SATA RAID 0 Video drive

GeorgeBW · Post by **GeorgeBW** » Sat Jul 02, 2005 8:16 am

Hi ALL,

I have a system comprising AMD XP3200+(2.2GHz real Freq) 1.5GB DDR in Dual Channel, 400MHz FSB. Using UVS9, and currently rigged with 80GB Maxtor +9 System drive and 200GB capture drive on the Primary IDE channel.. Works OK and not too much of a dropped frame problem. But I happen to have a SATA 150 controller on board and am considering rigging two SATA drives in a Stripe 0 RAID array, which sees the two large drives as a humungous single drive.. and theoretically gives a bit of extra performance that might be useful for capture. Has anyone in this support group any experience of using a setup like this... for example..any probs transferring data between the IDE and the SATA interfaces?

Thanks
GeorgeBW

Post by **Ken Berry** » Sat Jul 02, 2005 8:36 am

I have a system similar to the one you are planning, with two 180 GB drives in RAID 0 configuration and one 200 GB IDE drive. They all happily talk to each other and I have had no problems.

Incidentally, I don't think you will have your RAM working at dual channel if it is 1.5 in total, unless they are two 750 MB sticks (which I don't think exist). AFAIK, the dual channel thing only kicks in if you have one, two or four sticks of equal RAM... but I could be wrong.

GeorgeBW · Post by **GeorgeBW** » Sat Jul 02, 2005 8:57 am

Hi Ken,

Thanks for the swift come-back.
OK.. sounds like agoing concern. The reason I posed the question is ..I had a similar set up a while back using a PCI mounted Promise ATA RAID controller to run a stripe array, and had problems moving large files from IDE to the RAID and vice-versa, but the controller wasn't integrated with the mainboard in that set-up.

I would normally agree with you regarding the 3 chip / dual channel mode perplexity, but apparently dual channel mode is possible with three chips if your mainboard mem bus supports it. My M/B is an Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe for which the manual says Dual Channel Mode with A1 A2 and B1 banks populated is OK for Dual Channel. I think B1 might emulate two banks.. ie the chip mounted there pairs with each of the other two.

Getting back to the original topic .. I guess you capture directly to the RAID ..? Any serious instance of dropping frames when capturing High Q mpeg 2 with PCM sound..?

Thanks
GeorgeBW

Post by **Ken Berry** » Sat Jul 02, 2005 9:46 am

I can't really help you on your question about capturing high quality mpeg-2 as I have never done it -- at least from a digital source. I always, without exception, capture first to DV/AVI, do my editing, and then convert to mpeg-2 for burning. The only time I have captured mpeg-2 direct is using a capture card (TV-2000) for my old analogue tapes from an analogue camera (with which I have had no problems whatsoever, including dropped frames). I really have had no problems at all in this regard with my set-up, including no noticeable-by-the-human-eye drops in speed when transferring between the RAID and IDE HDDs.

Thanks also for the info re the dual channel stuff. I have precisely that motherboard on another computer, but I only run two sticks of 512 MB on that so the question has never arisen.

GeorgeBW · Post by **GeorgeBW** » Sat Jul 02, 2005 10:03 am

Hi Ken,

For the most part I do exactly the same ..capture AVI then convert at the Share stage. Just that if you can get the capture that you want in mpeg2 to begin with, it can save a bit of time rendering. UVS9 gives the ability to do this, but I get dropped frames unless I radically reduce the bitrate... or capture without sound. There are no dropped frames at all with full monty AVI Capture... and the end product is very good. I can live with this no probs, but with a slightly faster transfer possible with the Serial Raid, I might be able to capture to mpeg2 without dropping frames.

Anyway you have been very helpful so thanks for that... Have a nice day there in Canberra.. My location by the way, is the other Christchurch.. ie in UK..

best wishes
GeorgeBW

maddrummer3301 · Post by **maddrummer3301** » Sat Jul 02, 2005 12:49 pm

>Works OK and not too much of a dropped frame problem

I have a similiar ASUS MB with the SATA controller onboard (P4C800)
You should have no problems at all with ASUS MB.
Also EIDE & SATA mixed on same MB.
Very good performance.

What is your capturing device?
While capturing direct Mpeg2 dataflow to the Harddisk shouldn't be
a problem with your existing setup.
If you are dropping frames a new harddisk may not correct that
problem unless existing drive(s) are extremely fragmented(not likely).

Real-Time firewire to mpg2 conversion using ulead capturing module
is very cpu intensive.
Average compression is usually 70 to 80%.

