SSD RAID

[kandrathe]

If you go with JBoD instead of RAID, it doesn't matter (JBoD is sorta like RAID 0, but the data isn't equally spaced across the disks).

I was thinking RAID 0 with these drives would give much better game performance, though, as tested by Anand:

http://www.anandtech.com/show/3618/intel...g2-for-250


In any event I did not have the courage of my convictions, and not being able to find the same drive as I have, I ordered an 80 GB one that maybe will be able to run WoW until the next expansion.

Ok, some thoughts even though you seem to have solved the current dilema... Additional information would help. What are your other constraints, such as, is this a laptop? What is the Mobo/raid controller?

Hardware vs Software Raid -- If you are relying on hardware raid controller, you should be able to consult the controller's manual for requirements (which still may be bendable). It would be more important on hardware raid to ensure the components be more similar, (e.g. seek time, size, and throughput). If you are using Software raid (interrupt driven), then I think the OS would be more forgiving of slight differences. You are using CPU to create a logical RAID volume from two logical disk volumes, and most systems these days are not CPU bound. The volumes would need to be the same size, but theoretically they may not be the entirety of the physical volumes (e.g. Disk 1 is ~40 GB with one ~40 GB partition, and Disk 2 is ~80 GB with two ~40GB logical partitions). Slowest common denominator would be your expected timings, and if Disk 1 and Disk 2 were very different, then I'd expect other sync problems.

Also...

Barring other constraints like size and money... I'd want to have the SSD volume(s) dedicated to serving OS functions alone (i.e. logical C: ), and relegate other applications to a larger (500MB to 1TB) traditional hard disk (i.e. logical D:). One complaint I have with Microsoft OS's in general is that they make it too easy to co-mingle OS, Virtual Memory, application executables, data, cache, and temporary files all on the boot partition. It requires quite a bit of planning and discipline to keep a dedicated boot drive clear of non-OS junk (even including MS OS updates).

Then, for certain apps that may work better on SSD, I'd hack the registry to enable moving certain crucial files to the SSD volume (executables path would be the safest way, "C:\FastApps" then D: ). Thus, your application would be installed on the D:, and subsequent updates would update to D:, but you'd need to manually move the special performance executables to C:\FastApps. If the builds were consistent enough, you might even script the file copy process.