150GB raptors, Are they worth it?

[LOCO LAPTOP]

I was thinking of getting 2 150gb raptors and set them in raid 0 but, is it worth it? I have 2 250GB 7200 rpm 300mbps drives and one fail on me 2 days ago. my questions is are they better then my current hard drivers and even the 74GB raptors? I don't really care about storeage space becuase I never got over 100GB on a gaming computer, I also dont care about back ups because its only for games.

[ashmedai]

Quite a few threads on this, and it frequently degenerates, so here's some links and you can draw your own conclusions.

RAID 0 and why it's probably a bad idea. (http://faq.storagereview.com/tiki-index.php?page=SingleDriveVsRaid0) This fad just won't die...marketing people must be loving it though.

Test data on the Raptor 150GB. (http://www.storagereview.com/WD1500ADFD.sr) I bring to your attention that the only game-related data is I/Os per second, which doesn't much translate into frames or frags. If you want to spend $400 on hard drives, you damn well better already be on dual 8800s and a Westy 37". Even then, I wouldn't recommend bothering.

I recommend against buying the Raptor hard drives. The price per gigabyte is around $0.75, and it's easy to obtain drives for $0.20 per gigabyte. For this, you don't really get any huge benefits for gaming, maybe a couple seconds off load screens at best. If you get it at all, get a single 74GB or 150GB (either should do given your stated requirements, and based on the data available the 74GB version may be more reliable), and only get one after you have maxed out everything else you could possibly upgrade in your system to improve games performance.

[LOCO LAPTOP]

Wow. after reading this, its almost like a waste of money and raid 0 is not really worth it. (thanks for the links ashmedai.)

If im correct, I should just get regular drives and use one for OS and one for games?

[ashmedai]

I like to use one for OS + programs and keep data on other drive(s), but that's more of a personal quirk (makes it easy for me if I want to nuke Windows, or am swapping out most of my hardware). If you're doing heavy video work, you can get a substantial boost by having separate source and destination drives. Otherwise, just one drive should be fine. 500GB drives are running $100 lately, so with minimal storage needs like yours it shouldn't cost you much at all.

Newegg has the 74GB raptors up for $135 after rebate right now...that may be low enough to entice you whether or not the likelihood of it helping much is very high.

[cerebrex]

whats the point of the raptors? I have 2 Maxtor DiamondMax 500GB drives... and Vista rates them as the slowest portion of my system by a long shot.. should I be concerned with these drives?

[Jester FPS]

I like to use one for OS + programs and keep data on other drive(s), but that's more of a personal quirk (makes it easy for me if I want to nuke Windows, or am swapping out most of my hardware). If you're doing heavy video work, you can get a substantial boost by having separate source and destination drives. Otherwise, just one drive should be fine. 500GB drives are running $100 lately, so with minimal storage needs like yours it shouldn't cost you much at all.

Newegg has the 74GB raptors up for $135 after rebate right now...that may be low enough to entice you whether or not the likelihood of it helping much is very high.

excellent advice ashmedai, that's exactly how i run my setup.

74gb wd raptor main (os + programs)
320gb wd caviar secondary (documents, videos, music, etc.)

I need to get bigger secondary, wish wd made a drive bigger than 500gb, i don't even know why i'm a fan boy of wd.

[Dan_D]

I love Raptors. It's all I buy anymore. (Only because SAS dirves cost too much.) Really I think they are worth it because they offer the best performance for not alot of coin. Yes their cost per gigabyte is insane compared to other drives on the market, but they are faster than other typical desktop drives most of the time and that's good enough reason for me to buy them.

[Citizen86]

whats the point of the raptors? I have 2 Maxtor DiamondMax 500GB drives... and Vista rates them as the slowest portion of my system by a long shot.. should I be concerned with these drives?

