Author: Vivi The Mage

Categories
Computer Hardware Hard Drives

ICH9 + 6 1TB Seagate (ST31000528AS) in a RAID 5

Hardware :
Motherboard : Abit IP35+ICH9
CPU : E8400
Memory : 2GB x 4 OCZ DDR2 running @ 399MHZ (5-5-5-18)
OS Hard Drive : 1 x Seagate ST31000528AS
Raid Hard Drives : 6 x Seagate ST31000528AS
Raid info : RAID 5 64KB strip
PSU : Antec Basiq BP430 430W

Software :
OS : Windows Server 2008 Data Center Edition R2 x64
Intel Matrix Storage Manager Driver Version : v.8.9.6.1002
Benchmark : ATTO Bench32 v2.41

Here are some photos of the box, not the best quality (iPhone), but you get the idea :
[zenphoto src=”1.jpg” album=”blog/nas” width=”500″ /]
[zenphoto src=”2.jpg” album=”blog/nas” width=”500″ /]

Here are the benchmarks with write back-cache on

[zenphoto src=”bench1.jpg” album=”blog/nas” width=”500″ /]
[zenphoto src=”bench2.jpg” album=”blog/nas” width=”500″ /]

Now here they are with benchmarks with the write back-cache off

[zenphoto src=”bench3.jpg” album=”blog/nas” width=”500″ /]
[zenphoto src=”bench4.jpg” album=”blog/nas” width=”500″ /]

Overall, a great little set up, where I did not have to purchase a RAID card, the ICH9 was plenty fast for my home storage. I run it with write-back cache on, for the obvious reason. I would see sustained copy (When I want to write a file from my Windows 7 box to my NAS box) speeds of around 120MB/s, bursting to about 170MB/s. I have played 48GB movies off the NAS streamed to my PS3 with no hitch (via Ehternet).

I have been running this set up for a little over 5 months now with the 430W Antec PSU in an Antec 300 case. No drives have dropped from the array, I have not had to rebuild at all. I have zero errors in the read/write area as well so all is well. I have been adding/removing movies/media/files/storage/backups from that array since it was set up and running. I have a 7th ST31000528AS running as my main OS Hard Drive, so the NAS is purely for storage.

For reference, you can get ICH9 beta software/drivers from this website :
http://www.x-drivers.com/catalog/drivers/sata_controllers/companies/intel/models/ich9/index.html

Categories
Computer Hardware Hard Drives

oczssd2-2sld120g – benchmarks

[zenphoto src=”as-ssd-bench.png” album=”blog/OCZSSD2″ width=”500″ /]

[zenphoto src=”as-copy-bench.png” album=”blog/OCZSSD2″ width=”500″ /]

[zenphoto src=”attossdocz.JPG” album=”blog/OCZSSD2″ width=”500″ /]

Very fast drive, very comparable to the INTEL X25-M G2 80gb

Categories
Security

How to safely browse the internet

Download FireFox :

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/products/download.html?product=firefox-3.5.7&os=win&lang=en-US

When you run the for the first time, you can select all default options. When you run the shortcut on your desktop for the first time, make sure you have FireFox be your default browser. Since we no longer want to use Internet Explorer (blue icon).

Now that you have FireFox open, click on the “ADD to Firefox” button for NoSCript :
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/722

and do the same for addblock plus :
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1865

Hopefully this helps your home computers. You’ll stop seeing a lot of ads, and random popups, unless internet explorer is badly infected. If so, you might want to run some ad removal cleaners in SAFE MODE. A good ad removal software would be Spybot, or malwarebytes.

Categories
Uncategorized

Penny Arcade

Penny Arcade has started to film short 6-9 minutes clips of the authors/creators of Penny Arcade. If you’re a nerd, it’s great fun watching them go through their office, and watch them work.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/

CLIFFS :

1)They work few hours a week
2)play games
3) …
4) profit

Categories
Youtube

PES – delightful shorts

http://www.eatpes.com/

These are delightful shorts, this guy is great at making them…very clever.

Categories
Youtube

Too cool

C’était un Rendez-Vous from Thom Graves on Vimeo.

Too cool!

Categories
iPhone

iPhone APPS

Some iphone apps I find that are very useful are :

PushMail (If you do not have a exchange server)

RDP

iRdesktop

ping

iSSH

Air Sharing

Some games that I enjoy :

Lux Touch

Pocket God

I Dig It

Price is Right

Topple

Star Defense

Field Runners

Bejeweled 2

Tetris

Monopoly

GeoDefence/Swarm

Flight Control

Sim Cty

I’ve got a lot more, but those are the games I play the most, and the apps that I use.

Categories
Youtube

youtube blocked at work?

http://vivithemage.com/extra/yourtube.htm

works nicely, just input the 11 digit youtube code, and you are good to go! Unless your work port blocks youtube ^_^.

THANKS DAVE over at http://jaericho.com for coding this up quick.

Categories
Hosting Services

Web Hosting Requests – The final

I’d like to finish off saying that you pay for what you get as well. Some people expect 50GB of space, and 2TB of bandwidth for $8 a year, well, I hate to break it to you, but that is just not going to happen in this day and age. Good servers cost money, and if a company is allocating out that much space/bandwidth, you are safe to say they are overselling.

Do you need upgradable options? More Hard Drives, more bandwidth, additional IP addresses, 24/7 staff on the Data Center location, etc Those are just a few things to think about if you want to stick long term with a company.

http://www.vivicalhosting.com

Categories
Dedicated Servers

Web Hosting Requests – Dedicated Servers

There are a lot of people who seem to request these on a daily basis on forums across the web. These are some basic questions you should answer before posting a request for a Dedicated Server.

Dedicated Servers :
*CPU (single, dual, QUAD, dual QUAD core, etc)
*RAM (normal increments : 128MB, 256MB, 384MB, 512MB, etc)
*Disk Space (500MB, 2GB, 5GB, etc)
*RAID (0,1,5,6,10,50)
*Bandwidth (1TB, 30TB, unmetered, etc)
*Port Speed (10mb, 100mb, 1gb, 10gB)
*IP Addresses (1 IP, 2 IP’s, 3 IP’s, etc.)
*Location (USA east/west/central, EU, offshore, etc)
*Panel (cPanel, Direct Admin, PLESK, etc)
*OS (What version linux, or Windows)
*Payment plan (Do you want options for bi-annual, semi-annual, or just plain monthly?)
*Managed, or unmanaged?

Those are the basic questions you should think about when asking for a Dedicated Server provider.

http://www.vivicalhosting.com