Alternative to Promise RAID

I'm among the disappointed.. currently have 6 Xserve RAIDs and now going to have to resort to ebay for drive replacements until things just die on a massive scale.
$12k for a Promise RAID is far beyond my budget. The $6k entry Apple was feasible, and then buying drive or ebaying them as I went was ok. Does anyone know of any other more sensible alternatives now that the Apple RAID is no more?

Apple's page on the Promise RAID is pretty minimal. Promise's site (www.promise.com) has more info and the manual available for download. The manual is much more detailed than the XServe RAID manual.
Error notifications are available and are more flexible than the XServe RAID. It's detailed on page 73 of the manual, but they allow six different levels of email to any user.
I've only skimmed the manual, but in general I'd say:
1) The Promise RAID is (on paper) a very nice step up from the XServe RAID. It's faster (RAID 50 and 60), more redundant (RAID 6 and 60, active/active controllers) and has greater capacity (16 drives, external chassis, one controller can access all drives).
2) The configurations options are more flexible, more of the underlying capability is exposed to the user. This is good and bad. It will make initial setup a little more daunting, but ultimately it allows you to tune things more carefully.
3) If we can use the retail product effectively it is available at cheaper similar or cheaper price points (outside of Apple) than the XServe RAID (particularly if the 12 bay chassis works)
4) The retail versions of the box ship without drives. You buy your own drives and install them in carriers. Again, a little less plug and play than Apple, but you have access to cheaper drives. Just don't buy the cheapest thing out there, get something rated for 24x7 use.
5) None of this is worth anything if you can't actually plug the thing into an OS X machine and have it perform as they say it will
So in short there are lots of questions about actual experience with the box, and it won't be as easy to set up the first time, but on paper it's more functionality for the same or less money.

Similar Messages

K9A2 Platinum bios 1.4 or 1.5 Promise RAID fail Boot.

Ok I have BIOS version 1.3 running fine. I want to upgrade to a bios that officially support the phenom and its power usage. So back in may I try to upgrade to bios 1.4. No good the machine will not boot the RAID set that contains window XP. :( Reverted back. Contacted support. Not much help... a few weeks pass. Contact support again they send me bios version 1.51. Same issue. Reverted back to 1.3. Recently I tried the final release of 1.5 with the same issue.
Anyone out there using a phenom on the K9A2 and booting with the Promise RAID controller in a striped 0 set ? How did you get it to work with the current bios version. Tech support 'claims' they have no problem with the bios and that they have tested it with the promise controller booting to XP.
Thanks,
Jon Harrell

Considering the very large files that regularly run through the system and the extra cpus that windows inefficiently uses I doubt a software controller would impact the performance gains significantly. The units we have prep large format presentations and regularly handle very large files. Bandwidth is key. If this was the average desktop or even a web server yes 1 drive would most definitely be faster. But that would be a different subject.
Although now we might just be considering scraping the whole MSI created mess, and purchasing a hardware solution like that of the quad sata raid in our server.
But for now:
Does any one know the perfect combination?
e.g. Promise driver 1.1.1030.47 !work with Bios 1.50 (promise 2.8.1030.0032)
Thanks,
jh

Promise RAID vs. Via RAID

When I was setting up my system I wasn't really sure which RAID controller I should use in order to get the best performance...I opted to go with the Via controller as it is an integrated part of the KT800 chipset whereas the Promise RAID controller is an optional add-in chip (or such is my understanding), so I figured using the Via controller would give the best performance...but I'm curious as to how the Promise controller performs. Has anyone tried setting an array up both ways and testing to see which controller performed better?
I'm running two 36 GB WD Raptor SATA drives in RAID-0 off the Via controller, and I get a score of 61 MB/sec in Sandra 2004's File System benchmark...if anyone is running a similar array off the Promise controller and could post their benchmark results, I'd appreciate it.

I've 'tested' both controllers.
Before the K8T, I was using a KT4 ultra with a Promise 376 and two raptors RAID0 (around 60-70Mb/s with HDTach)
Then I switched to the Promise 378 of the K8T (I keep promise to keep data). A little bit better than with the 376 of the KT4V but not very clear. I recently put the two raptors on the VIA. A little bit better but again, not very clear. It seems however that with the VIA the output is more 'unstable' .. I mean: with Promise, HD Tach gives me a straight line from the begining of the disk array to the end; with VIA, it's less straight.
I think I will crash my RAID 0 to test with one raptor on the VIA and one on the Promise. OSsystem for a disk, software and apps for the other one. I'm not sure that it's a goo idea