I have the Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500Gb, and Disk Data Transfer rate is rated at 5.7... my CPU is rated at 5.3 :(

I love Raptors. It's all I buy anymore. (Only because SAS dirves cost too much.) Really I think they are worth it because they offer the best performance for not alot of coin. Yes their cost per gigabyte is insane compared to other drives on the market, but they are faster than other typical desktop drives most of the time and that's good enough reason for me to buy them.

Like ashmedai said, if you're buying raptors, you better have top of the line everything else before you consider them. But I can understand that if you're used to the fast load times that regular drives could really piss you off :p

Dan_D, do you get really irritated when you're using someone elses computer because the computer doesn't respond to EVERYTHING you can throw at it in under 0.1ms? hehe I think that came out sarcastic, but I'm actually being serious :D

[Riddlinkidstoner]

Dan_D, do you get really irritated when you're using someone elses computer because the computer doesn't respond to EVERYTHING you can throw at it in under 0.1ms? hehe I think that came out sarcastic, but I'm actually being serious :D


I don't know about Dan, but I do. Working as a computer technician is driving me crazy....

HOW DO PEOPLE STAND SLOW COMPUTERS?

[LOCO LAPTOP]

let me update this... I got 1 150GB raptor for games and im gonna order a 15,000rpm scsi drive later on when the scsi card is back in stock on newegg

As of right now I got one 74GB raptor for OS and one 150GB raptor for games.

Im I doing the right thing?

[Citizen86]

let me update this... I got 1 150GB raptor for games and im gonna order a 15,000rpm scsi drive later on when the scsi card is back in stock on newegg

As of right now I got one 74GB raptor for OS and one 150GB raptor for games.

Im I doing the right thing?

I'm not really sure why people would spend SO much on hard drives like 15,000rpm scsi drives... those are for servers, not for gaming... why spend hundreds of dollars for honestly, to save a couple seconds whenever you load a game. YOU CAN SACRIFICE 20 MINUTES OF YOUR LIFE FOR 2 WHOLE PAYCHECKS!!! sorry guess I got a bit strung out.

If you want, I think Raptors are where you should draw the line at hard-drives, they're already ridiculously overpriced....

[Dan_D]

I have the Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500Gb, and Disk Data Transfer rate is rated at 5.7... my CPU is rated at 5.3 :(



Like ashmedai said, if you're buying raptors, you better have top of the line everything else before you consider them. But I can understand that if you're used to the fast load times that regular drives could really piss you off :p

Dan_D, do you get really irritated when you're using someone elses computer because the computer doesn't respond to EVERYTHING you can throw at it in under 0.1ms? hehe I think that came out sarcastic, but I'm actually being serious :D

I do get frustrated when other people's machines or the machines at work suck.

[bbz_Ghost]

I know that sentiment precisely. I expect my 3 GHz box with a 250GB SATA drive (in ATA mode, go figure) with a decent video card and DDR2 533 RAM to perform for me, not make me sit around and wait.

I was testing UltimateDefrag last night and I might create an article about it to go along with my defrag shootout still in progress. It seems ridiculous to me that we have the following:

- Hard drives that can easily read 30-40MB/s sustained, or higher
- RAM that's capable of moving gigabytes of data in a second
- CPUs that can process those gigabytes of data even faster sometimes depending on usage
- The rest of the hardware in the machine to help it function

And then we have this, for example:

- A computer operating system that typically loads about 150-250MB of data when it boots (XP 32 bit is my example OS here)
- A few hundred files that need to load from the hard drive
- Read those files into the high speed DDR2 RAM
- Display the GUI on the high speed video card with high speed DDR2 RAM

Now, looking at that, considering that a modern box can easily load 30-40MB/s or higher, why the hell does it take so long to start Windows, or any modern OS for that matter?

250MB of data loaded into RAM shouldn't take more than what, 6 seconds at most, so where the hell does all the slowdown come from?

Over the years I think as OSes become more bloated (I use Vista occasionally but it's the biggest bloated pig OS ever made, period, and yes I said it, quote me) and the applications and drivers.

