• Some users have recently had their accounts hijacked. It seems that the now defunct EVGA forums might have compromised your password there and seems many are using the same PW here. We would suggest you UPDATE YOUR PASSWORD and TURN ON 2FA for your account here to further secure it. None of the compromised accounts had 2FA turned on.
    Once you have enabled 2FA, your account will be updated soon to show a badge, letting other members know that you use 2FA to protect your account. This should be beneficial for everyone that uses FSFT.

Need advice on next harddrive.

J

jamezzz122

Supreme [H]ardness
Joined
Jun 1, 2003
Messages
4,539
Well I have one 80gb WD hard drive. It is running down to like 4 gb free on my D drive. I want to get another one that is about 120gb or more so I can make it strictly for media. Currently, I have 3 devices on my IDE channels. I have room for one more. SHould I get the IDE? I have an Abit IC7 and I dunno if that supports SATA. Would that be the better choice if I could use it?
 
Yeah, if you have the option, definitly go SATA, if only just for cleaner and easier cabling
 
Get a 200GB drive, the price difference isn't much but the space is. At newegg, the (seagate) 120s were $95 (79c/GB) and the 200s were $123 (61c/GB) last I checked. SATA is nice, get them.
 
Hi I was contemplating buying a SATA drive. I currently have a Western Digital Special Edition 120gb 8mb cache ATA/100 hard drive.

Will switching to a SATA drive increase my overall performance much? I have read into the Raptors and obviously I see that will but I was wondering if just a "regular" SATA will do the job? I do game on my machine and right now I am happy with the way it runs now but I could see getting a bit more performance of her. I would lke to see my load times increase a good bit. Looking for your opinions before I make a purchase. Thanks in advance.

I have the following system:

AMD 2500+@3200+ speeds(200*11) 2.2ghz
ECS KT600-A mobo (hey it was a combo ok?!)
1024mb of PC3200 RAM
WD SE 120gb 8mb cache ATA/100
MAXTOR 80gb 2mb cache ATA/133 (slave)
running Windows XP Professional Edition SP2

Sorry to jack the thread but figured it would be easier to keep just one thread with this topic going.
 
no, you shouldn't notice any real speed difference, unless you get NCQ/>7200rpm drive. but the cables are much nicer. :)
 
SidewinderX said:
no, you shouldn't notice any real speed difference, unless you get NCQ/>7200rpm drive. but the cables are much nicer. :)
Click to expand...


Don't forget in home use enviroments, benches have shown that NCQ is slightly slower than non-ncq. Ncq only really benifits server type access patterns, not home use.
 
SidewinderX said:
no, you shouldn't notice any real speed difference, unless you get NCQ/>7200rpm drive. but the cables are much nicer. :)
Click to expand...
Don't forget that there are 16mb cache SATA drives, like the Maxline III. They supposedly are just on the heels of the Raptor in desktop performance
 
Vertigo Acid said:
Don't forget that there are 16mb cache SATA drives, like the Maxline III. They supposedly are just on the heels of the Raptor in desktop performance
Click to expand...

oh yeah, thanks. knew I was forgeting something! :)
 
If I went with the Raptors or a SATA drive with those speeds, I should expect very loud load-ups right?

Also are SATA "plug-and-play" like how IDE is. If I remember correctly, my motherboard came with a floppy with SATA stuff on it. I don't even have a floppy drive :confused:
 
jamezzz122 said:
If I went with the Raptors or a SATA drive with those speeds, I should expect very loud load-ups right?

Also are SATA "plug-and-play" like how IDE is. If I remember correctly, my motherboard came with a floppy with SATA stuff on it. I don't even have a floppy drive :confused:
Click to expand...


Some amd based chipsets for sata need the drivers loaded during the initial windows install boot.

Raptors are loud under heavy load, the only time i ever hear mine is when i defrag.
 
defakto said:
Some amd based chipsets for sata need the drivers loaded during the initial windows install boot.

Raptors are loud under heavy load, the only time i ever hear mine is when i defrag.
Click to expand...

Ohh I see. With my ABit IC7, I shouldn't expect to need drivers? Just plug and play?

Also, Will I be able to feel the faster speed. I was thinking that since I would be running 2 devices on each of the 2 IDE channels, it would be slow if I went with a IDE drive. With this, it would be my only SATA device.
 
You shouldn't need drivers for an IC7 as long as you're using XP. If not you can download the drivers from abit's website here


 
Yes, that ICH5R SATA controller on that IC7 mobo is treated as an IDE/ATAPI controller under Windows. The Intel driver for that chipset is only for RAID functions; thus, no driver is required unless you're planning to use RAID.

Speaking of NCQ, the ICH5R does not support NCQ at all - any SATA drive with NCQ support will work on the ICH5R, but with no command queuing support at all. And TCQ (Tagged Command Queuing) is supported on that ICH5R controller only in RAID modes - not in single-drive mode.

And I do have a 74GB WD Raptor. The Raptor is, indeed, moderately loud during disk access (though I have owned much slower drives in the past that were even louder than the Raptor at its loudest).
 
E4g1e said:
And I do have a 74GB WD Raptor. The Raptor is, indeed, moderately loud during disk access (though I have owned much slower drives in the past that were even louder than the Raptor at its loudest).
Click to expand...


I think I will go with a regular SATA drive (200GB) for storage now. I will then upgrade IDE(80GB) which is used for programs to a Raptor. That is where I will have the most performance increase with a Raptor right? With programs, games, etc opening?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top