Promise RAID problems

Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone on the list had problems with the Promise RAID.
My system is a 875P Neo. The two SATA drives are Seagate ST2380023AS. The system shas been wrking fone for about a month than troubles started. My system is updated to all the latest patches WinXP and MSI wise as well.
The system keep corrupting itself. When rebooting WinXP goes into a repair mode and run chkdsk. After in installing PAM 4.0 and enabled the logging I see these messages popping up in the event viewer:
Source: fasttx2k
event ID: 9
Desc: The device \device\scsi\fasttx2k1 did not respond within the the timeout period.
I had to recover WinXP a few times now and I can't keep working with the system this way and wondering when it is going to corrupt some files what I have not backed up yet.
I can't find any answers on Promise's website or here.
Any help appreciated,
--Laszlo--

Thanks for your help. I think my config is more simple than yours. I only have WinXp on this system on the Promise controller. I have the two drives in a stripe configuration, RAID 0 with 2x80GB drives. Same manufacture same BIOS on them.
I am not using the Intel SATA controller. The only device is a CD drive there.
What can I configure on the RAID controller? The only option I saw is for cache. Write Through or Write Back. Mine is set to the default of Write Back.
How could I verify that the drives individualy performing well? Is there any utility from MSI or Promise allow me to do that? What version of the Promise driver are you using and what is your BIOS version? I have the latest available from MSI which is 1.00.1.29 and my system BIOS is 1.9.
Thanks,

Storage redundancy using two OSX servers - Promise RAID

Hi All,
Currently we run 1 Mac Mini and Server on Mavericks connected via Thunderbolt to a Promise RAID 5 device, it works great. I want some redundancy and have purchased an additional Mac Mini to backup Open directory and DNS as our main server does pretty much everything.
Incase the main server fails what is the best way for the Promise RAID to stay up? I've read you can create a "Thunderbolt Bridge" by connecting both Mac Mini's via thunderbolt cable and one to the RAID??? Is this correct? Or.... purchase a Thunderbolt to Gigiabyte adapter and run the RAID off the network. Any idea how to configure this?
Thanks.
James

Sadly Apple do not provide much if any facilities for building a resilient setup along the lines you are thinking.
The nearest you can get happens to be for Open Directory and DNS. You would setup two servers, one as the DNS master and one as a DNS secondary, and you would setup one server as the Open Directory Master, and the other as the Open Directory Replica. Neither of these require the two servers to share any storage or files, the two servers would send the information between themselves over the network. This only works for those two services.
You couldn't for example have both connected to the promise and act as File Servers. (Both ordinary files sharing or network directories.)
To get nearer to having two servers sharing common storage so that if one goes down the other takes over would require a SAN and not direct attached storage like the Promise. However Apple's software does not support this for file sharing services.

K7T266Pro Promise Raid not detected anymore

Have just installed a MSI FX5700 Ultra graphics card on a K7T266Pro, and am now unable to use the onboard Promise raid controller.
I realise it's the card that is causing it, but can't find out what it has done. I've also looked for a bios update for the raid controller but can't find one. Motherboard has latest bios and drivers, as has the FX5700.
Any help greatly appreciated.
Pete.

hi martin555,
you should have really started a new thread, giving as much info about your problem and your system as you can, rather than add to this old and unresolved thread
but as we are here now, please post full system specs, and also what the blue screen error message says if you can

Promise RAID or other Storage

I've noticed a few threads where people have mentioned the Storage they're using. I'm sure it would be handy for others if people could give a bit of info on their setup as I initally assumed everyone was either using Promise RAIDs or some none Xsan type setup for Final Cut Server.
I saw Infortrend mentioned by Willard in another thread which is what sparked me thinking about this.

I think you can use any strorage you like it all depends on the SAN software you use. SAN software secures your volumes and files from getting corrupted when a volume is being entered from more then one computer. XSAN has it's own filesystem and needs a metadata controller. I use MetaSAN from tiger technology because it makes your RAID act a an ordinary drive. You can format is NFS and put any file type on it you like. Just a very big drive on your desktop.
Read more about it on:
http://www.kenstone.net/fcphomepage/metasannattress.html
What should be important for the hardware are things like support, easy to setup and maintain.
Yesterday as wat at the IBC and overwhelmed by the amount of storage systems. I am working o the infortrend for a year and a half now with zero problems.