I just loaded Vista x64 last night from an image for some testing and installed the latest Catalyst stuff from ATI. Download was 57MB, it extracted to 300MB+, and the ATI folder is about 375 actually.

Why is that? Why is stuff so damned bloated anymore?

Bleh... we'll never know, but I am firmly one of those people that gets riled up after noticing I clicked something and it hasn't loaded... yet... yet... still waiting... etc.

GUI responsiveness and system performance are important to me, but sometimes when you get a slowdown and you can't figure it out, it's frustrating when everything else works so well. :)

Just my $.02... back to your regularly scheduled thread already in progress...

[Justintoxicated]

I know that sentiment precisely. I expect my 3 GHz box with a 250GB SATA drive (in ATA mode, go figure) with a decent video card and DDR2 533 RAM to perform for me, not make me sit around and wait.

I was testing UltimateDefrag last night and I might create an article about it to go along with my defrag shootout still in progress. It seems ridiculous to me that we have the following:

- Hard drives that can easily read 30-40MB/s sustained, or higher
- RAM that's capable of moving gigabytes of data in a second
- CPUs that can process those gigabytes of data even faster sometimes depending on usage
- The rest of the hardware in the machine to help it function

And then we have this, for example:

- A computer operating system that typically loads about 150-250MB of data when it boots (XP 32 bit is my example OS here)
- A few hundred files that need to load from the hard drive
- Read those files into the high speed DDR2 RAM
- Display the GUI on the high speed video card with high speed DDR2 RAM

Now, looking at that, considering that a modern box can easily load 30-40MB/s or higher, why the hell does it take so long to start Windows, or any modern OS for that matter?

250MB of data loaded into RAM shouldn't take more than what, 6 seconds at most, so where the hell does all the slowdown come from?

Over the years I think as OSes become more bloated (I use Vista occasionally but it's the biggest bloated pig OS ever made, period, and yes I said it, quote me) and the applications and drivers.

I just loaded Vista x64 last night from an image for some testing and installed the latest Catalyst stuff from ATI. Download was 57MB, it extracted to 300MB+, and the ATI folder is about 375 actually.

Why is that? Why is stuff so damned bloated anymore?

Bleh... we'll never know, but I am firmly one of those people that gets riled up after noticing I clicked something and it hasn't loaded... yet... yet... still waiting... etc.

GUI responsiveness and system performance are important to me, but sometimes when you get a slowdown and you can't figure it out, it's frustrating when everything else works so well. :)

Just my $.02... back to your regularly scheduled thread already in progress...

One part of the answer is that programing languages are alot more complex making them easier for programer to accomplish an objective, but also resulting in less optomized software. But it's not all bad, through reuse and newer languages software can be written much more secure these days and fix alot faster. if you have ever had to debug a huge assembly language program you would understand why. Think about it... Back in the day a Comador 64 was fast, but why? And before this there was punchcard systems that read all the data from cards. (Data was not boloated, but the space used was) Memory was measured in blocks on the commador 64 and storage was at a premium, so every last bit was utilized. it's much easier to grab what you need from a collection of functions that already exist than re-write the same code over and over and optomize it for each application. It would cost an instane amount of money to still code complex applications in assembaly language to increase performance, much easier to just create faster hardware, it's just not practical anymore and really limits reuse. Another answer is all the eye candy. Obviously DOS was alot smaller than the origional windows, it did not have ANY images to load what so ever. Hardware is becoming increasingly complex as well and it takes more complex software to utilize it.

[young wing]

I'm not really sure why people would spend SO much on hard drives like 15,000rpm scsi drives... those are for servers, not for gaming... why spend hundreds of dollars for honestly, to save a couple seconds whenever you load a game. YOU CAN SACRIFICE 20 MINUTES OF YOUR LIFE FOR 2 WHOLE PAYCHECKS!!! sorry guess I got a bit strung out.

