>Just guessing here but are the RAID configurations the same?

Well, this was my first guess, and remains my nagging hunch. Both are using the same controller, Dell's "perc 2". While the older faster one has 5 9G drives and the new slow one has 6 18G drives, I cannot imagine that the hardware itself is the problem. Both are basically spec'd the same, with 30Mb/s disk to buffer, and 80Mb/s buffer to host.

So from here I have been looking at the RAID configuration itself. The old slow machine was factory-configured, while someone else did the new machine. But I am hoping someone can point me to more detail on what to look for. I know in principle of course what RAID is doing, and also suspect from experience that it should not be possible for the guy who set it up to have strayed so far from the defaults that he could so cripple the performance. But if he did, what am I looking for?

All random thoughts appreciated.