Abstract: In one aspect, a method of a storage adapter controlling a redundant array of independent disks (RAID) may be provided. The method may include examining performance curves of a storage adapter with a write cache, determining if an amount of data entering the write cache of the storage adapter has exceeded a threshold, and implementing a strategy based on the determining operation. The strategy may include one of coupling Read-XOR/Write operations and providing priority reordering of Read operations over the Read-XOR/Write operations in order to minimize host read response time if data entering the write cache is less than the threshold, and allowing all Read operations and Read-XOR/Write operations to be queued at the device using simple tags in order to achieve maximum throughput if data entering the write cache is greater than the threshold. Additional aspects are described.