If you want, I think Raptors are where you should draw the line at hard-drives, they're already ridiculously overpriced....


+1. You don't need a damn SCSI drive. Grab a few (or one) 7200.10's and be done with it.

[g1xx3r]

whats the point of the raptors? I have 2 Maxtor DiamondMax 500GB drives... and Vista rates them as the slowest portion of my system by a long shot.. should I be concerned with these drives?

Raptors rate 5.9 by Vista FTW..:p

[LOCO LAPTOP]

I'm not really sure why people would spend SO much on hard drives like 15,000rpm scsi drives... those are for servers, not for gaming... why spend hundreds of dollars for honestly, to save a couple seconds whenever you load a game. YOU CAN SACRIFICE 20 MINUTES OF YOUR LIFE FOR 2 WHOLE PAYCHECKS!!! sorry guess I got a bit strung out.

If you want, I think Raptors are where you should draw the line at hard-drives, they're already ridiculously overpriced....

I don't think its that much money for scsi anyway...
My plans were to get does 2 items.
scsi card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816103045
and hard drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822116010

And im not gonna use it for gaming anyway, its for my OS. I already got 1 raptor 150GB for games.

If you all think that I should not go with scsi for other reasons, feel free to post it. Right now im not buying anything, I did read the hole post so almost everyone favor is on the raptors.

EDIT:
I did a test on both my 74GB raptor and my 150GB raptor. Im not suprise much.
74GB (16mb cache version)
http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j152/LOCOLAPTOP/74GB.jpg
150GB
http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j152/LOCOLAPTOP/150GB.jpg

[drizzt81]

I'm not really sure why people would spend SO much on hard drives like 15,000rpm scsi drives... those are for servers, not for gaming... why spend hundreds of dollars for honestly, to save a couple seconds whenever you load a game. YOU CAN SACRIFICE 20 MINUTES OF YOUR LIFE FOR 2 WHOLE PAYCHECKS!!! sorry guess I got a bit strung out.

If you want, I think Raptors are where you should draw the line at hard-drives, they're already ridiculously overpriced....

It is as hard for me to imagine as it is for you, but there are people out there that make a lot more money that either of us. I define `worth it' as
the incremental benefit divided by the product of incremental cost and cost of capital. People with a large income are more likely to see a product as worth it, since their cost of capital is lower than ours. Also, if a person makes 20k/ month, that person's time is more valuable. As such he or she will have an increased benefit from reduced waiting times. 20 minutes of that person's life costs $38, provided that person works 171 hours/ month.

The problem on many forums are that people ask for `worth it' without the financial reference needed to make an objective decision. Of course, I also lack the knowledge about the exact benefits, but that is another story.

[jkeener71]

Very much worth it!

Once you get a raptor you dont go back! :D

[Citizen86]

It is as hard for me to imagine as it is for you, but there are people out there that make a lot more money that either of us. I define `worth it' as
the incremental benefit divided by the product of incremental cost and cost of capital. People with a large income are more likely to see a product as worth it, since their cost of capital is lower than ours. Also, if a person makes 20k/ month, that person's time is more valuable. As such he or she will have an increased benefit from reduced waiting times. 20 minutes of that person's life costs $38, provided that person works 171 hours/ month.

The problem on many forums are that people ask for `worth it' without the financial reference needed to make an objective decision. Of course, I also lack the knowledge about the exact benefits, but that is another story.

Yes I understand this, some people have the money for it. If I really wanted to, I could have the money for it too. I guess I just don't see it was overly necessary, of course unless you've already spent 2 grand on your computer and the hard drive eventually becomes the bottleneck :p

But I mean, LOCO LAPTOP, no offense, but you want to spend $170 on an SCSI card, and $270 on a 74GB hard drive... that's basically $440 for 74GB of hard drive space! You can buy OVER 2TB's of 7200.10 Barracuda for that price.....

