SRT Questions

[boozie]

Quick version:
Building a PC, don't have the funds for an SSD atm. Can I install an SSD and enable SRT down the road without having to reformat/reinstall windows?

Long Version:
What I know about SRT is that you have to have the mode set to RAID in BIOS. What I don't understand is if you can enable RAID while you only have one drive installed. Normally I would think no, but seeing the ASROCK SRT instructions it says:

※ Note:
Please DO NOT connect SSD to the system at the moment.

Step 2:
Please press F2 or DEL to enter BIOS > Advanced > Storage Configuration.

Step 3:
Please set SATA mode to [RAID Mode] as shown below


Step 4:
In RAID ROM screen, HDD status should be "Non-RAID Disk”

Step 5:
Please install OS in SATA HDD, after installation, please shut down your system and connect SSD to SATA ports listed above.

This would make me think that I could do it way later if I wanted to but I want to make sure.

 

[bryanW1995]

Can I install an SSD and enable SRT down the road without having to reformat/reinstall windows?

Yes you can, just use RAID mode when you first install windows.

 

[boozie]

Yes you can, just use RAID mode when you first install windows.

Followup question:

Building a new PC (don't have the SSD yet), I will install windows and use RAID mode. However, I wanted to also bring over another HDD from an older computer that has important files on it. Will the 2nd HDD be read/useable if I install windows in RAID mode and later attach this 2nd drive (which is not in RAID mode).

 

[tweakboy]

I urge you to install OS on SSD now! I mean a 128GB is 89 dollars. Save up a little and get it from www.amazon.com .....

 

[gpse]

Install Windows with the BIOS set to RAID
add SSD whenever you want (64GB max)
you can add the other drive and read\write without issue, even in RAID mode, you just can't boot using that non-raid drive.

 

[boozie]

I urge you to install OS on SSD now! I mean a 128GB is 89 dollars. Save up a little and get it from www.amazon.com .....

Well the PC is for my wife and I don't want to micromanage when she instantly fills up the SSD. I do realize prices are incredibly low, it's just a matter of me settling for a bit less performance at the gain of less hassle.

Install Windows with the BIOS set to RAID
add SSD whenever you want (64GB max)
you can add the other drive and read\write without issue, even in RAID mode, you just can't boot using that non-raid drive.

Awesome news, thanks!

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Well the PC is for my wife and I don't want to micromanage when she instantly fills up the SSD. I do realize prices are incredibly low, it's just a matter of me settling for a bit less performance at the gain of less hassle.



Awesome news, thanks!

Tweakboy promotes a view that ISRT somehow isn't worth it if you just install your OS directly on an SSD. No criticism intended, but I've had this Z68 system up and running 24/7 since about August, 2011, when I installed my final choice of an SSD purely for caching/disk-acceleration (ISRT).

I stand firm on my position that this ISRT option is absolutely stellar for a mobo and BIOS which supports it reliably. You end up with 80% of the performance of the SSD as a standalone boot drive, and as much as 400% of the performance of a standalone HDD as a boot drive. I've yet to experience a single glitch or problem with it.

Further -- the SSD should be an SATA-III model and connected to an SATA-III port. The HDD can be either -II or -III, but you're probably just as well to connect it to an SATA-II port.

This solution is especially nice because you can unhinge the SSD at any time and boot from the HDD without any issues in windows -- you'll only notice a decrease in speed and performance. And of course you can install windows on your HDD now, continue to use the computer, and then add the SSD and IRST Intel software later to implement the ISRT feature. Just make sure that you have an SATA-III port available at that time on the same Intel controller as your HDD (another reason to set up the HDD on an SATA-II port.)

Even so, I'm not sure why you want to wait. First -- you do NOT want to use an SSD larger than 60 to 64 GB for this caching. Second, there are some good candidates out there you might want to look at which fill the size criterion. Third, they are all less than $100 -- and they're getting cheaper.

Take a look at the Patriot Pyro 60GB SATA-III SSD, and maybe the Intel 520 Cherryville 60GB SATA_III SSD. I can vouch personally for at least one Pyro -- that's the one I'm using.

Whichever SSD you choose, limit the size to 60/64GB and verify that the sequential read-rate is greater than 500MB/s with a write-rate over 400MB/s. Some of these SATA-III SSD's have slower write-rates, and you can do better than that.

 

[bradcollins]

Using an SSD above 64gb is perfectly fine. RST won't be able to use it of course, but you can use a seperate partition for other data if you like, or of course you can just leave it unpartitioned entirely and effectively overprovision the SSD. There are a number of reasonable 60gb SSD's at about $65-70, Vertex 3, Intel 330, even the Plextor M5S, but the step up to 120gb isn't much more, there are a number of drives available around $100 that are quite good and are faster as well as allowing you to do what I suggested above.

 

[gpse]

I used a Crucial M4 64GB when I was running IRST, worked great!
best part is only 1 drive shows up in Windows, so it's not confusing at all, it just seems like you have 1 super fast, large capacity hard drive. (great for people who aren't computer savvy and don't wanna mess with two drives showing up in windows explorer)

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I used a Crucial M4 64GB when I was running IRST, worked great!
best part is only 1 drive shows up in Windows, so it's not confusing at all, it just seems like you have 1 super fast, large capacity hard drive. (great for people who aren't computer savvy and don't wanna mess with two drives showing up in windows explorer)

There was some confusion about the "RAID" configuration. Or -- people wonder how you can "RAID" one drive. Or -- they get confused and think the accelerated HDD is "part of" a RAID volume.

How the disks are configured in BIOS as "RAID" has nothing to do with whether they'll be "part of" a RAID configuration. The BIOS setting allows implementing the RAID "configuration" for the SSD, while your accelerated HDD is a separate entity. That's why it's so easy to unhinge the caching/acceleration in the IRST software and simply boot the HDD as "un-accelerated." And -- if you want -- you could RAID0 or RAID1 two HDDs and then deploy ISRT and an SSD to cache the resulting RAID volume.

Tutored speculation, but suppose you had a RAID0 of two -III HDDs on two -II ports. I've seen the new -III drives showing burst and sustained rates between 100 and 150 MB/s. You'd probably double the throughput to the ~300MB/s SATA-II limit. Caching it would put you closer to the standalone SSD -III performance than just "80%." But power usage goes up, and risk of failure goes up, even though the caching puts less stress on the HDDs bringing that same failure risk down somewhat.