External storage recommendations..

I have a Sonnet 4 drive enclosure ( http://www.sonnettech.com/product/storagesolutions/index.html) and like it very much. The fan is not much loader than my Mac Pro.

I have the Sonnet enclosure configured with four 400 GB SATA hard drives connected to my Mac Pro via a RocketRaid 2314 eSATA card in a RAID 5 configuration. I don't get more than 55 MB/sec throughput during reads/writes. If you need faster speeds than that I would NOT recommend the RocketRaid card for RAID 5 and video.

When I first connected the enclosure to the RocketRaid and created a striped array (using Disk Utility) I got >200 MB/sec read/write speeds so I know the enclosure and drives are not the cause of the slower read/write speeds.

Message was edited by: Martin Pace

I think you'll find Sonnet or other 4-channel, 8x or 4x controller reviews:
http://www.amug.com

You can easily configure 4 direct connect drives, or Port Multiplier and 4-5 drives per channel and maintain sustained bandwidth.

Sonnet E4P and Sonnet Fusion 500P cases would do the trick, but there are other choices and other vendors. And some use the same SilImage chipsets.

If you want RAID 5 for redundancy and good performance your options include the RocketRAID 2322 and the Areca ARC-1221x. You can see performance results for the RocketRAID 2322 in the AMUG E8-ML review found here:
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/enhance/e8/

It can provide an average of 420MB/sec with an eight drive RAID 5 setup. The other HighPoint RocketRAID cards offer RAID 5, but performance is much more limited.

The Areca ARC-1221x provides a hardware RAID using the Intel IOP341 I/O processor, 256MB of on-board DDR333 533 MHz SDRAM with ECC protection and an optimized RAID engine to support extreme RAID 6 performance. You can read the AMUG review here:
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/areca/1221x/

The Areca cards have a faster web interface and include RAID 6 which provides twice the data protection of RAID 5. The Areca ARC-1221x provides 420MB/sec. average performance using RAID 5 or 370MB/sec using RAID 6 with eight hard drives.

After using both solutions I would much rather have a RAID 6 solution using the ARC-1221x than the RocketRAID 2322. In my experience, the Areca product is easier to configure and easier to use when recovering from a hard drive failure. The Arc-1221x is more expensive but if this is for a professional environment I would go with the Areca solution.

If you want even higher RAID 6 performance, the 12 channel Areca ARC-1231ML Host Adapter can be used with a Norco DS-1240 to provide over 510MB/sec average performance with a 12 drive RAID 6 setup or over 470MB/sec using a RAID 6 setup with a hot spare. You can see the AMUG review here:
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/norco/1240/

I find the 12 drive RAID 6 combination provides amazing speed and redundancy for those wanting the optimal RAID 6 configuration.

Have fun!

Is this the Fusion D400 RAID you went with?
[FUS-D4MR-2TB]

http://store1.sonnettech.com/productinfo.php?cPath=23_45&productsid=205

At $2500-3000 I can find a lot of systems that provide better redundancy using RAID 6. It will be difficult for a four drive system to provide RAID 5 performance above 170MB/sec on average across the volume as it fills.

RAID 5 uses one drive for parity data which only leaves the user with the space of three drives. It is hard to get the 240MB/sec average performance that full sized HD video manipulation can require.

The Areca ARC-1221x is $680 using the AMUG special
http://www.tekramonline.com/amugpromos.html

The EnhanceBox E8-ML 8 bay enclosure is $595
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/enhance/e8/

Two model Ext-MS-1MSB cables are $72
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000FUOMO0/arizomacinusergr

and 8 Seagate 320GB 7200.10 hard drives are $79.99 each equals $640
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148140

This gives you an external RAID 6 solution for under $2000 that will be able to provide twice the performance of a four drive RAID 5 system and twice the redundancy using RAID 6.

Have fun!

None of the Sonnet cards support RAID 5 which I wanted for better reliability.

Anyone try this card? No RAID 6, but well known brand.

ATTO ExpressSAS R380

http://attotech.com/expressSASr380.html

They have a good reputation. It is the only card that I have found that is reported to work properly with XServe. If they have tested that far it bodes well for working on a MacPro but I have had no direct experience with it. A recent email to them regarding its ability to work with XServe got a reply the next day and that's not bad either. I'd do a quick google and if nothing dramatic shows up I would not hesitate to give it a try.