As I said, Raptors are nice, don't get me wrong, but why would you go any further? I'm not going to go do the research, but I'm not so sure an SCSI hard drive is going to get Windows booted up that much quicker... You can buy another Raptor 150GB for half that price and load more programs onto it :D

[Dan_D]

It is as hard for me to imagine as it is for you, but there are people out there that make a lot more money that either of us. I define `worth it' as
the incremental benefit divided by the product of incremental cost and cost of capital. People with a large income are more likely to see a product as worth it, since their cost of capital is lower than ours. Also, if a person makes 20k/ month, that person's time is more valuable. As such he or she will have an increased benefit from reduced waiting times. 20 minutes of that person's life costs $38, provided that person works 171 hours/ month.

The problem on many forums are that people ask for `worth it' without the financial reference needed to make an objective decision. Of course, I also lack the knowledge about the exact benefits, but that is another story.

Exactly. Even some of my friends that game as much as I do don't see my spending so much money on hardware as being worth it. However it is worth it to me.

Like you said it also has to do with income. I make considerably more than most of my friends do. So my spending $1200 for two video cards is about the same % of income as a friend of mine who might buy a single $400 video card. (Just as a rough example keeping with your analogy.)

[LOCO LAPTOP]

Ok then, an other 150GB raptor I got to pick up today. unless there is news about SATA 300 raptors :rolleyes:

[Citizen86]

Exactly. Even some of my friends that game as much as I do don't see my spending so much money on hardware as being worth it. However it is worth it to me.

Like you said it also has to do with income. I make considerably more than most of my friends do. So my spending $1200 for two video cards is about the same % of income as a friend of mine who might buy a single $400 video card. (Just as a rough example keeping with your analogy.)

There's nothing wrong with it per say (sp?), it's a hobby and you can spend as much as you like on your hobby. But like you said, it's not worth it to many, worth it to some. It all depends on how much you're willing to spend even though you KNOW how much/little difference it will make.

People spend a lot more on trying every different type of cooling method/heatsink/water cooling setup they can try to get the lowest temps. At least with the raptors you KNOW it's a given you'll have better load times ;)

Edit:
Ok then, an other 150GB raptor I got to pick up today. unless there is news about SATA 300 raptors :rolleyes:

Really? LOL, didn't know we swayed you so quickly :P

[LOCO LAPTOP]

Really? LOL, didn't know we swayed you so quickly :P

I need to reinstall my OS and I don't feel like waiting and I need to fix my cooling issue anyway :mad:

[unhappy_mage]

There's nothing wrong with it per say (sp?)
Per se. It's Latin for "by itself".
It all depends on how much you're willing to spend
This is what it all boils down to. If you don't want to spend the money on a Raptor, don't. But if you spend the money, it will be money well spent.

[Top Nurse]

I have been using Raptor's almost exclusively since the month they came on the market. First with a pair of 36 Gb run in RAID 0 just to see what all the hub bub was all about. Worked fine for me, but now I use 3 74 Gb Raptors (1 for system, 1 for data, and one for backup). The 36 Gb Raptors are used for games in a RAID 0 configuration.

Is it worth it? Who the hell knows, but I like them. :D As far as cost goes I always buy them at computer swap meets in the OEM configuration. IIRC I paid about $128 each for the 36 Gb ones when they first hit the market and the 74 Gb ones were about $150 each the month they hit the market as well.

Have already decided to get a LSI card and go hardware raid.

[LOCO LAPTOP]

I just toke a pic of the place I put my Raptor 150GB.
http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j152/LOCOLAPTOP/IMG_0282.jpg
It has a nice view :D

On a side note, i know that 2 hard drives are not plug in...

[Dan_D]

I have been using Raptor's almost exclusively since the month they came on the market. First with a pair of 36 Gb run in RAID 0 just to see what all the hub bub was all about. Worked fine for me, but now I use 3 74 Gb Raptors (1 for system, 1 for data, and one for backup). The 36 Gb Raptors are used for games in a RAID 0 configuration.

