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August 31, 2007
mini-SAS, RAID 5, Port Multiplier Controller
A Review of the HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS PCI-Express SATA PM Host Adapter
By Arthur Whalem
HighPoint Technologies Inc. is shipping the RocketRAID 2314MS SATA RAID controller ($199). The external mini-SAS connector provided by the RocketRAID 2314MS can support external SATA direct connect or SATA port multiplier enclosures. Apple Mac Pro users can utilize Disk Utility to create striped RAID sets or utilize the HighPoint web based RAID management software to create RAID 0, 1, 5, 10, 50 and JBOD configurations with the RocketRAID 2314MS. When
configured with an external mini-SAS to eSATA data cable model Ext-MS-1MES ($54), the RocketRAID 2314MS can support up to four 5-bay port multiplier enclosures which can mount up to twenty SATA hard drives. The purpose of this review is to determine how the HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS will perform with an Apple Mac Pro.System Requirements
Requires an empty PCI-Express slot.
Supports Mac OS X 10.4.8 or higher, Windows, Linux and FreeBSD.
Supports up to 20 external SATA hard drives.
PCI-Express X4, compatible with X8 and X16 Interface.
SMTP support for email notification.
What's Included?
The HighPoint Technologies RocketRAID 2314MS external mini-SAS to PCIe RAID controller includes a PCI-Express host adapter, a printed manual and a CD with software drivers. Data cables are NOT included.
InstallPCI-Express also known as PCIe, communicates using 250MB per second data lanes. PCI-Express bandwidth is determined by the number of data lanes that can be supported. One lane, four lanes, eight lanes, or 16 lanes are some of the typical PCIe options available. The RocketRAID 2314MS is a four lane (4x) PCIe SATA host adapter that also functions well in an eight lane or a sixteen lane slot.
During this review the HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS was mounted in slot 4 of the Apple Mac Pro 2.66 GHz model. Mac Pro users can view how the PCIe slots are configured by launching the Apple "Expansion Slot Utility" application. It can be found within Mac OS X at Macintosh HD: System: Library: CoreServices: Expansion Slot Utility. This application will usually automatically launch when it detects that a card has been installed in a slot with fewer lanes than the hardware is capable of utilizing.
The Mac Pro used in this review has PCI-Express Profile option #1 selected which provides slot 4 with eight lanes. The image below displays how the Expansion Slot Utility application looks in this configuration. The RocketRAID 2314MS is identified as a x4 "unknown SCSI Bus Controller Card".
After the RocketRAID 2314MS is installed, Macintosh users will want to download the latest driver available at the HighPoint web site. While Mac OS X drivers are now available on the HighPoint CD, users will probably still want to download and install the latest driver available. The RocketRAID 2314MS Mac OS X driver is installed by launching the rr231x.mpkg application. This process will provide the proper drivers for the Mac Pro to communicate with the RocketRAID 2314MS.
Once the RocketRAID 2314MS driver is installed and the computer has been restarted, users can examine the Mac OS X system profiler data for the PCI card. As shown below, the RocketRAID 2314MS shows up as a SCSI Bus Controller.
Web Interface
To access the HighPoint web based RAID management software the user will need to navigate to https://localhost:7402/ using a web browser. The user name is RAID and the default password is hpt.
While the user name cannot be modified the password can be changed using the "Setting" menu. Macintosh users may also want to disable the alarm. The alarm will go off any time that the user attempts to hot swap hard drives without using the web manager. The "Setting" menu also allows the web manager port to be altered and can be configured to send email reports to users concerning the status of the RAID volume.
Features
The HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS utilizes the Marvell 88SX7042 PCIe to Serial ATA controller chip. It is compliant with both SATA 1.0 and SATA II hard drives and features Native Command Queuing (NCQ) and Spread Spectrum Clocking (SSC) support. The Marvell 88SX7042 controller chip is compatible with both SATA PM and direct connect SATA connections. The FIS-based port multiplier aware hardware provided with the RocketRAID 2314MS allows it to support up to twenty hard drives when four 5-bay SATA PM enclosures are connected. Using the direct connect method of one hard drive per channel allows up to four external hard drives to be mounted.
The HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS is port multiplier compatible and also supports RAID 0, 1, 5, 10, 50 and JBOD configurations. The ability to combine RAID configurations with port multiplier enclosures is a unique feature that few controllers provide. The RocketRAID 2314MS also supports deep sleep, bad sector repair, automatic rebuilding of a degraded RAID set, hard disk health monitoring, staggered drive spin up, email notification of errors, reports hard drive SMART data through the HighPoint web management application and provides SES2 intelligent enclosure management support. However, it does not share SMART data with Mac OS X. As such, users will NOT be able to view the SMART data of hard drives connected to the 2314MS via Disk Utility or with Hardware Monitor. If you are interested in more details about how the HighPoint web manager works with the Macintosh, the users guide is available in PDF format on-line.The RocketRAID 2314MS PCI-Express bus interface allows it to be easily installed in an Apple Mac Pro. The HighPoint web based RAID management tool is utilized to establish RAID 0, 1, 5, 10, 50 and JBOD hard disk configurations. In addition, the RocketRAID 2314MS can be used with Disk Utility to setup individual hard drives or Mac OS X supported RAID configurations.
No Boot Capability
The HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS does not provide boot capability. Users that are looking for boot capability built into a high performance RAID controller should read the AMUG Areca ARC-1221x review. The Mac Pro bootable Areca ARC-1221x controller supports RAID levels 0, 1, 3, 5, 6, 10 or JBOD for maximum configuration flexibility. The fact that all of these configurations are bootable on a Mac Pro with the ARC1221EF firmware installed is a very cool feature.
No Traditional Mac Hot Swap Capability
Most SATA host adapters built for the Macintosh support hot swap. Hard drives can be dismounted and then ejected from the SATA enclosure. Once a new hard drive is inserted it automatically mounts on the desktop or prompts the finder to ask the user to initialize the hard drive.
The HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS driver is not designed to follow traditional hot swap Macintosh design guidelines. Instead, the HighPoint web based RAID management application is used to dismount hard drives while the computer is turned on. RR 2314MS users dismount the hard drives with Mac OS X and then push the "Unplug" command in the web management device window. When the user wants to mount a new hard drive, it is inserted and the web interface is used to rescan the devices. This usually results in the mounting of the hard drive. While this system is awkward compared to the traditional Macintosh method for hot swap, it usually works. The other option is simply to shutdown, make the hard drive changes and restart.
Energy Usage
According to the Kill-a-Watt electricity usage monitor, the HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS requires approximately 3 watts to operate while idle and installed in the Mac Pro 2.66 GHz model. This was determined by measuring the energy usage with and without the card installed while the computer was idle for at least 10 minutes. The difference between the two readings is 3 watts.
PerformanceThe HighPoint Technologies RocketRAID 2314MS was tested in slot 4 of an Apple Mac Pro 2.66 GHz running Mac OS X 10.4.10. The HighPoint web manager version 1.6.1 was installed. Several Seagate 320GB model 7200.10 hard drives were mounted to create various RAID configurations. DiskTester 2.0 10GB read and write tests were performed using a run area test so that this article could display how the RAID performed. DiskTester is a Terminal application that measures the combined performance of a volume and the Mac OS X operating system. Using the command: ./disktester run-area-test --chunk-size 128M --test-size 10G --delta-percent 10 DriveName, puts DiskTester to work testing how the RAID will perform when empty, 10% full, 20% full and so on. The table below displays the performance provided when using one to four SATA PM enclosures with five to twenty hard drives.
