Does the A7V333 onboard RAID stink?

**dwb** · 07-03-2002, 08:02 PM

I have had two weeks of smooth sailing with my new A7V333 motherboard. So why would I want things to stay that way - time to experiment with RAID! Should I be afraid of this board's included RAID chip? I am well aware that the best solution is an add-on card, but hell, I own this one already. Thinking about a couple of Maxtor fluid bearing models in the 40GB size.

dwb

**Anthony2816** · 07-04-2002, 11:13 AM

There are many threads saying that the performance does stink...that it isn't much different than a single drive.

If you don't feel like purchasing an addon raid controller, you might improve matters if you flash with the bios available here:

http://www.lumberjacker.de/Downloads/downloads.html

...which apparently upgrades the controller from the "lite" to the full version.

**dwb** · 07-04-2002, 11:46 AM

I am wondering if I might be best off to use the modified BIOS to allow the use of the RAID ports as normal IDE, and install a 80GB drive on one, and my 20GB as a backup on the other. It certainly would be a safer set up. I keep thinking that the RAID configuration should be noticibly faster, but if not, why accept the risk?

I don't know...

dwb

**Anthony2816** · 07-04-2002, 12:23 PM

I used raid a year or so ago. I did the hack on my Promise Ultra 66 card to make it into a Fasttrak66, and added three Maxtor 20 gb drives (for a single striped 60 gb drive).

It worked, but it wasn't really *that* much faster than a non-raid setup. Eventually, I got tired of living with the idea that I had tripled my chances of suffering a drive failure, so I abandoned the raid idea all together.

Now I'm using my A7V333 raid ports to run 4 non-raid drives, using the hacked UDMA bios on that link.

**dwb** · 07-04-2002, 01:04 PM

Is that the "lumberjack" link that allows full 133 IDE support? Is it a tried and true BIOS without side effects? I wouldn't want to get flashbacks, or produce deformed offspring or anything!

I like the idea of being able to seperate all of my IDE devices, not in small part because I have extra ultra sexy silver rounded cables that are single device. Sometimes "show" is as important as "go," eh?

=^) dwb

**Anthony2816** · 07-04-2002, 02:52 PM

Originally posted by dwb
Is that the "lumberjack" link that allows full 133 IDE support?

Right.

Is it a tried and true BIOS without side effects? I wouldn't want to get flashbacks, or produce deformed offspring or anything!

Seems to be. I've been using the 1007 version, and nothing seems different from the 1007 version offered by Asus except that the raid ports are now running a HDD, a CD, a CDRW, and a DVD.

I like the idea of being able to seperate all of my IDE devices, not in small part because I have extra ultra sexy silver rounded cables that are single device. Sometimes "show" is as important as "go," eh?

Definitely. But it has a couple of practical benefits, too. First, better airflow. Second, two drives can transfer data faster if they're on different ports.

**abb1** · 07-04-2002, 06:23 PM

Originally posted by Anthony2816
There are many threads saying that the performance does stink...that it isn't much different than a single drive.

If you don't feel like purchasing an addon raid controller, you might improve matters if you flash with the bios available here:

http://www.lumberjacker.de/Downloads/downloads.html

...which apparently upgrades the controller from the "lite" to the full version.

I understand German fairly well. Are they trying to say that you should flash the Motherboard bios with their 1007r bios (which is also a .bin file for Asus bios), and this will turn the Lite controller to a fully functional Raid controller? This sounds very Risky! Has anybody tried this yet?
Abb

**frobnitz** · 07-04-2002, 07:06 PM

I'm confused about this as well. How come there isn't a seperate utility to load the bios? I mean, if you had a tx2000 card, you wouldn't update the bios with a motherboard bios change.

Thanks,
Frob

**dwb** · 07-06-2002, 01:08 PM

Anthony 2816, thanks for all of your input. Lumberjack has two different BIOS listed for the IDE support: 2.20.2.12 - 1007U1, and 2.20.1020.13 - 1007U2. Which have you used, and what is the difference between the two, do you know?

Also, how do you have your drives arranged on the respective IDE and former RAID connections? Is it best to put hard drives on the IDE, and CD, CD/RW on the hacked RAID connections?

I am getting more and more interested in passing on the RAID, and going with the single Western Digital 80GB "JB" drive.

=^) dwb

**abb1** · 07-06-2002, 07:00 PM

UPDATE: I have flashed the 1007 R1 bios from Lumberjack and it is for real. I now have a fully functional Raid Controller labelled TX2000. I reformated the drives using a 16kb stripe (which you cant do with the "Lite" controller) and got an increase of 7000 pts in SiSoft Sandra. My apps seem to run a lot faster now too.

Yes, Lumberjack is for real.
Abb

**dwb** · 07-06-2002, 08:20 PM

Congratulations, abb1, I am happy tate you found a solution to some problems. Keep us posted on the Lumberjack BIOS, I am looking at flashing it soon, and appreciate your comments on how it is holding up.

For some reason, I am hesitant to flash my board with a BIOS developed by someone named "lumberjack." It would be something like going to a dentist named "Vinnie," I suppose.

dwb

**Anthony2816** · 07-06-2002, 08:42 PM

Originally posted by dwb
Anthony 2816, thanks for all of your input. Lumberjack has two different BIOS listed for the IDE support: 2.20.2.12 - 1007U1, and 2.20.1020.13 - 1007U2. Which have you used, and what is the difference between the two, do you know?

Not sure about the difference. I'm using the 1007U2 version.

Also, how do you have your drives arranged on the respective IDE and former RAID connections? Is it best to put hard drives on the IDE, and CD, CD/RW on the hacked RAID connections?

Since all four channels are now ATA133 ide ports, it really doesn't matter. At the moment, I have it set up like this:

Pri Master: Maxtor 80gb ATA133 (C: drive)
Pri Slave: (empty)
Sec Master: Asus 40x CD
Sec Slave: Pioneer 16x DVD
Raid Pri Master: Maxtor 80gb ATA133 (backup drive)
Raid Pri Slave: Plextor CDRW
Raid Sec Master: Maxtor 40gb ATA133
Raid Sec Slave: Maxtor 20gb ATA66

I tried to separate the drives between which I transfer files a lot onto separate channels.

**dwb** · 07-06-2002, 08:49 PM

Holy cowpoop, that is quite an array of drives, my friend!
Thanks again for the info.

dwb =^)

**Anthony2816** · 07-07-2002, 02:35 PM

Originally posted by dwb

For some reason, I am hesitant to flash my board with a BIOS developed by someone named "lumberjack." It would be something like going to a dentist named "Vinnie," I suppose.

dwb

Could be worse. He could be named "Butcher".

**Anthony2816** · 07-07-2002, 02:41 PM

Originally posted by dwb
Holy cowpoop, that is quite an array of drives, my friend!

Well, I download a lot of images, movies and mp3s. And one of the 80 gb drives is used solely to backup the important files on the other drives (fastest method of backup I could find).

Plus, the second 80 gb drive was sort of a freebie. I had a Maxtor 40 gb ATA 66 drive that started losing data, so I RMA'd it. It was replace with a 40 gb ATA 133 reconditioned drive that wouldn't even format, so I RMA'd that one, and they replaced it with a new 80 gb ATA 133 drive....the support guy said to consider the upgrade as compensation for my trouble with the bad drives.

That's the main reason I only buy Maxtor drives...

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