Warren,
Pardon my ignorance, on the hard drives: what is the advantage of a RAID 5 disk array over other drives?
Rodman.
Main Topics
Browse All TopicsI'm an amateur programmer that has written several apps with a SQL back end. My next project will require robust hardware since I will be working with tables millions of lines long and with complex statistical calcs. I plan to use SAS, SQL Server and several sources of financial data. I however have no clue how to set up the hardware. Can you recommend specifically hardware that I can use for storage (100+ GB) and very fast calculation (think multi-variate regressions on several normalized tables of 1 million plus rows. I'm not in a production environment so I don't have duplicity, although I would like to recover my data should a drive go down. I'm mostly focused on very fast calculations. My budget is around $5000. Thank you!!
This Question has been solved and asker verified All Experts Exchange premium technology solutions are available to subscription members.
Experts Exchange has been collecting answers to technology questions since 1996…3 million and counting! If you have a question, chances are we already have your answer.
If you can't find the exact answer you're looking for, ask our exclusive community of 50,000 experts. You’ll get a personalized answer from a trusted professional.
Thousands of free tech tips, tricks, how-to’s and tutorials are available in our peer reviewed articles section. See for yourself how smart our experts are, no login required.
Access the answers to your technology questions today.
30-day free trial. Register in 60 seconds.
Members of the expert community talk about why the experience at Experts Exchange is different than what you will find anywhere else.

Try it out and discover for yourself.
30-day free trial. Register in 60 seconds.
Join the community of experts here and help other tech pros by answering question in your area of expertise. You can earn FREE access to all Experts Exchange's premium features and resources.
Hi Rodman,
Ques:
what is the advantage of a RAID 5 disk array over other drives?
Ans:
With a RAID 5 setup, you cater for hardware disk failure
RAID 5 definition:
# RAID 5: Striped Set (3 disk minimum) with Distributed Parity: Distributed parity requires all but one drive to be present to operate; drive failure requires replacement, but the array is not destroyed by a single drive failure. Upon drive failure, any subsequent reads can be calculated from the distributed parity such that the drive failure is masked from the end user. The array will have data loss in the event of a second drive failure and is vulnerable until the data that was on the failed drive is rebuilt onto a replacement drive.
Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wi
Good physical diagram to understand RAID 5:
Reference: http://www.acnc.com/04_01_
This results in excellent performance and good fault tolerance.
Best Regards,
Alvin
Business Accounts
Answer for Membership
by: warrenbucklesPosted on 2007-04-16 at 19:29:20ID: 18922008
Hello Rerodrig:
I assume you are looking for a test platform for your exclusive use. This would be a server with moderate computing power and a reasonably fast disk sub-system - probably something like a dual-processor unit running AMD Opterons or the more recent Intel Xeons with a RAID 5 disk array. I could rattle off a list of processor/RAM/disk suggestions but they are only the tip of the iceberg.
Before you jump into the hardware you should look at the SAS modules you are planning to use and learn their suggested hardware platforms - I assume you will be using a Windows server OS since you mention SQL Server.
Your best option would be to buy a pre-configured server from a system integrator who is familiar with SAS and database work and who is able to support you. There are many vendors out there - Dell, HP and IBM are the biggies but you need someone to set up the system and keep it running. A lack of duplicity [sic] and a $5k budget can buy you some significant hardware but I would go for more moderate hardware and a support contract - assuming you don't have in-house IT support.
wb