RocketRAID 2314MS SATA Port Multiplier Striped RAID Set Comparison
 Mac Pro 2.66 |
||||
| Enclosure Type |
1 SATA PM
|
2 SATA PM
|
3 SATA PM
|
4 SATA PM
|
| Drives Used |
5 Hard Drives
|
10 Hard Drives
|
15 Hard Drives
|
20 Hard Drives
|
| Area Full |
Write - Read
|
Write - Read
|
Write - Read
|
Write - Read
|
| empty |
223 - 251
|
434 - 473
|
566 - 662
|
621 - 732
|
| 10% |
224 - 251
|
436 - 472
|
569 - 650
|
622 - 717
|
| 20% |
224 - 249
|
435 - 466
|
561 - 662
|
621 - 711
|
| 30% |
224 - 251
|
433 - 474
|
572 - 637
|
619 - 734
|
| 40% |
224 - 251
|
435 - 465
|
570 - 652
|
615 - 714
|
| 50% |
224 - 252
|
436 - 472
|
571 - 658
|
624 - 732
|
| 60% |
224 - 252
|
435 - 476
|
568 - 666
|
617 - 737
|
| 70% |
223 - 252
|
436 - 478
|
570 - 676
|
623 - 733
|
| 80% |
224 - 248
|
434 - 478
|
568 - 672
|
614 - 735
|
| 90% |
219 - 222
|
425 - 442
|
567 - 662
|
615 - 715
|
| 100% |
182 - 182
|
360 - 363
|
518 - 543
|
619 - 728
|
| Average |
219 - 242
|
427 - 460
|
564 - 649
|
619 - 726
|
| MSRP |
$199
|
$199
|
$199
|
$199
|
| Configuration |
RAID 0
|
RAID 0
|
RAID 0
|
RAID 0
|
| Volume Size |
1.45TB
|
2.91TB
|
4.36TB
|
5.45TB
|
The table above demonstrates that the HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS controller performs very well with up to twenty hard drives and multiple SATA PM enclosures. The new RocketRAID 231x version 2.11 Mac driver provides enhanced performance and works with up to twenty hard drives configured as a striped RAID set.
RAID 5The next table displays the performance of the RocketRAID 2314MS controller utilizing a RAID 5 configuration with SATA PM enclosures. The same Seagate 320GB model 7200.10 hard drives used in the striped RAID test above were reformatted to create a RAID 5 configuration using the HighPoint web manager. RAID 5 configurations with 5, 10, 15 and 16 hard drives are included in the results.
RocketRAID 2314MS SATA Port Multiplier RAID 5 Performance
|
Mac Pro 2.66 |
||||
| Enclosure Type |
1 SATA PM
|
2 SATA PM
|
3 SATA PM
|
4 SATA PM
|
| Drives Used |
5 Hard Drives
|
10 Hard Drives
|
15 Hard Drives
|
16 Hard Drives
|
| Area Full |
Write - Read
|
Write - Read
|
Write - Read
|
Write - Read
|
| empty |
172 - 167
|
386 - 381
|
535 - 561
|
625 - 604
|
| 10% |
172 - 167
|
386 - 382
|
532 - 557
|
622 - 575
|
| 20% |
173 - 167
|
388 - 380
|
536 - 562
|
636 - 590
|
| 30% |
172 - 167
|
386 - 382
|
536 - 549
|
648 - 563
|
| 40% |
174 - 168
|
387 - 382
|
532 - 553
|
648 - 588
|
| 50% |
173 - 168
|
388 - 377
|
530 - 562
|
631 - 594
|
| 60% |
174 - 169
|
385 - 385
|
531 - 569
|
623 - 614
|
| 70% |
173 - 170
|
386 - 387
|
534 - 563
|
584 - 616
|
| 80% |
172 - 171
|
389 - 386
|
523 - 572
|
627 - 616
|
| 90% |
170 - 169
|
372 - 390
|
540 - 562
|
580 - 597
|
| 100% |
150 - 150
|
319 - 326
|
507 - 501
|
490 - 520
|
| Average |
170 - 167
|
379 - 378
|
530 - 556
|
610 - 589
|
| MSRP |
$199
|
$199
|
$199
|
$199
|
| Volume Size |
1.16TB
|
2.62TB
|
4.07TB
|
4.36TB
|
The HighPoint web manager allows the user to enable or disable NCQ. During these RAID 5 performance tests, it was discovered that disabling NCQ provided a 3-4% write performance gain while using the Seagate 320GB hard drives. As a result, NCQ was disabled for these performance tests. This may or may not be the case with your particular RAID 5 setup. However, it may be worth testing both methods when configuring a RAID 5 volume.
