Overview:

This document contains best practices that will insure that maximum performance is obtained from the SuperTrak EX 4650/8650/8654/8658/16650.

 

Pre-Requisites:

SR3 firmware (version 1.08.0000.00) with respective SR3 drivers and SR3 WebPAM/CLI versions.

 

Steps for Optimal Performance:

These quick steps will help to insure that optimal performance is obtained out of the card.

  1. Only use equipment that has been verified in the latest HCL (Hardware Compatibility List). This list can be downloaded from the Promise website.
     
  2. Make sure cache is enabled on each Hard Drive
     
  3. Make sure write back cache is enabled at the logical drive level.
     
  4. For larger block size transfers, adjust the default LD stripe size from 64k to 256k or larger.
     
  5. In order to maximize the design bandwidth, it’s strongly recommended to use a PCI-e x8 slot. Some motherboards (older ones especially) have PCI-e x8 or x16 physical slots, but the system bios only runs on PCI-e x4 electrically. It’s important to make sure the system board supports PCI-e x8 completely. Refer back to step 1.
     
  6. If a redundant data RAID level is selected (not RAID 0) it’s important to fully initialize the LD before performance testing.