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    Triple-RAID, does it work for m17x? :D

    Discussion in 'Alienware 17 and M17x' started by Ryan, Jun 27, 2010.

  1. Ryan

    Ryan NBR Moderator

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    I just thought up an idea,

    if I were to replace the optical drive, use a caddy,

    and put another SSD in there,

    with already 2 filled with SSDs,

    would a Triple-RAID0 formation be possible?

    Will the RAID manager acknowledge the HDD that's in the optical drive,

    and allow that to be a part of a RAID array as well? :D

    Just some thoughts on how to make the m17x better and faster!
     
    Ryan, Jun 27, 2010
    #1
  2. lordqarlyn

    lordqarlyn Global Biz Consultant

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    Hehe not sure if the BIOS supports that, but let us know if you try it and tell us what happens....
     
    lordqarlyn, Jun 28, 2010
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  3. Lozz

    Lozz Top Overpriced Dell

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    It should, the Precision M6500 is the closest thing to the M17x that Dell has, and it supports triple HDD RAID 0.
     
    Lozz, Jun 28, 2010
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  4. mfractal

    mfractal T|I

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    does the M6500 and M17x share the same chipset ?
     
    mfractal, Jun 28, 2010
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  5. Lozz

    Lozz Top Overpriced Dell

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    yup, they're both the PM55.

    I just checked, it should be possible, the BIOS even has a manual option to assign whether a HDD or DVD drive is present at that SATA port.
     
    Lozz, Jun 28, 2010
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  6. mfractal

    mfractal T|I

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    that'd be a nice experiment! Although i am not sure how much gain can we get from raiding SSDs. From what i saw sequential r/w speeds increase but 4k speeds stay the same and those are the most important ones.
     
    mfractal, Jun 28, 2010
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  7. putochip0123

    putochip0123 Notebook Consultant

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    Erm, wondering RAID 0 Intel SSD 160GB have a big improvement in terms of speed and other? like boot time, loading time, ETC
     
    putochip0123, Jun 29, 2010
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  8. mfractal

    mfractal T|I

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    not so much, like i said, sequential r/w will improve, so copying/reading huge files or hibernating will be faster but normal os functionality will not speed up.
     
    mfractal, Jun 29, 2010
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  9. freedom16

    freedom16 Notebook Deity

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    This is so awesome and i would love to see this happen, be like having one of the Sagers. I have been thinking about this for sometime.
     
    freedom16, Jun 29, 2010
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  10. mfractal

    mfractal T|I

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    One thing to note is that the drives should be of the same capacity and relatively with the same parameters or the whole array performance will degrade.
     
    mfractal, Jun 29, 2010
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  11. Ryan

    Ryan NBR Moderator

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    Good to know that this is even possible!

    I will go for this and hopefully set this up before the end of July.

    I'll keep you guys posted on the benchmarks.. At the latest end of August.
     
    Ryan, Jun 29, 2010
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  12. mfractal

    mfractal T|I

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    Good luck mate! And the possibility of it is speculation only until you prove it one way or another ;)
     
    mfractal, Jun 29, 2010
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  13. putochip0123

    putochip0123 Notebook Consultant

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    will be the boot time decrease? loading file faster? load game faster? load appliacaton faster?
     
    putochip0123, Jun 29, 2010
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  14. mfractal

    mfractal T|I

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    mfractal, Jun 29, 2010
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