Asus P5W64-WS Professional Motherboard
More testing with PCMark05's HDD Performance module along with the P5W64 WS and the Areca PCI Express RAID controller is detailed below...
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We ran the ARC-1210 RAID card in different slots on the motherboard, to look at performance over a X8 or X4 PCI Express connection. Scores labeled with "X4 SB" were taken with the card in the third slot which is enabled with a X4 PCIe link off the Southbridge in the 975X chipset. Scores labeled with "X8 Switch" were taken in the forth slot with a X8 PCI Express connection driven from the IDT PCI Express switch on this motherboard.
The Areca RAID controller with the P5W64 WS shows a distinct advantage for write performance over a X8 PCI Express link with the on-board switch versus the X4 link on the Southbridge, whether in a two drive RAID 0 configuration or three drive RAID 5 setup. Virus scan, which is virtually all read request workload, shows a similar but less pronounced performance scale between the setups. And again the ICH7R is completely outclassed by the hardware-assisted RAID solutions listed above. This is to be expected of course and it's important to remember that ICH7R RAID functionality is basically a free-bee with the 975X chipset.