Novell driver for promise raid controller PDC20276

[size=13]Is there a Novell driver for the promise raid controller on the KT3 Ultra2-R (MS-6380E) mainboard[/SIZE] this board uses the promise PDC20276 chipset.
The supplied disk only supports windows ;(
Can any one advise options thanks :P

CapricornC,
Since you have a KT3 Motherboard and you posted in the nVidia/AMD/SiS Motherboard Forum, I moved the thread to Via Forum for you.
Good Luck,
Richard

Promise Raid won't recognize all of my HD space??!! HELP

I have the MSI 845 Ultra board with the promise RAID controller on it. This is my first time using raid, so bear with me. I purchased 2 80GB HD's for the purpose of striping to gain some speed. I have them hooke up as masters 1 to each port, but the problem is that the controller/MB tells me that they are 33GB dirves!! When I go into the configuration mode its all they show up as. When I go into windows its all they show up as!!
I have tried to delete and recreate the array many times with no luck. I have tried to find some setting in the BIOS which would let me change the size, but no luck....
Do I have to individually go and format them on a normal channel 1st before hooking them up to the RAID?
Is there something I'm missing here besides 100GB of space??!
Any help would be GREATLY appreciated.
Thanks in advance.

Master on Samsung should be |::: with the orientation being |----IDE----||jumpers||power|
Did you by any chance set it to ||:: ?
This is the master with cylinder limitation mode which is intended to force 32GB on the drive.

Howto use onboard Promise Raid Controller pdc20265 on 694D PRO AR Ver1

Currently I'm running Win2k on my MSI 694D Pro AR Ver 1.0 board with Bios version W6321VMS.310 and the included Fasttrack-Family Win2k Raid-Controller driver for my Promise Raid Controller pdc20265 with lite bios.
Due to software updates I'm now absolutely required to switch to Windows XP Prof. However this is the cause for my inquiry:
I downloaded and installed the latest available Bios version W6321VMS.370 from MSI site.
On installation of XP I tried to include the pdc20265 Fasttrack raid driver from MSI site to get access to my HD's. However WinXP couldn't find any HD's. Remark: XP with SP1 and VIA 4in1443v.exe installed.
So I repeated this procedure with the original drivers Fasttrack family and pdc202065 which were attached on floppy. Unfortunately no success as well.
Then I have put the HD on the Ultra66 channel and installed XP first without raid and ultra 100 support.
Later I re-enabled the on-board promise device in bios and unfortunately WinXP didn't recoginze the device by itself. So I provided the latest pdc20265 driver from MSI site. XP complained that the driver is not digitally signed. After reboot the promise device reported an error under WinXP.
I repeated this procedure with the original drivers Fasttrack family and pdc202065 which were attached on floppy. Unfortunately no success as well.
Why MSI-Site says this pdc20265 driver supports WinXP if there are only the Win2k and WinME,98... drivers included?
Currently I can't use the promise device at all under WinXP. This means even I don't have an Ultra 100 controler available.
Has anyone an idea how to install HD's on WinXP with the corresponding promise raid drivers for my pdc20265 onboard chipset?
I'd really appreciate your help!

Some of the suggestions I don't understand quite well. Please could you explain further:
> remove the other two drives leaving the raid pair
> and cd only
>
> put raid 2nd in boot order
What do you mean with that?
> reboot press the key you need to get in to raid bios
> create the array and make it bootable
array is already created (Note: there is important data on it, can't recreate it! Only Segate 80GB is free and empty)
I don't want to boot from raid.
>
> now boot to cd to install,right at beginning it will say
> press f6 to install mass storage drive you need the
> driver on floppy to install it
I already tried the XP-Install routine to specify additional mass storage drivers. (Note: 1 single 80GB Drive was attached) Which are the suitable ones? As mentioned I tried the following:
1. Attached floppy 'Fasttrack family drivers'
Result: Message: Driver is for Win2k only. Not a single Harddrive shows for installing XP.
2. Attached Floppy (Promise Ultra 100 lite, 256 only)
Result: Driver is for Win2k only. Installation procedure hangs.
3. Driver from MSI-Site for pdc20265. Same as 2.
4. Extracting via4in1 drivers and putting WinXPIDE drivers on floppy:
Result: Installation routine doesn't recoginze drivers on floppy.
> rest should be the same as normal
>
> this should be similar as well
>
> http://www.amdforums.com/showindex.php?s=&threadid=146384
Which is the right driver for WinXP to specify for mass storage device at WinXP installation?

Promise Raid, like to use the P-ata

Hi, I'm using the Promise Raid controller, 2x Serial-ATA in RAID-0, and I want to use the Promise U-ATA connector for a Cd-rom drive. Is this possible?
K8T
bios 1.1
Athlon64 3200+

Nope....

