[GLLUG] Disk drive controller question

[Stanley C. Mortel]

Points 1 and 2 have already been accounted for.  Copy partition on A 
attached to on-board IDE to B attached to 3WARE: takes 5 minutes.  Now 
just disconnect the cables at the drives and swap them around.  Copy 
partition on A attached to 3WARE to B attached to on-board IDE:  takes 2 
hours.  Point 3 is, I suppose, possible, but the on-board IDE controller 
works just fine and isn't THAT old.  If it could only write about 1/24th 
as fast as the 3WARE card then either the system would suck in normal 
operation or the 3WARE card would be worth a lot of money.  Besides 
that, the on-board IDE controller would have to be only writing at 
1/24th of what the drive is capable of.  I haven't taken a look at the 
specs of the drive, but, again, the system and IDE controller are not 
that old, and they work as expected.  Also, they are both on the same 
PCI-33 bus.  I may be that the 3WARE card is caching a bunch, but for a 
sustained transfer like this, that wouldn't account for the difference.

I think.

Stan



Bill Bartilson wrote:
> One is obviously faster than the other.   :)
>
> All kidding aside, if you want to shed light on what the actual  
> differences are:
>
> 1.  Swap the drives.  I know you say they are identical, but they  
> can't be.  Each drive has different physical parts.  One drive might  
> be dying, one might be healthy.  At any rate, it's only science if you  
> can duplicate it.  Mark one 'A' and one 'B' and try each on each  
> different controller, copying each way, and note any differences, and  
> whether the differences follow the drive or not.
>
> 2.  Repeat the same deal with each other item.  (IDE wires, different  
> jumper settings on the drive, anything else you can think of to  
> change.)  Keep good notes.
>
> 3.  Try a different piece of software (Gparted or something)  Perhaps  
> the code written for reading data with controller X works much better  
> with controller X, but only for long reads, and works like crap for  
> long writes.  I dunno.
>
> Via process of elimination, you'll discover that one controller reads  
> or writes a lot faster, one of the drives is actually not so good, or  
> something in the code itself is different.
>
> This all presumes it's not merely an intellectual question and you  
> care to 'know' the answer.  I for one would be interested to hear your  
> findings if you care to try.
>
> Me thinks the most likely scenario is that one of the drives is  
> getting funky.  In which case I'd say Spinrite them both before you  
> try anything else.
>
> Regards,
> B
>
>
> On Feb 6, 2009, at 2:35 PM, Stanley C. Mortel wrote:
>
>   
>> OK, here's the deal.  I'm using Acronis to copy a partition from one  
>> IDE
>> drive to another identical drive, both are 120 GB with a single
>> partition.  One drive is connected to the on-board IDE controller, the
>> other is connected to a 3WARE RAID controller with only one drive on
>> it.  Each drive is alone on its channel / cable, set to cable  
>> select, on
>> the right connector, etc.  If I copy from the IDE to the 3WARE, it  
>> takes
>> about 5 minutes.  If I try it the other way around, it tells me it is
>> going to take 2 hours.  There is nothing in my knowledge base to  
>> explain
>> this.  Anyone know why this would happen?  If you don't know for sure,
>> any reasonable ideas?
>>
>> Stan
>>
>>
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