Hope this helps,

MD

GeorgeBW · Post by **GeorgeBW** » Sat Jul 02, 2005 5:19 pm

Hi MD,

Just got back... Been taking a look at the Live 8 concert on the box. Spectacular show in Hyde Park London.

My system as mentioned when opening this topic, except I should have added that the OS is Windows XP with Service Pack 2.
I am capturing DV via the generic iLink port on the Asus mainboard and have a ViVo Graphics card which is the Winfast NVidia WDM device.. for capturing analogue video. It is really the AV which places the high demand on the PC's resources and in particular the speed of the capture drive. I think that the bit of extra performance from a SATA stripe array might be just enough to bolster my reluctance to reduce bitrate, and try to keep the quality up as some of the tapes I have been working with are not great. AVI capture is AOK as mentioned.. It is just mpeg2 with audio that tends to drop frames.. Not totally disastrous, just niggling to an obsessive perfectionist. Otherwise I find UVS 9 quite a nice program. There are a load of tweaks that I have to get to learn about, and one or two annoying little things that come up now and again... But on the whole, the results are very reasonable.. I want to add the SATA drives as a Stripe RAID 0... two drives acting as a single ATA 150 drive... exclusively for video capture and keep the IDE system drive as it is... I was putting out feelers to see if this was a bug free proposition.. and it seems from Ken and yourself that this is the case. Thanks guys, I'm going for it...

Best wishes,
GeorgeBW

maddrummer3301 · Post by **maddrummer3301** » Sat Jul 02, 2005 10:03 pm

>I was putting out feelers to see if this was a bug free proposition

You aren't talking about windows are you?
Windows -> May work on mine bgt not yours.......

Uh-Oh.

GeorgeBW · Post by **GeorgeBW** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 7:54 am

Hi MD,

Wow don't you burn the midnight oil then...?

Perish the thought mate.. or 'Why don't I have that problem, when my system is exactly the same as yours.. hee hee?' On this occasion, I wasn't especially pointing a finger at Windows... but it has been known.. I'm just trying to squeeze the most out of my hardware..

Cheers
GeorgeBW

maddrummer3301 · Post by **maddrummer3301** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 2:23 pm

My MB on this machine is an ASUS P4C800-E
When you boot your computer does it display 400Mhz "Dual Channel"
or 400Mhz "Single Channel"?.
Direct out of the P4C800-E Asus manual states:
"DIMMs installed into any three sockets will function in single channel mode"
As Ken previously posted about the memory configuration.
I would think another 512k in B2 would help overall system performance.
(It's only your money.... not mine :>)

You may have to disable Asus bootup screen and disable "QuickBoot"
to see the "Post-Bootup" messages.

Your MB is a differenct ASUS MB though.

MD

GeorgeBW · Post by **GeorgeBW** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 5:13 pm

Hi MD,

Mainboard=Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe,
The pre-POST memory check says that mem is in Dual Channel Mode.
The CPU core Frequency is 200 MHz, set by Autodetect in CMOS, the FSB is 400MHz, set by jumper alongside nForce 2 SPP ultra 400 Northbridge chipset.. The CPU multiplier for CPU output frequency is 11 and for the Memory bus is 2... but these are determined by SPD/Auto. The mem slots are A1, A2, and B1 (There is no B2) Dual channel operation is A1+B1, A2+B1, and A1+A2+B1.. I have matched original 512Mb chips in each of the 3 slots. The MB manual says there are 4 slots while showing a diagram of the board with only 3 physical slots. The configuration matrix gives the above options for three physical slots... and B1 has to be occupied to give dual channel operation with either or both of the the other two. Once the memory is installed and BIOS has detected it... whether or not it is in dual channel mode is determined by the chipset... there is no User Define option. I must admit I was puzzled by the three chip/dual channel anomaly.. but my techie guru pals tell me that Dual Channel Mode merely means that the operating system can strobe memory in Columns and Rows simultaneously as opposed to sequentially which is single operation. For this to work, there must be at least two memory chips and all must have exactly identical CAS and RAS latency... ie must be matched or registered modules...
As often happens, we digressed somewhat from the original topic which was to identify any issues that may have been experienced by group members running an IDE boot drive with a SATA Stripe 0 RAID array for video capture.. Seems like a going concern from your's and Ken's feedback and so I will start building the raid as soon as I can pick up a couple of Max +10s next week.
I don't have any memory problems, and the current single 200MB Maxtor capture drive can deal OK with AVI capture without anhy probs at all.. Just drops some frames if doing MPEG2+audio from an analogue source. Maybe a Serial stripe array will give me that increase in performance that might make the difference... if not.. I will survive... and the capture drive will be bigger and faster anyway..

Thanks and regards
GeorgeBW