RAID 5 utilizes the space of one disk drive for storing parity data. The parity data can be utilized to rebuild the RAID 5 should a single hard disk fail. If users compare the striped RAID set performance data against the RAID 5 data they will notice that RAID 5 is slightly slower with the same number of hard disks. RAID 5 adds some recovery protection to the disk array while RAID 0 provides zero protection. The price for redundancy is usually a little slower performance.
RAID 10The HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS controller also supports RAID 10. This redundant RAID format creates a mirror of each hard drive for recovery purposes. The RAID 10 volume size is one half of the total disk space as a complete mirror is created with half of the hard drives used in the disk array. The traditional RAID 10 configuration requires an even number of hard disks. RAID 10 configurations with 10, 12 and 16 hard drives were compared against the HighPoint RocketRAID 2322 with eight hard drives in the results below.
RocketRAID 2314MS SATA Port Multiplier RAID 10 Performance
|
Mac Pro 2.66 |
||||
| Enclosure Type |
2 SATA PM
|
3 SATA PM
|
4 SATA PM
|
|
| Drives Used |
10 Hard Drives
|
12 Hard Drives
|
16 Hard Drives
|
8 Hard Drives
|
| Area Full |
Write - Read
|
Write - Read
|
Write - Read
|
Write - Read
|
| empty |
210 - 364
|
275 - 424
|
311 - 573
|
288 - 296
|
| 10% |
210 - 363
|
278 - 428
|
314 - 577
|
293 - 296
|
| 20% |
210 - 350
|
275 - 419
|
313 - 556
|
285 - 290
|
| 30% |
210 - 346
|
274 - 407
|
314 - 544
|
276 - 279
|
| 40% |
210 - 329
|
279 - 394
|
313 - 523
|
266 - 267
|
| 50% |
210 - 317
|
279 - 377
|
315 - 501
|
253 - 256
|
| 60% |
211 - 301
|
280 - 362
|
314 - 474
|
239 - 242
|
| 70% |
210 - 278
|
277 - 334
|
314 - 442
|
222 - 225
|
| 80% |
210 - 259
|
275 - 311
|
313 - 417
|
206 - 207
|
| 90% |
211 - 226
|
262 - 272
|
314 - 363
|
181 - 183
|
| 100% |
178 - 186
|
209 - 223
|
288 - 298
|
147 - 149
|
| Average |
207 - 302
|
270 - 359
|
311 - 479
|
241 - 244
|
| MSRP |
$199
|
$199
|
$199
|
$299
|
| Volume Size |
1.45TB
|
1.75TB
|
2.33TB
|
1.16TB
|
The HighPoint web manager provides an easy way to setup a RAID 10 on a Macintosh. SoftRAID 3.6 does not support RAID 10 and I have been unable to get Disk Utility to create a complex RAID 10 configuration. I can get Disk Util to create a RAID 10 using the command line and a bit of time. However, creating a RAID 10 and rebuilding it is a lot easier with the HighPoint web manager solution.
While the HighPoint RocketRAID 2322 can provide excellent RAID 10 read and write performance, the RocketRAID 2314MS write performance is approximately 30-50% slower than the read performance. This limitation hinders the RocketRAID 2314MS RAID 10 write performance. However, using 12-16 hard drives with the 2314MS can still out perform a RR 2322 eight drive RAID 10 configuration.
RAID 50The latest HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS Mac driver version 2.11 adds support for RAID 50 configurations. Sixteen hard drives were mounted in four SATA PM enclosures and connected to the RocketRAID 2314MS for the RAID 50 performance test. By using a RAID 50 configuration with four RAID 5 member disks, a fast RAID 50 configuration can be created. The RocketRAID 2314MS RAID 50 setup provided average write performance of 459MB/sec. and average read performance of 517MB/sec.
