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Question: How does a OCZ Vertex 120GB compare to an 8 drive 15k RPM 2.5″ SAS Raid 5 array with a fast Adaptec 5805 controller?

Answer: It is slower… kind of… but both options have some great features! Read the full story

As high-performance hard drives move to the 2.5” form factor, a form factor that has been common in the SSD and notebook space, mounting these drives in traditional cases can be somewhat difficult. Purchasing 2.5” to 3.5” adapters allow system builders to mount a single drive to a space meant for a 3.5” drive, but that can be a serious waste of space.

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Just to check some additional 15k rpm SAS numbers, I used three Seagate Cheetah 15k.5 300GB drives in Raid 5 to see what the numbers would look like. The drives are 3.5″ form factor units so they run quite a bit warmer than the 15k.1 2.5″ Savvios that are also in this machine. First the chart:

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Did some testing this weekend with the new Adaptec 5805. Since I wanted to see what this card could do, I decided to try it with some cheap Seagate Savvio 15k.1 36.7GB SAS drives. Overall performance is fine, however there was a consistently interesting note in ATTO’s benchmark at 64k. I tried every stripe size imaginable, and there was a distinct fall-off every time in read speeds. I also tried the newest firmware, same result. Truly odd indeed.

8x Seagate Savvio 15k Raid 5 Adaptec 5805

Notice the dip in read performance at 64k. This seems to be very strange and did not go away with three different firmware versions.
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