Link to home
Start Free TrialLog in
Avatar of Snowguy
Snowguy

asked on

What size of cluster for Raid 0

System spec's
Motherboard= Asus A7N8X-E deluxe
CPU= 2500+ Barton OC@ 200 FSBX11 2.2GHZ 3200+
Ram= 2X256 PC3200
Hard drive= 2X SATA150 WD 36gb rapture 10k
Video= Asus Radeon 9800XT

What is the optimal size of the clusters ie 4k 8k 16k ect...
For best performance in the raid set up and why?

Running OS's
Partition 0= Win98se 7gb fat32
Partition 1= Win ME 7gb fat32
Partition 2= Win XP pro 10gb ntfs
Partition 3= Programs 10gb fat32
Partition 4= Data 6gb fat32
Partition 5= Images 30gb fat32
Avatar of mattisflones
mattisflones
Flag of United States of America image

The 40GB bigbro drive on SATA could handle max 64K.

Mattis
Avatar of Snowguy
Snowguy

ASKER

Yeh I know what it will handel but is that the optimal for best performance? And why would it be?
Dunno... Havent found any test, but whats the point.. you wont be able to get any big performance diffs on 32k vs 64k Go safe, go 32k... :-$

Mattis
Avatar of Snowguy

ASKER

The point is if you can shave a few ms off in the read write performance of the drive' then why not do so.
Well a lot depends on fragmentation of files the average size of files the size of the partition ect.

Followind is a quote from Partion magic. I does not directly adress what you ask but the info may be worht something.

Use Resize Clusters to change the cluster size on FAT, FAT32, and NTFS partitions. Reducing cluster size may help you reclaim wasted space on your hard disk.
All files on FAT and FAT32 partitions are stored in allocation units called clusters. Each file is allocated at least one cluster, resulting in wasted space in clusters containing small files. The size of a partition determines cluster size. Larger partitions have larger clusters, and, therefore, more wasted space. For more information about managing your hard disk space, click See Also on the Help toolbar.

It is not recommended that you use the smallest cluster size on partitions containing a single, large file, such as a database or swap file.

Default Cluster Sizes

A partition's cluster size is set by the DOS FORMAT operation, based on the size of the partition, as shown in the following tables.

DOS and Windows default FAT cluster sizes

Partition Size (MB)      FAT Type      Sectors Per Cluster      Cluster Size
0-15      12-bit      8      512 bytes
16-127      16-bit      4      2 K
128-255      16-bit      8      4 K
256-511      16-bit      16      8 K
512-1,023      16-bit      32      16 K
1,024-2,047      16-bit      64      32 K
2,048-4,096      16-bit      128      64 K*
*Only available with Windows NT and Windows 2000/XP.

Windows FAT32 cluster sizes

Partition Size (GB)      Sectors Per Cluster      Cluster Size
0.256-8.01      8      4 K
8.02-16.02      16      8 K
16.03-32.04      32      16 K
> 32.04      64      32 K
Resize Clusters Information

The Resize Clusters dialog box displays the possible cluster sizes from 512 bytes to 64 KB. For each cluster size, PartitionMagic displays the following:

·      A bar graph and percentages represent how much space would be used and how much space would be wasted if you chose that cluster size for the currently selected partition

·      Wasted space (in megabytes)

·      The range of allowable partition sizes (in megabytes) or other information

·      If a cluster size requires a partition that is too small for the data and files on the partition, "Not Allowed" appears in the Notes column. "Not Enabled" appears in the Notes column for the 64 KB cluster size because it is only used for Windows NT. You can enable the 64 KB cluster size, but it is not recommended.

The lower area of the Resize Clusters dialog box displays information about the current and new cluster size, as well as the current and new partition size (based on the new cluster size). You can click the New cluster size drop-down list to change the cluster size.
PartitionMagic adheres to the established limits for partition and cluster sizes. You cannot select a cluster size that is invalid for the selected partition.
Choosing a smaller cluster size may resize the partition smaller, creating free space next to the partition. You can use this free space to create a new partition.

Copyright © 1994-2002 PowerQuest Corporation. All rights reserved.
SOLUTION
Avatar of CrazyOne
CrazyOne
Flag of United States of America image

Link to home
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
Start Free Trial
SOLUTION
Link to home
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
Start Free Trial
Avatar of Snowguy

ASKER

To CrazyOne Thank you for your time. I do have PM 7.0 and have read that info.
And I do understand about the size of clusters to data storage and wasted space that it entails.

To HippyWarlock Thank you for your time also. I can appreciate your concern for not using a striped array.
I have been running a striped array on my old pc for  3yrs now with IBM delta drives (I live dangerously)
This is a none mission critical pc.
Its more like a tinker with it toy if you will.

A local pc company where I live claims to have the fastest PC's on the planet and is offering  $1000 to anyone that can buy or build a faster like model PC.

So I need to tweak it anywhere I can.
SOLUTION
Link to home
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
Start Free Trial
Avatar of Snowguy

ASKER

That may be my only way out, I was trying to save time with out doing that.
You know delete raid create raid with different clusters. Run an image back, resize clusters on partition(s)
benchmark ect... I was hopeing someone had already done this.
BTW PM7.0 is compatable with XP & ntfs.
>>>BTW PM7.0 is compatable with XP & ntfs.


Not entirely lots of people who use it on XP find themselves in a world of heart. :)
Just an FYI, my raid 0 went haywire this wekend, and i still havent managed to get my files back entirely.. From now on its RAID 0/1 for me!
heart = hurt

Ver 7 has some limitations that Ver 8 takes care of but for what you are doing Ver 7 may not cause you any problems.

But I do know lots of people who used Ver 7 found it caused a number of problems with XP and had to use ver 8 to correct those problems.
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
Link to home
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
Start Free Trial
Snowguy, i would be really thankfull if you could send me the conclusion of your search (which stripe size is the best for ... er.. normal use, movies, music, corel draw, etc...)
Avatar of Snowguy

ASKER

VIRION What I came up with for the best balance of read and write after trying all combinations of chunk or block sizes from 4k -128k and cluster size from .512k -32k. Is a  chunk or block size for the raid of 16k with a 32k cluster on the partition(s)
is there a way i can chat a little with you about this problem? my yahoo ID is "virion69" if you can talk, please send me a message! thank you very very much!
Avatar of Snowguy

ASKER

I don't have yahoo sorry. You can post here if you like.
Will be leaving to go to Las Vegas at 4 am MDT. I wont be back till late tomorrow