance. The only real implementations of RAID for single-user PCs are people who do video editing, graphic art, or gaming.

RAID is mostly for the server environment. Large number of users, hefty amount of data, little tolerance for extended downtime.

Elnrik Talshiar · Member Joined: 23 Jul 2003 Posts: 820 Location: Denver, CO

You play EQ and you don't know what a raid is? Twisted Evil

jk jk...
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(AKA - Brent)

BonlainyT · Member Joined: 08 Jan 2003 Posts: 3942

Actually I think Kan was making a joke, based on the old commercials for bug spray. You have to be old like Kan and me to know about those, but DAMN they were funny.
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Xecutioner Smith(retired) Dread Lord of Walkers
Bonlainy Trueheart(retired) Lord Protector of Walkers

Shiloch Veneficus · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 9:38 pm Post subject:

I remember the SC Johnson Wax commercials. Razz

Brakiss · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 10:15 pm Post subject:

Raid and Black Flag, funny stuff in the day Laughing

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Adalric Brandl - Gimp of Innoruuk

Jenny · Member Joined: 23 Mar 2004 Posts: 2916

I think I smell something wierd. I'm glad you find this amusing.
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"Enough about me, let's talk about my dress."

Elnrik Talshiar · Member Joined: 23 Jul 2003 Posts: 820 Location: Denver, CO

Jenny?
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(AKA - Brent)

Jenny · Member Joined: 23 Mar 2004 Posts: 2916

""? Me, Elnrik Talshiar ?
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"Enough about me, let's talk about my dress."