What you're describing is two sets of RAID 1'd arrays, and for that I'm fairly sure you should go with a dedicated card. Kllrnohj, are you sure that current mobos with onboard RAID controllers can deal with managing concurrent but separate arrays?

So. I went through NewEgg and setup a wishlist to detail what I have in mind, it came to just over 4k.

I started thinking that a TV isn't the best option for photo editing but I don't think humans can differentiate 20000:1 from 50000:1, so I went with a 32" 1080p TV with a 20000:1 contrast ratio.

The largest price points is the CPU (6-core 3.0GHz for 1k), 12GB's of RAM, the 32" TV, 2 RAID cards* and 7 Ultimate 64b. Other than that nothing is really over 250$, unless you count 5x 2TB HDD's at 109 a pop.

*I listed two because it sounds like I need to connect the drives to the card and to have two arrays I'd need two cards, so.

Any chance that you could make that wishlist public or something, Comic? It asks me to log in.

That's because those specs are completely, 100% made up. Dynamic contrast are literally numbers pulled out of thin air, ignore them. What matters is STATIC contrast (which tends to range from 500:1 to 1200:1), and color reproduction. And really, accurate colors matter for more for pro photography than contrast ratio. For that, you *need* an IPS panel and you *need* colorimeter. Truly, those two are *far* more important than a fast computer. Otherwise, if you get a TV, you'll end up with colors that aren't accurate, and no way to properly calibrate it. There are also other things you should be aware of, like 10 bit panels and wide gamut displays. I have a calibrated wide gamut display - it's fantastic. Beware, most displays (which are TN) are only 6 bit.

Here, check out some reviews of monitors: http://www.tftcentral.co.uk/reviews.htm

In particular, this one: http://www.tftcentral.co.uk/reviews/nec_pa241w.htm



Without being able to see the build, you really only need 1 raid card (if that), since the motherboard has one. And you might not need two RAID sets at all.



Don't be ridiculous. Worst comes to worst and the mobo can't do two RAID arrays, then use the mobo's RAID for one set and a cheap RAID card for the other.



Nope.

I still feel like $4k is a shocking price point for the kind of specs you have notched, so I'm interested to see this wish list, comic.

I know for 90% of the mobo's out there the "hardware" raid is really what is known as fakeraid, which is just storing the raid settings in the hardware and then the drivers are doing all of the syncing and such. From what I understand that would be just as bad if not worse than software raid.

I checked to see if the list is "shared" and it is. I made it private again then set it back to "Public" but it's still not showing up in the Public Listing.

So, I hacked a link together. Clicking another public list then substituting it's ID with mine...

Yes, but fakeraid is still far, far superior to software raid. And it's not completely "fake".



There are some major problems with that build:

1) RAM won't work. You chose server RAM, you need desktop RAM. Also, it's stupid expensive. Get this instead: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227538

2) You picked a more expensive case, any particular reason? Almost looks like you just went down the line and bought more expensive versions of everything I picked out. If you want the best, this is the current best case out there: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811139001&Tpk=800d

3) Save yourself some money, get the OEM version of Win 7, not the retail: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116762

4) You're spending a *lot* of money on those RAID cards. What RAID setup are you looking to have? You aren't running a server, you don't need high end RAID cards.

5) You've still got a TV on there. A TV is for watching TV. It is not a professional display. I said it before I'll say it again, its a complete waste of money to buy a nice camera if you are going to edit your pictures on a shit display. You're spending your money in the wrong direction. Display first, desktop second. Doesn't matter how well photoshop runs if your display makes blue look purple, now does it?

6) I highly recommend getting at least one SSD for OS+Programs. Something in the ~60-80gb range is fine. It makes a *huge* difference. Something like this would be good: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227611

Oh, Server RAM differs from Desktop? I figured it'd be the same just built to handle a larger/intensive load.

I went with the case linked because it shows great ventilation in the photos. The brushed aluminum of the Corsair is really nice, but it's not enough to make me drop 279$ on a rectangle. I'll admit, the front loading HDD bays are nice.

I also believe the COOLER MASTER had USB 3.0 ports - and 2.0. The 3.0 will be great when more devices use such a connection.

Sounds like a great idea!

Just to have two drive RAID array for both photos and client information. I saw the 300MB/s and went with those. Not the best spending model.

Now that I actually see this - must have missed it earlier - it makes sense. I've hooked my laptop up and my photos never look as good coming from my laptop as they do when on display from a console.

But I'd eventually like to use a TV for a Monitor, or find a Monitor with a secondary HD port for TV. But I can wait on that.

Hm, that's a rather good deal. I'll take that advice.

I'd imagine there's no harm in setting the SSD has the Master drive and the other HDD's as slaves, correct?

No, it actually has ECC which isn't compatible with desktop chips. Basically it has error checking, but that makes it slower.



So are you familiar with the RAID options available? You don't need two RAID arrays for that. Instead, you can use 3x2TB hdds in RAID 5. That gives you a total usable size of 4TB with redundancy. Why do you want two separate RAID arrays?

And for your uses, the mobo's built in fakeraid is fine.

Oh, and FYI, RAID absolutely does not replace backups. You still need to backup your data, even with RAID redundancy. Mainly because drives have gotten so large, that the chances of a second drive dying while rebuilding the RAID is huge.



