> Good points. However, I have heard disk array sales people
> try to claim
> controller caching improves both read and write performance.

On systems that don't do effective read-ahead, it probably will help reads.
On MPE, read caching on the controller is probably wasted effort. I wonder
if MPE-oriented controllers can be configured to "write-only" caching? If
they used their cache only for writing (in "write-back" mode with power
protection), and bypassed the cache completely on reads, they might do even
better.

> In answer to
> your question in your other posting, the AutoRAID cache is 96
> MB, pretty
> small by today's standards.

Definitely small for higher-end hardware. Heck, even "PC class" hardware
like Mylex's PCI-card RAID controllers go up to 256MB!


Steve Dirickson   WestWin Consulting
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