This RAID 50 disk array configuration utilizes four RAID 5 volumes which are striped together for increase speed. This type of disk array adds increased redundancy and provides good performance. Up to one hard drive in each RAID 5 group can fail and the RAID 50 should still be able to be rebuilt.
The HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS ($199) PCI-Express SATA PM controller provides RAID 0, 1, 5, 10, 50 and JBOD capabilities when installed in an Apple Mac Pro. It provides a single mini-SAS connector that can be used with an external mini-SAS to eSATA data cable model Ext-MS-1MES ($54). The mini-SAS cable is not included. As such, users will need to order the data cable separately.The mini-SAS to eSATA data cable allows the RocketRAID 2314MS to support up to four SATA PM enclosures with up to twenty hard drives. The HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS provides the unique ability to support RAID configurations with SATA PM enclosures. This feature allows SATA PM users to upgrade to RAID 5, 10 or 50 with a controller priced under $200. The new HighPoint 231x version 2.20 Mac driver improves RAID 5 write performance dramatically and provides enhanced RAID 5 performance with up to 20 SATA PM configured hard drives. This new driver also works with the RocketRAID 2314.
The RocketRAID 2314MS does has some limitations. It does not provide boot capability. It also does not share SMART data with Disk Utility or Hardware Monitor. The HighPoint web manager also seems a bit slow.
With that said, the HighPoint RocketRAID 2314MS can provide awesome RAID 5 performance using twelve hard drives with four SATA PM enclosure. This twelve drive setup produced average write speeds of 520MB/sec. and average read speeds of 510MB/sec. The fact that an Apple Mac Pro compatible controller with a MSRP under $200 can produce RAID 5 performance over 500MB/sec is awesome. In addition, RAID users looking for even more redundancy will want to check out the new RAID 50 format.
Pros
Works with Mac Pro PCIe slots.
4-port eSATA version is also available (RocketRAID 2314).
Supports up to 20 hard drives on a single host adapter.
Supports SATA PM or direct connect enclosures.
Uses a single mini-SAS connector for hard drive connections.
PCIe 4x compatible. Also works in 8x or 16x slots.
Disk Utility can be used to create RAID 0, 1 or JBOD.
Web manager supports RAID 0, 1, 5, 10, 50 and JBOD configurations.
Provides great RAID 5 performance with up to 15 hard drives.
Online Capacity Expansion and Online RAID Level Migration feature.
RAID rebuilding capability and drive failure alarm.
Web Manager displays SMART data.
HighPoint bad sector repair feature.
User-upgradeable firmware.
Provides hot spare support.
Supports Sleep.
Cons
No boot capability.
No data cable included.
No traditional hot swap support.
Web management software may seem slow with Safari.
RAID 10 write performance is 30-50% slower than read performance.
Mac users cannot change Web Manager user name.
Does not pass SMART data to Disk Utility.
RocketRAID 2314MS gets 4 AMUGs out of 5!
Thanks to HighPoint, SATA PM users can now enjoy the redundancy of RAID 5, 10 and 50 configurations with SATA PM enclosures. With a price of under $200, the RocketRAID 2314MS provides a compelling option for Mac Pro users interested in adding redundancy to their external storage configurations.
Contact Information:
HighPoint Technologies Inc.1161 Cadillac Court
Milpitas, CA 95035
Phone: (408) 942-5800
Fax: (408) 942-5801
http://www.highpoint-tech.com
Copyright 2007
Arizona Macintosh Users Group, Inc. (AMUG). Visit AMUG at www.amug.org for news, discounts and friends. JOIN AMUG!
Additional Resources
AMUG HighPoint RocketRAID 2314 Review
AMUG EnhanceBox E8-PM SATA PM 8-Bay Enclosure Review
AMUG Sonnet Fusion 500P SATA PM Enclosure Review
AMUG Areca ARC-1221x 8-Port, RAID 6, PCIe Controller Review