Problems burning from RAID

skoobz 2006-03-20 06:20:01 UTC #1

Hi all,

I have a problem I hope you may be able to help with. I have set up a raid 0 array using 2 maxtor 200G sata drives on my asus A8N-SLI SE (nforce 4). When I check it using HD Tach every thing looks great and the drive is very fast. However, when I try to burn a dvd using any image on the drive it's either very slow (reported 16x actual about 4x) or it fails with "no seek complete" error. I have 2 dvd drives - nec 3540 and nec 4550 both on separate ide channels with no other device on these channels. I have tried nero and alcohol both of which do the same. If I burn from any other non raid drive on my machine they work fine at 16x. I have checked both dvd drives are DMA enabled. BIOS and chipset drivers are the latest. I also flashed both drives with the latest firmware.

Machine spec:
Asus A8N-SLI SE mobo.
2 Gig memory
Radeon X1800xt graphics.
Nec 3540 dvd burner
Nec 4550 dvd burner
300 gig x 2 maxtor hard drives SATA non-raid.
200 gig x 2 maxtor hard drives SATA raid 0.
Athlon 3800+X2 dual core proc.

thankyou

Skoobz

rdgrimes 2006-03-20 08:38:38 UTC #2

Start by performing a CDSpeed datadisc test and posting the resulting graph.

Do not burn an ISO in this test at first, use the default datadisc setting. If this results in a 16x burn, then do an ISO datadisc and also post that.

harley2ride 2006-03-20 09:58:44 UTC #3

I have read a lot of posts on numerous forums, and the general concensus is that it is not good to use Raid for dvd decoding or encoding. There are a very few people who have had good results with it, but not many. Some people have even had problems using Sata, but there aren't many. The number 1, most fool proof decoding/encoding solution, is a dedicated IDE HD, followed by using a dedicated SATA drive. I'm sure that some people will disagree with me, but like I said, I'm just going off results I have seen in numerous forums on this subject. I personally use dedicated SATA drives on both of my systems, and have had excellent results.

rdgrimes 2006-03-20 10:19:12 UTC #4

Sorry, but this is nonsense. There's absolutely nothing about RAID that should have any impact at all on encoding or burning, except to make it a bit faster.

I use nothing but RAID, and love it.

brokenbuga 2006-03-20 12:05:22 UTC #5

Second what rdgrimes is saying. I'm using what would be considered 'esoteric' RAID, and I have no issues at all, from either volume which incidentally span across the same pair of physical drives.

I would guess there is a conflict between the two controllers on the motherboard. Do you have two different RAID controller's onboard? Are all the devices on the same controller, or is one set of drives on the chipset controller while the other spans across the PCI bus? Do you observe the same problem with images stored on the non-raided drive?

Also check to see if there are any updated chipset drivers for your system.

harley2ride 2006-03-20 13:19:31 UTC #6

Refer to the following post links:
http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=169888&highlight=raid+video

http://forum.videohelp.com/viewtopic.php?t=295025&highlight=raid+video

http://forum.videohelp.com/viewtopic.php?t=292141&highlight=raid+video

http://forum.videohelp.com/viewtopic.php?t=294227&highlight=raid+video

http://forum.videohelp.com/viewtopic.php?t=293114&highlight=raid+video

Is raid faster than non-raid? Sure.
Is it faster for video? Only if you are doing NLE with very large video files. No benefit on the capture or encoding process. That is all dependant on CPU, memory, etc...

skoobz 2006-03-20 13:29:15 UTC #7

Thanks for all the replies. I appear to have sorted it.

With me not being able to burn anything from my raid yesterday I went back to just sata (non raid) drives and everything was fine. After seeing the first reply I set my raid back up again to get the graphs. Only this time I used 2 160 gig maxtor sata drives instead of the 200 gig ones. This time everything appears to work fine.

As for whether its worth setting a raid array up or not, the only reason I did it was because I had never tried it before and my mobo had it so I decided to do it. I will keep it for the moment and if it gives me any bother then I will go back to separate drives again.

thanks

skoobz

brokenbuga 2006-03-20 14:54:22 UTC #8

I agree that encoding is CPU dependant and that disk I/O is less important. Which leads to the following...

I have read a lot of posts on numerous forums, and the general concensus is that it is not good to use Raid for dvd decoding or encoding.

Is it important, or isn't it? FWIW, I have first hand experience that RAID is indifferent in the encoding/decoding process.

There are a very few people who have had good results with it, but not many.

Can't speak for the many, can only speculate that improper setup or hardware fault was the culprit. My experience is exactly the opposite, those who have chosen to go the RAID route having problems is the exception, not the rule.

Some people have even had problems using Sata, but there aren't many. The number 1, most fool proof decoding/encoding solution, is a dedicated IDE HD, followed by using a dedicated SATA drive.

This requires your definition of 'fool proof'. If you mean 'easiest to configure', I would suggest that SATA is, as it requires no jumpers to configure or cable concerns. I will agree that RAID does require some investment of time to overcome it's learning curve. Not much of one IMO, but that will vary with the individual.

I'm sure that some people will disagree with me, but like I said, I'm just going off results I have seen in numerous forums on this subject. I personally use dedicated SATA drives on both of my systems, and have had excellent results.

Again, my first hand experience differs from what you've read. I think it's great that your setup is giving you excellent results. My setup also gives me excellent results.

I have read many of your posts and have been in agreement with you on many things. It is not my intent to get into a flame war on this issue, I'm only offering another perspective to consider.

rdgrimes 2006-03-20 16:46:24 UTC #9

Yes, well there's a huge leap in logic to go from "RAID does not help speeds" to "RAID is bad" where video work is concerned. That said, at least here, RAID most certainly is faster for encoding and recoding, although not much. It is, however, hugely faster for re-coding DVD's with no compression, sometimes 5 x faster. I'll wager that the vast majority of serious video hounds and most video professionals are using one version of RAID or another. Working with HD video, in particular, can demand RAID speeds.

Anyway, as has already been stated, most problems with RAID or SATA are due to bad drivers and/or improper setup by the user. We all know what has happened in the past with Nvidia IDE drivers that got installed along with RAID drivers and chipset drivers.

As an aside to the OP, there have been cases of specific drives causing problems with specific RAID/SATA controllers. Perhaps this is what you are looking at.

RoscoeMcGurk 2006-03-20 22:16:20 UTC #10

I agree with these guys, there's nothing wrong with raid at all. It's all I use for everything including all dvd stuff, and I never have a problem. In certain circumstances, it is also much faster. I have two raid0 volumes in my computer and I love having it. It's absolute best feature to me is having two raid0's when you need raw data transfer, oh man does it pick things up.

For example on a program like vobblanker. It takes your movie, and cuts out whatever you don't want for better compression, then dumps the new dvd image to wherever you want. From one raid0 to a single drive, you'd of course be limited to the speed of the slower drive. But when you go from one raid0 to another raid0, it smokes. Gets it done twice as fast. Same for if you wanna backup any large amount of data from one raid0 to another raid0, it hauls ass, and I'll never go back to single drives if I can help it.

So maybe raid doesn't help really for alot of things, I know that. But for raw data transfer specifically, it's great . Also makes your boot time more zippy too. Thing is you need 4 drives for two raid0's, but if you transfer GB's of data often between your drives, and you want speed, that's it.