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 Poor RAID performance

Author  Topic 

cjp
Yak Posting Veteran

69 Posts

Posted - 2008-01-26 : 05:22:15


I am finding that my (standalone) installation of 64-bit SQL Server 2005 is running very slowly when performing large disk writes (I have 4 fast SCSI disks in Raid 10 formation). My main computer runs 64-bit Windows Server 2003, has 8 GB RAM and 2 dual-core Xeons, so it should fly. A small 32-bit computer with an Intel dual-core cpu and only 2 gig RAM is much faster at large disk writes, using non-Raid XP. Is there anything I can do in order to speed up RAID performance on my main computer?

Thanks.

cjp

eyechart
Master Smack Fu Yak Hacker

3575 Posts

Posted - 2008-01-26 : 13:06:49
first thing I would do is make sure that you are current on drivers and up to date w/service packs for SQL and the OS.


-ec
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cjp
Yak Posting Veteran

69 Posts

Posted - 2008-01-27 : 03:51:03
Thanks - I am fairly sure that I am up to date with service packs but will check these and drivers tomorrow.

I read something on a blog the other day in which someone was complaining about RAID 10 in similar terms. The 'explanation' (which I didn't really grasp) was that RAID 10 is good for reading data but relatively poor for writing data. Does this make sense? - The read performance is quite good (much faster than on my 32-bit computers) so I think it might be something to do with the way RAID is set up rather than with other issues.

This is my first experience of RAID, so I am struggling (tech support in my workplace has no idea...): is it possible to change anything in the RAID BIOS so as to alter the balance between reads and writes?

cjp
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graz
Chief SQLTeam Crack Dealer

4149 Posts

Posted - 2008-01-27 : 10:37:03
What results do you get when you capture the following performance counters:

Disk Writes per second
Avg Disk Bytes per Writes
Avg second per Disk Write

They should all be in the physical disk counters object.

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