KA92 Platinum - JBOD SATA - Vista 64 - Promise RAID

I just setup a new machine with the KA92 Platinum and almost everything is running perfectly excluding the 2 750GB SATA 3.0gb drives I have installed on the Promise SATA ports.
Configuration - (Second RAID enabled, onboard ATA set to IDE, 750's individual JBOD)
SATA Port #1 - WD VelociRaptor 300GB system drive
SATA Port #2 - DVDRW
SATA Port #3 - BRD\DVDRW
SATA Port #4 - Case eSATA copnnection
Promise SATA Port #1 - Samsung 750 SATAII
Promise SATA Port #2 - Samsung 750 SATAII
The issue is that although the Devicer Manager recognizes the 2 drives () and they are visible in Disk Management, I cant create a new volume on either of them. As soon as I try to create a volume Windows recognizes a new device and tries to install a driver which it cant find.
I tried removing the Promise Drives and Changing the ATA to RAID but that just caused BSOD until I reset it.
Any Ideas?
Thanks

Regrettably that last idea didn't work for me :( I formatted the two drives then re-connected the two drives and enabled the promise raid without configuring the discs into an array, booted into Windows and the drives didn't show up anywhere, I then added them to JBOD in promise config (which deletes the boot info) and started into Windows with the results I was experiencing before. To be honest, at this point Ive pretty much given up on the Promise ports ever working for me, at least with SATA drives, perhaps SAS drive would have better luck but I'm not going to spend the money to find out, it looks like an external eSata setup for me... I just wish these were regular Sata ports rather than promise, life would have been sooooo much easier, and cheaper in the end.... Thanks again everyone!

K9A2 *V1* Bios 1.8 - No drivers for Promise RAID controller.

Does anyone know which set of Promise Raid drivers work with the updated Promise firmware that is part of the 1.8 bios update?
Version 1.2 of the bios includes Promise version 28.1030.0021 which works with at least 1.1.1030.27 of the promise drivers.
Version 1.8 of the bios includes Promise version 28.1030.0032 for which I cannot find any working drivers; do they exist? (Vista cannot see the controller and is unable to locate a suitable driver. Trying to use existing promise driver fails since it will not recognise the device)
Just had a brainwave. On the MSI site, there is an updated driver pack for the Promise controller (this is a V1 board); this version is
Vista32/64 Ver.: 1.1.1030.47
Is this the version that is compatible with v1.8 of the bios (and hence 28.1030.0032)?

Give them a try, they if they work will show soon enough.

K8N Neo2 + NVRAID + Promise Raid Controller = not working right

I'm trying to get my Promise Raid card working with nvraid enabled and I've finally given up. It works fine with NVRAID disabled though. I have 2xSata on Raid 0 and 2xIDE on raid 0+1. i also have two other IDE's on non-raid and two atapi cdrom drives. In order for me to use all of my storage devices, i need the promise controller to boot. The Prommise RAID controller's BIOS will not boot with nvraid enabled. WindowsXP detects the drives, but if i try to mount them via PAM (Promise Arry Management), it says one of the drives is corrupt/not working. but if i have both the ide raid hd's on the nvraid w/ sata raid, then it works fine. I just won't be able to use my cdrom drives. if anyone has a fix for this, please let me know. and sorry for the long descriptions. thanks.

Why don't you go into BIOS and alter the IRQ manually for that PCI card, because probably that card is using the same IRQ as the nVidia one.
Be well....

Hard drive configuration with Promise Raid controller

I plan on running two 30 gig 75GXP drives on the Promise controller in Raid-0 mode. I also have a 60 gig WD drive that I use for backups and for initial installation. During installation, I put the Win98SE setup files and all the drivers, apps, backup data, etc. on the WD drive and do a clean install from there.
My current (old) board is an Abit KT7-R with the Highpoint raid controller. Using the Highpoint controller, I am able to put the WD drive as a slave device and the controller treats it as a normal IDE drive. I'm moving to the 845 Ultra ARU. From what I've read, if you put a single drive on the Promise controller, it tries to set it up as a Raid drive? I don't want to risk losing my backup data on the WD drive to some attempt by the Promise controller to "raid" my single drive. So, where is the best place to put my WD drive so that I can install my system from it? I'm thinking about putting it as Master on IDE2. I normally run my CD as Master on IDE1. Once the installation is complete, I will remove the installation files from the WD drive and use it exclusively for backups. I have the WD drive in a Vantec EZ-Swap rack, and I normally keep it powered off unless doing a backup.
So, the plan is to create the Raid-0 array, Fdisk and format the array, and then load Windows from the WD drive, followed by all my applications. Is Master on IDE-2 the best solution for the WD drive?

hi
not very clued up on raid but it sounds right
if the wd drive is on its own on that ide do not jumper
as master you have to have no jumpers if all alone

Alternative to Promise RAID

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