Is it worth it? Who the hell knows, but I like them. :D As far as cost goes I always buy them at computer swap meets in the OEM configuration. IIRC I paid about $128 each for the 36 Gb ones when they first hit the market and the 74 Gb ones were about $150 each the month they hit the market as well.

Have already decided to get a LSI card and go hardware raid.

I started with 74GB models. I still use them in my girlfriends gaming rig. My main gaming PC has 4 of them and I am considering adding a RAID-0 150GB Raptor setup and just keeping the RAID 5 for data storage. I might even switch that to a 0+1 setup. I'm still undecided about that.

[Citizen86]

Nice pic LOCO! What case is that? I'm actually thinking of making my own Plexiglass desktop case, I think it might have better cooling than my mid-tower case. I'm just thinking about it though....

[mjz_5]

i went from a raptor to a oldschool 160 gb samsung sata drive. man, i am so missing my raptor. i didn't know it made such a difference. unzipping, using quick par and pretty much any multitasking is soo much slower

[Blackstone]

let me update this... I got 1 150GB raptor for games and im gonna order a 15,000rpm scsi drive later on when the scsi card is back in stock on newegg

As of right now I got one 74GB raptor for OS and one 150GB raptor for games.

Im I doing the right thing?

No, actually, you SHOULD have bought two identical raptors and put them in raid zero, but unfortunately, you were fed a bunch of bullshit by people in this thread telling you it isn't worth doing. The fact of the matter is 1. raptors have much better random access times and seek times than normal drives, and 2. raid zero configurations yield much faster sequential transfer rates than normal configurations. Two raptors would have given you a combination of the two, the best possible performance in a home computer.

Based on the fact that you have no long term data storage needs, no need for large capacity beyond 100GB in a gaming computer as you said, the benefits of RAID 0 greatly outweigh the risks for you and you were a good candidate for one.

The idea that you would buy two raptors and not raid them is just plain silly. You got some really really bad advice here.

[mjz_5]

No, actually, you SHOULD have bought two identical raptors and put them in raid zero, but unfortunately, you were fed a bunch of bullshit by people in this thread telling you it isn't worth doing. The fact of the matter is 1. raptors have much better random access times and seek times than normal drives, and 2. raid zero configurations yield much faster sequential transfer rates than normal configurations. Two raptors would have given you a combination of the two, the best possible performance in a home computer.

Based on the fact that you have no long term data storage needs, no need for large capacity beyond 100GB in a gaming computer as you said, the benefits of RAID 0 greatly outweigh the risks for you and you were a good candidate for one.

The idea that you would buy two raptors and not raid them is just plain silly. You got some really really bad advice here.

i have done tests with raid 0 and they don't yield any real world improvements. benchmarks yes, but not real world

[LOCO LAPTOP]

Nice pic LOCO! What case is that? I'm actually thinking of making my own Plexiglass desktop case, I think it might have better cooling than my mid-tower case. I'm just thinking about it though....

http://www.mountainmods.com/product_info.php?cPath=21_71&products_id=359

:D

[Blackstone]

i have done tests with raid 0 and they don't yield any real world improvements. benchmarks yes, but not real world


Nonsense. It might not be dramatic but I know professional PC techs who swear by RAID 0 when it comes to their personal systems.

It does depend on what you do with it, however. Supreme Commander, for example, loads maps almost instantly regardless of what HDD I put it on, raptor or not. Battlefield2, on the other hand, benefits greatly from faster hard disks and RAID arrays with respect to map loading.

Of course the HDD itself is never going to be a bottleneck with respect to games and framerates, but it does give overall system performance and response a boost--it is icing on the cake. I just think it is silly to spend the money on two 10krpm drives and not raid them.

