The HTPC: now dubbed, the storage beast

[veedubfreak]

Ok well rather than cluttering up another of my threads, might as well start a new one since this will basically become a worklog.

The new build.

5x seagate 7200.10 750gb drives
intel e2180
arctic freezer 7
gigabyte p35-ds3r
ultra grid case with ultra 500w psu
2gb corsair xms2 ddr2 5-5-5-12
msi 8500GT video card
hauppage 1800 capture card
vista home premium 32

This rig will be set up in raid 5 for a total of what i hope ends up being around 2.5TB of storage space after everything is said and done.

And for the first update, everything is installed, but when i boot, it hangs at the gigabyte splash screen Can't get into bios to see whats going on, so on to the fun part of disconnecting everything until i figure out what the heck isnt working.

 

[lancec2c30]

wow awesome rig..... cept for the whole not booting thing...

Tried running just one hard drive and seeing if it will boot.

 

[veedubfreak]

Ya im about to unplug everything. I know the board is good because it was in this rig until i went sli. Same with the memory. The only variables at this point are the CPU and hard drives. I hate it when stuff doesnt work right the first time. Er well and the video cards.

 

[Deadpixel]

Maybe because your power supply cant supply enough power to 5 different drives and everything else.

 

[veedubfreak]

Nah, the PSU is fine, its only 5 hard drives, a low end cpu and low end video card. Apparently the computer doesnt like my IDE dvd drive. Good news is, at least none of the hard drives are DOA which seems to be a major problem with newegg shipped hard drives.

Confirmed that. Machine boots er well posts and errors cause there is no OS, but with all 6 drives powered up it works, so its not a power issue. Anyone know if there is an issue with IDE optical drives on the ds3r?

 

[veedubfreak]

Ok looks like i solved the issue. So 5 750gb drives (698gb *screw you lying buttplugs*) comes out to 2.8TB in raid 5.

woot woot, its booting to CD. although im pretty sure that xp is going to take a dump when i try to make it install to the raid. But the main thing was just to see if everything works. I'll be picking up vista home premium 32 on monday. At least vista seems to be a bit easier to use when it comes to installing raid drivers.

 

[Deadpixel]

Ok looks like i solved the issue. So 5 750gb drives (698gb *screw you lying buttplugs*) comes out to 2.8TB in raid 5.

What does that have to do with anything problem wise?

 

[Blitersety]

Anyone know if there is an issue with IDE optical drives on the ds3r?

Nope, mine works just fine.

 

[veedubfreak]

What does that have to do with anything problem wise?

Nothing as far as problems go, but it just irks me that hard drive companies can blatently lie about storage size and not get sued all the "4311". If they sell a 750gb drive, it should be seen by windows as 750gb. I can understand if we were still in the 90s, but this crap is getting old, THEY KNOW, that they are counting differently than the OS yet still sell them according to 10^10 power rather than using 1024 that an OS sees.

Also as far as the box goes, its on hold until monday when i get my vista disk. I dont feel like making a floppy to install the raid drivers. Vista actually lets you install raid drivers from the cd.

 

[zerodayATK]

i aways figured that some of the space was taken buy formatting the drive... maybe?