I have not tested the ATTO EXPRESSSAS R380 but AMUG is currently testing the Areca ARC-1680x SAS card.

The ARC-1680x is $845 instead of $1199 for the ATTO card and it supports more RAID options including RAID 6. You can find it for sale here:
http://www.scsisource.com/sas_controllers/

You can read more about the Areca ARC-1680x at this link:
http://www.areca.com.tw/products/pcietosas1680series.htm

The Areca ARC-1680x is a PCIe 8x card that utilizes the Intel 800 MHz IOP348 I/O processor with SAS controller. It includes 256MB of on board memory and supports an optional battery backup module. The card has two external miniSAS connectors that can be used with miniSAS to Multilane cables or miniSAS to eSATA cables.

The new SAS controllers can support up to 128 drives in theory using a SAS expander. The SAS expander looks similar to a hub and allows multiple hard drive enclosures to be networked together. Using this configuration, the user can connect several enclosures to a single SAS host adapter. This could easily lead to large 32 to 64 SATA/SAS hard drive subsystems. As you can see expansion possibilities will be one of the SAS controllers most interesting feature.

The price of SAS expanders is on the high side ($800-1200) but I expect those prices to drop as this technology becomes more common place. In the meantime, the Areca ARC-1680x that AMUG is testing will still work without a SAS expander by connecting the ports directly to eight SATA hard drives.

I believe SAS controllers will be the next new cool tool for adding lots of hard drives to a computer similar to how SATA port multiplication gained popularity by being able to support 20 hard drives with a single 4 port card.

It will be interesting to see what type of performance can be achieved with extended RAID systems using SAS controllers. So far, my guess is that a direct connect SATA host adapter may provide slightly better write performance than a SAS controller. However, the read speeds seem very close and the SAS controller with a SAS expander will be able to support many more SAS or SATA hard drives than a conventional direct connect setup.

Have fun!

Thanks for the info mbean. As it should happen I'm a card carrying member of AMUG. I have built several RAIDs based on AMUG reviews. I have 4 of the larger firm-tek boxes they are awesome. I know the Apple people won't like it, but I'm an AVID editor and a mac user. With a sonnet card, firm-tek boxes and SoftRAID, I have no problems cutting standard def and native DVCPROHD.

I purchased the ATTO R380 and and Enhance enclosure recommended by AMUG. I cannot get the system to work. I can mount a disk, open it and look at it, but if I try to copy something to it, anything, it freezes the computer. Not a kernel panic, but a freeze. Force quit wont work. I had read the review of the Areca 1221x but went with the ATTO because the ATTO SCSI card is recommend with the AVID and they seem to have a good reputation. They also have a software utility to control the card as opposed to using a browser (thought it might be better). I also did not want to invest heavily in a very expensive SCSI system because SCSI is older technology and I was ******* for RAID 5. I have also had good success with my previous RAID set-ups. ATTO technical support has been attentive, but I'm still not having any luck and I just want to get on with editing. The latest suggestion from ATTO support was to download free-ware that will allow me to crank up the fans on my MacPro. Apparently I may be running too hot. I have not tried this yet, but it doesn't seem like a great solution.

I'm getting kind of desperate and think I might try one of the Areca cards and see if I can't get it to work. Also RAID 6 is appealing.

Can someone explain the difference between the Areca 1221x and the 1680x?

I'm trying to set up on an 8 Core 3Ghz Macpro 5GB RAM OSX 10.4.9

I'm using 8 500GB Maxtor Maxline SATAII 3GB drives from Otherworld Computing.

A lot of people do use smcFanControl and Hardware Monitor to keep their eye on and control internal temps and sensors.

Hardware Monitor $9
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/16609
smcFanControl - donation-ware
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/23049

You aren't on 10.4.10 so that is probably good, but maybe on bleeding edge right now 😉

I'd think between you and ATTO - and Mark J - ought to make some headway. Could it even have anything to do with the drives you are using? tried different make? (what do you have now?) which has been an issue from time to time with new technology.

SCSI is old, but that spells "proven" and "mature" sometimes. Smaller drives but able to push the 100MB/sec point.

