Message-ID: <4E538BAC.4050904@missouri.edu>
Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 06:14:52 -0500
From: Robert Schnabel <schnabelr@missouri.edu>
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To: pgsql-performance@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: RAID Controllers
References: <4E5313B0.6000004@boreham.org>
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On 8/22/2011 9:42 PM, David Boreham wrote:
> I'm buying a bunch of new machines (all will run an application that heavily
> writes to PG). These machines will have 2 spindle groups in a RAID-1 config.
> Drives will be either 15K SAS, or 10K SATA (I haven't decided if it is
> better
> to buy the faster drives, or drives that are identical to the ones we are
> already running in our production servers, thus achieving commonality in
> spares across all machines).
>
> Controller choice looks to be between Adaptec 6405, with the
> supercapacitor unit;
> or LSI 9260-4i with its BBU. Price is roughly the same.
>
> Would be grateful for any thoughts on this choice.

I'm by no means an expert but it seems to me if you're going to choose 
between two 6 GB/s cards you may as well put SAS2 drives in.  I have two 
Adaptec 6445 cards in one of my boxes and several other Adaptec series 5 
controllers in others.  They suit my needs and I haven't had any 
problems with them.  I think it has been mentioned previously but they 
do tend to run hot so plenty of airflow would be good.

Bob