SATA doesn't have Master/Slave. There is a single drive per connection. 6 SATA ports limits you to 6 drives. I boot to a 64gb SSD, and have 2x1.5TB in RAID 0 for games (in addition to a couple of other drives)

I might actually consider doing that one of these days, although I think I'm more likely to invest in an SSD for my laptop for ruggedness before I get one for my desktop. Kllrnohj covered pretty much everything I was going to say when I read through your list: the expensive case, the ECC RAM, the horribly expensive case, and the very expensive RAID card (and the TV, but he had also already discussed that before you posted the working link). I tend to agree with him about using a RAID 5 setup with three drives for 4TB and the remaining two drives as another 4TB - maybe use the RAID to backup the other 4TB? Just a thought.

I'll respond with a quote P:One array for photos, one array for client. The client drive won't be storing massive data, so I could likely get by with 250 or 512GB drives.

Another answer via quote:

So, how does the Mother board know which drive is/will be the Main drive? I suppose I assign that on OS install and it just remembers which one is the bootable drive?

I would use the other 2 drives to backup the RAID, actually. Then if a drive suddenly dies, you still have time to do another backup before rebuilding the RAID array.

And the case isn't THAT expensive. I have this case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119160&cm_re=HAF_932-_-11-119-160-_-Product and it is really, really good, I highly recommend it. Great airflow, and it's *quiet*. Not silent, but I do occasionally have to look to see if it's on. The HAF-X actually has slightly smaller fans. Good looking case, don't know if it's worth another $70 though.

If you are interested, there are some good case reviews here: http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/content/reviews/computer_cases/

Some other cases worth considering: (especially if you don't need something that big)
Raven2 (supposed to have good airflow): http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811163154

Antec 1200: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129043

Silverstone FT02 (has a 2.5" bay for an SSD): http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811163161

Silverstone TJ10 if you want something awesome that isn't black: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811163090

Full tower cases are *BIG*, I don't know if you are OK with that, but do take a look at the dimensions on the case if you care at all about size.

As you flip through Newegg's case list, Silverstone and Lian-Li are top notch companies, almost all of their cases are excellent. Well, Lian-Li used to be, I think they still are. Antec, Cooler Master, and Thermaltake are sort of more midrange. They make some great cases, and they make some crap cases. But in general they are good as well.



That doesn't answer why you want 2 *arrays*. That could easily be 2 folders on 1 partition, or 2 partitions on 1 array. Why do you want 2 *arrays*? 3x 2TB hdds in RAID 5 gives you 4TB to divide between pictures and clients however you want. Even just 2x 2TB drives in RAID 1 still gives you 2 TB to divide up however you want.



You set the boot order. Which HDD is first in the boot order, second, etc...

One array for client and one array for photos. I'd go with partitions but I'd rather not sacrifice photo space for client space, even if it is 250GB or less.

Think this through:

Scenario 1:
You buy 4 2TB hdds. You set them up in 2 RAID 1 arrays. That gives you 4TB total space, 2TB for photos, 2TB for clients (or if you only get 512gb hdds, that gives you 512gb for clients) - or 4 TB total (or 2.5tb total).

Scenario 2:
You buy 3 2TB hdds. You set them up in 1 RAID 5 array. That gives you 4 TB total space, which you can then partition as 3.5tb for photos, 512gb for clients. Or you could just use 2 folders, and then they grow as they please.

In both scenarios you end up with 4TB total space. In the first, it is divided at the size of the 2 arrays. In the second, it can be divided however you want or not at all. You still haven't presented a reason to use 2 *ARRAYS*. I honestly can't even think of a reason to use 2 arrays. If you have enough drives for 2 arrays, it always makes more sense to simply make 1 array with those drives.

In case you are unaware, RAID isn't limited to 2 or 3 drives. You can have a single RAID array with 20+ drives in it, if you want.

And if you go with 2 arrays you *are* sacrificing photo space for clients. It is no different from simply partitioning the RAID array.

So I could have, say, 3.75TB and .25TB for photos and clients if I use one 4TB array by using two folders to store the respective information in.

If I go with RAID 5, how exactly does that work? I read up on it and sounds like it keeps parts of data on each drive so there is never a complete file anywhere, or if there is it's on at least one drive.

Exactly, assuming you actually have 3.75TB of pictures and .25TB of client information.

And if you want partitions, remember that those can be grown/shrunk as needed. Win 7 will actually do that for you, no 3rd party tools needed. Although I recommend just using folders - simpler, no real downsides.



It works through the magic of XOR. Lets say you want to write 2 bytes, A and B. You write A to drive 1, B to drive 2, and A ^ B (which we'll call C) to drive 3. Now if any of the drives fail, you can recover the data. If drive 3 fails, A ^ B gets you C again. If drive 2 fails, A ^ C gets you B. and if drive 1 fails, B ^ C gets you A.

Oh, I guess I never thought about using one or more physical disks as each "disk" of the RAID array, but that makes lots of sense. Thanks, Kllrnohj.

Wait, WHAT? The whole point of RAID is to use multiple physical disks. If you are using multiple partitions on one disk, then what's the point? To make things slower?

You know exactly what I mean. >_< Using a pair of PAIRS of disks for RAID 1, for example, or three PAIRS of disks (even three TRIPLETS of disks!) for RAID 5.