From owner-freebsd-hardware@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Sep 18 21:22:02 2007 Return-Path: Delivered-To: hardware@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C420316A417 for ; Tue, 18 Sep 2007 21:22:02 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from jonny@jonny.eng.br) Received: from coe.ufrj.br (roma.coe.ufrj.br [146.164.53.65]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 7D3D813C442 for ; Tue, 18 Sep 2007 21:22:02 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from jonny@jonny.eng.br) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by coe.ufrj.br (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1E14A125413; Tue, 18 Sep 2007 18:22:00 -0300 (BRT) X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at coe.ufrj.br Received: from coe.ufrj.br ([146.164.53.65]) by localhost (roma.coe.ufrj.br [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id hUQon4Jg9Rv6; Tue, 18 Sep 2007 18:21:57 -0300 (BRT) Received: from [127.0.0.1] (localhost [127.0.0.1]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by coe.ufrj.br (Postfix) with ESMTP id 21D99125409; Tue, 18 Sep 2007 18:21:57 -0300 (BRT) Message-ID: <46F0416B.4010607@jonny.eng.br> Date: Tue, 18 Sep 2007 18:21:47 -0300 From: Joao Carlos Mendes Luis User-Agent: Thunderbird 1.5.0.12 (X11/20070719) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Ashley Moran References: <46EDDDD0.2070409@jonny.eng.br> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Cc: hardware@freebsd.org Subject: Re: SATA mirrror performance X-BeenThere: freebsd-hardware@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: General discussion of FreeBSD hardware List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 18 Sep 2007 21:22:02 -0000 Ashley Moran wrote: > > On Sep 17, 2007, at 2:52 am, João Carlos Mendes Luís wrote: > >> After using gmirror, now I have the RAID in its full performance, >> getting over 60Mbytes per second at raw reads, very near the 70MBps from >> the specs. Could only be better if we already had NCQ working. >> >> Now the question: Is this expected? Is ataraid somehow deprecated? > > I had no end of trouble with ataraid. At first I was under the > impression it was the best solution, seeing as it has some support > from the motherboard. But after posting to a list (possibly > -hardware) a long time ago, all the answers I got were to use > gmirror. I don't know that ataraid is deprecated, but I can't think > of any reason to use it. Fortunately (as you have found), turning an > ataraid mirror into a gmirror is easy. I would just use gmirror and > not worry about it. The main advantage of ataraid is its integration with BIOS and other operating systems. If we had something like a master GEOM device which could read ata raid specs and build GEOM graphs based on this information, that would be a good workaround. I am not sure if this is enough, but at least would solve startup problems. I am also not sure if it is even possible, because no single GEOM device would suffice: The master device should recognize disk labels, and call geom_mirror, geom_strip, geom_raid5, etc when needed. I hope GEOM architects have something in mind, because this is very important to desktop and dual boot. I can deal with geom_mirror, but I am not a typical user. Most users don't even know FreeBSD supports mirroring, since it is not on installation options menu. Indeed, install a FreeBSD with boot mirror support was still a complex task the last time I saw sysinstall. Thanks for your info, anyway...