New too RAID - using 2 x 120Gb Samsung EVO

Important Drivers Specific: Intel AHCI/RAID Drivers
1

Hi,

Noob here - Ive always wanted to do a RAID setup, I decided to purchase 2 x 120Gb Samsung EVO SSD’s and I have put them in RAID 0 array using H77 chipset (Gigabyte H77M-D3H v1.0 F13a), I am running 12.9.0.1001 RST driver - I see there is a newer BETA driver (v13) and Ive heard of OROM’s and was wondering If anyone could advise what these OROMS are? Im guessing its a custom ROM for the RAID chip on the mobo? - is it worth me using these?

any advice to improve my RAID setup would be great.

edit: ive read that RST driver adds too windows boot time, how is this can I ask? - I have timed it compare to my single drive and boot performance is the same

my RAID stats on AS SSD are:

950-1025MB/s seq READ
740-820MB/s seq WRITE
125,000-140,000 IOPS
30MB/s 4k READ
50-60MB/s 4K WRITE

thanks

2

@ snadge:
Welcome at Win-RAID Forum!

Yes, the RAID OROM is a BIOS module and works like a Firmware for the on-board RAID Controller.

This question can not be answered generally, because each system reacts different.

Please read the start post of >this< thread.

Then you are a lucky RAID user, which is able to install the OS in UEFI mode. This way you can avoid the usual boot lag during the detection of the RAID array.

Regards
Fernando

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when you say it doesnt have boot lag due to UEFI… what kind of lag you talking about? Am I right in thinking thats the RAID screen that appears for 2 seconds to allow you time to press CTRL+I and boot into the RAID utility to edit the array? - yeah I get that but its only 2 seconds extra

Ive seen benchmarks by Toms Hardware with Samsung drives that show RAID is more or less the same as Single drive SSD’s except for sequential R/W - therefore real-world usage is the same as a single drive except if you copy/move or load up extremely large files - I have to say it does ‘feel’ the same…but as long as I’m not losing any performance over a single drive I don’t mind.

My CPU is 3.43Ghz Ivy-Bridge i5 and RAM is 8Gb (2x4) 1616Mhz Ballistix Sport on Extreme mode, really quite fast RAM in benchmarks actually, quite surprised.

Do you know if TRIM is supported/operating on my system? as I cant find any solid evidence that its supported on latest Intel RAID setups?

which driver do you recommend for my system?

thanks again for the help

4

Yes, that is the boot lag RAID users get, when they have installed the OS in Legacy (non-UEFI) mode.

Trim should be active within your 7-Series chipset RAID0 system, but you may have to trigger TRIM, before you are doing the Trim test. Please read the start post of >this< thread.

Please read the start post of >this< thread.

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thanks

my boot mode is BOTH Legacy+UEFI - should I enable UEFI…?

also is your ‘best drivers page’ updated? that is too say have you tested against the latest drivers?

thanks again

edit: i see they are updated…thanks

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If you don’t want to get the RAID boot lag anymore, I recommend to reinstall the OS in UEFI mode.
You cannot switch from Legacy to UEFI mode booting without doing a fresh OS install.

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whats the difference? is POST quicker when UEFI is enabled? if its only the 2 seconds I lose from the RAID setup screen im not sure i will bother as i have tons of stuff installed and would have too start over… then again im curious…

i installed the driver you recommended…my score in AS SSD went up a bit from 1500 to 1700 - the results were the same except for 4k-64Thrd which increased somewhat from circa 450-480MB/s to 520-560MB/s - write latency increased slightly from 0.04ms to 0.06ms

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The quicker boot time is not the only advantage of running the OS in UEFI mode. Contrary to the Legacy boot option you have access to the Intel Rapid Storage RAID Utility from within the BIOS (no need to hit CTRL+I while booting).

The 4K write score should be better. Have you enabled the write-caching options within the Device Manager according to my tips, which I have layed down >here<?

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Yeah I followed your instructions, as I say the 4K-64thrd was higher - the 4K write score may have been slightly better but mostly the same in other runs…circa 48-52MB/s

I thought you already said that running it in Legacy mode slowed it down because of the RAID Setup screen adding precious time onto the boot process? - I have mine set in Legacy+UEFI and I can boot into the RAID setup screen using CTRL+I … this (I thought) was the 2 seconds you lose in boot time as it waits for you to press CTRL+I…after which it continues to boot into windows.

heres what I see

Gigabyte flick on screen for 1 second…
RAID Utility…press CTRL+I for 2 seconds
Gigabyte flick up on screen again but for fraction of second (100ms)
then windows loading…the glowy balls dont even form the windows logo (are about too) and then the desktop appears