[unhappy_mage]

The fact of the matter is 1. raptors have much better random access times and seek times than normal drives, and 2. raid zero configurations yield much faster sequential transfer rates than normal configurations.
While hurting that seek time. The drives have to rotate farther on average when in raid 0, and that means more latency. You spent lots of money for those 8ms seeks; I see no reason to spend more money to get worse seek times.
The idea that you would buy two raptors and not raid them is just plain silly.
That's a nice statement you have there. Care to back it up?
Nonsense. It might not be dramatic but I know professional PC techs who swear by RAID 0 when it comes to their personal systems.
Ad hominem. "Professional PC techs" may be biased, or simply wrong. Unless you've got *evidence* otherwise, I'll continue to believe my model of how disks work is accurate.
It does depend on what you do with it, however. Supreme Commander, for example, loads maps almost instantly regardless of what HDD I put it on, raptor or not. Battlefield2, on the other hand, benefits greatly from faster hard disks and RAID arrays with respect to map loading.
What I/O patterns does BF2 use as compared to Supreme Commander? Why does RAID make such a big difference?
Of course the HDD itself is never going to be a bottleneck with respect to games and framerates, but it does give overall system performance and response a boost--it is icing on the cake. I just think it is silly to spend the money on two 10krpm drives and not raid them.
And I think it's silly to spend the money on 10k drives and then waste their performance advantage by putting them in raid 0 (for a desktop system).

[Dark Prodigy]

Here we go again...:rolleyes:

[Citizen86]

http://www.mountainmods.com/product_info.php?cPath=21_71&products_id=359

:D

Interesting... you only have 1 mobo in there, right? lol. For my case I was just thinking of putting the mobo down flat and having like three 120mm fans in the front blowing on it. Might not even need an exhaust fan if I make it small enough to just vent out the back. It's a work in progress up in me old noggin :rolleyes:

[LOCO LAPTOP]

Interesting... you only have 1 mobo in there, right? lol. For my case I was just thinking of putting the mobo down flat and having like three 120mm fans in the front blowing on it. Might not even need an exhaust fan if I make it small enough to just vent out the back. It's a work in progress up in me old noggin :rolleyes:

nope two mobos. my gaming and my server in the same case :)

[Blackstone]

While hurting that seek time. The drives have to rotate farther on average when in raid 0, and that means more latency. You spent lots of money for those 8ms seeks; I see no reason to spend more money to get worse seek times.

That's a nice statement you have there. Care to back it up?

Ad hominem. "Professional PC techs" may be biased, or simply wrong. Unless you've got *evidence* otherwise, I'll continue to believe my model of how disks work is accurate.

What I/O patterns does BF2 use as compared to Supreme Commander? Why does RAID make such a big difference?

And I think it's silly to spend the money on 10k drives and then waste their performance advantage by putting them in raid 0 (for a desktop system).

It isn't a question of I/O pattern, obviously there is more to load in BF2 than in Supreme Commander. I was just citing BF2 as a game that improved significantly going to a raptor.

It is true that you take a hit on random access times when you go to Raid 0 but you gain read/write speed so you get better load times and overall performance. I was under the impression that the random access times for raptors in raid zero was still much faster than a single or raided normal drive.

I'm not saying that RAID is for everyone, but this guy is like the perfect candidate for raid zero--no long term storage needs, gaming computer, ect. Instead he wound up with drives that he can't RAID, even to test it out.

[Citizen86]

nope two mobos. my gaming and my server in the same case :)

Awesome! That's a cool case, I like it. I'm interested in all the clear-type cases I'm seeing. Trying to get a good idea.

And can I ask.... what water-cooling setup do you have? I see it all fogged up on the right side there ;)

[Retsam]

My logic is this. People who go around spending $400-$600 for a video card, $100+ PSU, top end oc'd CPU with $70-$100 heatsink and 4 gigs of memory are not going to care about cash. Obviously a 150GB ratpor is one of the fastest HD's out there, so theres really no reason not to get it if you are one of those people. As everyone knows the Hard drive is the biggest bottleneck of a computer. Faster HD speeds are noticeable.