Dear thepopester,
AMUG has reviewed the Enhance E8 enclosures and we really like them. Once we taped 80% of the side holes on the enclosure the E8 provided great cooling capabilities.

AMUG has not reviewed any of the ATTO controllers including the R380. Unfortunately, I cannot verify whether they work or not 😉

If you have the Enhance E8-ML enclosure you will find the Areca ARC-1221x works great with it. The ARC-1221x provides amazing RAID 6 performance and works well with the Mac Pro. In addition, Areca is trying to make their cards even better for Mac users. They sent AMUG a new firmware upgrade for testing that allows an external 8 drive RAID 6 setup to be bootable. RAID 5 is OK, but I would much rather have double the redundancy with RAID 6.

The AMUG special is available on the ARC-1221x until the end of August 2007 here:
http://www.tekramonline.com/amugpromos.html

Can someone explain the difference between the Areca 1221x >and the 1680x?

http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/areca/1221x/

The Areca ARC-1221x is a SATA host adapter. It provides great performance but is limited to being used with 8 direct connect SATA hard drives using the external miniSAS connectors on the back of the card. It does not support PM just direct connect. The Enhance E8-ML works great with the ARC-1221x or the ARC-1680x. AMUG uses two external Mini-SAS to Infiniband (Screw) cables to connect the enclosure to the card:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000FUOMO0/arizomacinusergr

http://www.areca.com.tw/products/pcietosas1680series.htm

The Areca ARC-1680x is a PCIe SAS RAID controller that can provide up to (128) SAS/SATA ll peripheral devices using SAS expanders. What does this mean? The user can setup the ARC-1680 just like the ARC-1221x and use it with up to 8 direct connect hard drives. However, if the user purchases a separate SAS Expander additional hard drives can be attached to the ARC-1680x setup.

Initial AMUG tests show the ARC-1221x can provide sightly higher 8 drive RAID 6 average write performance. However, once AMUG gets its hands on a SAS Expander, the results should show that the ARC-1680x will be able to provide much better performance with additional hard drives. The SAS controller will not be limited to 8 drives and will be able to expand as additional hard drives are brought on line with a SAS Expander. In addition, the SAS controller supports SAS and SATA hard drives.

The bottom line is: if eight drives are all you will ever want to attach to the controller the ARC-1221x is an excellent choice. However, if you want the option to use SAS drives and a SAS Expander in the future the ARC-1680x will be worth considering.

http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/norco/1240/

Another very cool RAID 6 option is the Areca ARC-1231ML. It uses internal Mini SAS SFF-8087 connectors. AMUG was able to easily snake the cables out of the rear of the Mac Pro and use this card with the 12 bay Norco DS-1240. Twelve drives in a RAID 6 configuration is an awesome performer. We recorded RAID 6 write speeds of 640MB/sec on average across the drive. If you want a mind blowing high performance RAID 6 setup this review is worth reading.

Have fun!

Just wanted to say thank for all the info and share my results.

Atto tech support recommended downloading the SMC fan control utility and crank up the minimum fan speeds. Apparently the chips on the R380 card get hot fast. I'm happy to report that it worked. I was worried about noise, but I can't hear the difference.

I would definitely recommend the Enhance Box and ATTO R380 combo for anyone wanting some high speed RAID for video.

AVID wanted me to buy their 2 terabyte SCSI RAID 0 for $8000. I have managed to build my own 3 terabyte solution RAID 5 for about $2500. And I'm getting faster data rates to boot!

Does the ATTO R380 have a fan on the Intel chip?

The Areca ARC-1680x provides an ultra quiet built-in fan on the Intel chip that keeps the card silent and cool without having to increase the Mac Pro fan speeds.

Does the ATTO R380 support booting? The Areca ARC-1680x provides this option plus RAID 6 which features twice the redundancy of RAID 5.

Its nice to know that you were able to get the ATTO R380 to work.

Personally, if I was buying a SAS controller for the Mac Pro these days I would want RAID 6 capability, a built in cooling solution (silent fan), and boot capablity.

The real bonus is that the Areca ARC-1680x also costs less.

I would definitely recommend the Enhance Box E8-ML and the ARC-1680x combo for anyone wanting a high speed SAS controller for video or anything else 🙂

Have a great day!