It comes down to what you value. I went with the $100 74GB raptor myself. I definitely feel a difference. If you game and/or do anything that involves opening big files and such, you will see a difference. I think its worth it. Splurge a little on the part of the system that is the biggest bottleneck of a computer I say. :)

Once you get a raptor and use it for a while, try to go back to a 7200hd. You will wish you had the raptor back.

[Dan_D]

My logic is this. People who go around spending $400-$600 for a video card, $100+ PSU, top end oc'd CPU with $70-$100 heatsink and 4 gigs of memory are not going to care about cash. Obviously a 150GB ratpor is one of the fastest HD's out there, so theres really no reason not to get it if you are one of those people. As everyone knows the Hard drive is the biggest bottleneck of a computer. Faster HD speeds are noticeable.

It comes down to what you value. I went with the $100 74GB raptor myself. I definitely feel a difference. If you game and/or do anything that involves opening big files and such, you will see a difference. I think its worth it. Splurge a little on the part of the system that is the biggest bottleneck of a computer I say. :)

Once you get a raptor and use it for a while, try to go back to a 7200hd. You will wish you had the raptor back.

Agreed.

[Citizen86]

My logic is this. People who go around spending $400-$600 for a video card, $100+ PSU, top end oc'd CPU with $70-$100 heatsink and 4 gigs of memory are not going to care about cash. Obviously a 150GB ratpor is one of the fastest HD's out there, so theres really no reason not to get it if you are one of those people. As everyone knows the Hard drive is the biggest bottleneck of a computer. Faster HD speeds are noticeable.

It comes down to what you value. I went with the $100 74GB raptor myself. I definitely feel a difference. If you game and/or do anything that involves opening big files and such, you will see a difference. I think its worth it. Splurge a little on the part of the system that is the biggest bottleneck of a computer I say. :)

Once you get a raptor and use it for a while, try to go back to a 7200hd. You will wish you had the raptor back.

Now I want a Raptor.... too bad money IS a problem for me :(

[Dan_D]

Now I want a Raptor.... too bad money IS a problem for me :(

If you are on a budget, the Raptor isn't the most cost effective way to improve system performance. You should only buy Raptors if the rest of your stuff is pretty high end.

[LOCO LAPTOP]

Awesome! That's a cool case, I like it. I'm interested in all the clear-type cases I'm seeing. Trying to get a good idea.

And can I ask.... what water-cooling setup do you have? I see it all fogged up on the right side there ;)

i have 2 3x120 rads on the front *old pics*
http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j152/LOCOLAPTOP/IMG_0221.jpg
http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j152/LOCOLAPTOP/IMG_0220.jpg


I didnt get the raptor yet since my local bestbuy is sold out :( , I bet a few ppl saw this thread. :D It should be back in stock friday and its the same price as newegg but its retail.

[MajorDomo]

My latest build has 4X 150 Raptors in RAID 0+1 with a 500gb SATA2 backup drive...best of both worlds. I bought the ones with the windows and have them installed in a clear acrylic case....loud, clicky and visual. Bragging rights FTW:D

[Dan_D]

My latest build has 4X 150 Raptors in RAID 0+1 with a 500gb SATA2 backup drive...best of both worlds. I bought the ones with the windows and have them installed in a clear acrylic case....loud, clicky and visual. Bragging rights FTW:D

I'm thinking about adding two more Raptors and going 0+1. I've got the PSU, space and controller to do it so I might as well.

[Citizen86]

My latest build has 4X 150 Raptors in RAID 0+1 with a 500gb SATA2 backup drive...best of both worlds. I bought the ones with the windows and have them installed in a clear acrylic case....loud, clicky and visual. Bragging rights FTW:D

yay e-peen! although I think more than half the time, e-peen is just what someone says because they're jealous of what the biggest e-peen has :p