Question about hard drive speeds

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shroomiin

Gawd
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Dec 23, 2008
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hello everyone. currently i have 1 36gb raptor 1st gen but i would like to have more capacity, and a speed increase wouldnt hurt. people say that the old raptors are pretty much worthless now a days, and that the new 7200 rpm drives are faster. a cheap option for me is to get a second 36gb raptor and stripe them in raid 0. now, would i see any performance boost? so basically heres the situation...

i could get another raptor, for 30$ and put them in raid 0

or

i could drop larger sums of cash on a totally different hard drive, (I would get either another raptor with larger cache, or a wd black drive)

which would you choose based on price/performance ratio?
 
I am all about more space, and 72GB would just not cut it. I would go for the WD6401AALS, and as a matter of fact, I am. :D

By the way, you might get more input if you had posted this in the Data Storage Systems Forums.
 
the thing is, i am looking for a hard drive for just my operating system..and i would never use the full 640gb i only need a little more gb space for my os, so putting 2 36gb raptors in a raid 0 config sounds like a good idea. if anything i would get a wd black for file storage,i do want one of those as well.
 
And why not have more space? The 36GB Raptors have what? A 50 or 60MB/s average read rate? My WD6400AAKS (slower than the WD6401AALS) wile being used as my OS drive has a average read speed of 90MB/s, so it's already almost twice as fast and look at all the extra space! And no need to set up a RAID and less points of failure. 32GB for 30 bucks = .93 cents per GB, 640GB for 80 bucks = .125 per GB. I don't know, seems like a no brainer to me.

So who cares if you never use the space, at least it's there! And you get a big speed jump to boot!
 
knothead34 said:
you do know they make 75 gig and 150gig and 300gig raptors dont you?
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He said he has a 36GB raptor, so he will need another 36GB raptor for RAID0. And even then, the old raptors don't keep up with the new 7200rpm drives like the WD6401AALS, and price per GB the AALS will still win out, and you could buy two of them and RAID0 them just as easy as the 72GB/150GB/300GB raptors (benches here). The 72GB raptors still only have an average read speed of upper 60 or lower 70MB/s, still slower than a single AAKS.
 
The larger the drive (if chosen well), the faster it will transfer data so if you get a smaller drive, it needs to be very fast spinning to compete and that costs a lot.
You can do yourself a favour by getting any 7200rpm drive that has 330GB platters or even better 500GB platters, they're the fastest.
The reason being that the data density is higher so more data passes under the read/write head per second, therefore the data transfer rates are higher.

The WD640 AALS or AAKS (if cheap) drives are the cheaper options that will get you really good performance.
I'm using a Samsung 1TB drive with 330GB/platter and get between approx 115MB/s to 60MB/s transfer rate sustained average read/write speeds.
The 500GB per platter drives are even faster!!
 
Twice (or more) as reliable as the 36GB in RAID 0 and about the same DTR but slightly slower seek time.
Forgot to mention the average overall read/write speed of the 330GB/platter drives is approx 92MB/s so thats between 33% and 50% ish faster per drive.
So you will get close to the same performance, the RAID might be slightly faster but that also depends on the RAID controller you use, you can easily end up with a slower RAID system!
 
It's all about density today, rpm has very little to do with it, even if the old raptor ran at 15,000rpm it would not keep up with some of the 7200rpm drives today. Like Seagate's 7200.12 1T drives are said to have sustained rates of up to 160MB/s, that's about the same as 2 of the WD 640 drives in RAID0. So forget those little 36GB raptors. 2 of the raptors will only have a read speed the same as one of the newer 7200rpm drives, that is if everything in the RAID is prefect and you get a perfect double in read rate.
 
I agree with everyone here but in my experience the access times in the raptors 36,74,150 or 300 cant be beat and believe it or not that affects all things you do with your computer.

Just my 2 cents.
 
lakerstowin said:
I agree with everyone here but in my experience the access times in the raptors 36,74,150 or 300 cant be beat and believe it or not that affects all things you do with your computer.

Just my 2 cents.
Click to expand...

Access times are rather a moot point when it takes the drive a full second or more longer to read a file, I will take a 40MB/s increase in read performance (almost double) over a 3ms better access time. Access times only really come into play when there are allot of random reads, and access times only account for about 25% of read response time. However if you HAVE to have that 3ms less access times you can always short-stroke the drive by allocating only say 150GB of the fastest part of the drive and then you have your access times, look at the benchmark link I posted, the #8 post, he allocated only the fastest part of the each drive, take a look at the access times, right there with the old raptors. Come on people, the old raptors are well past their prime.
 
but, since i am only going to be using these raptors for my operating system, isnt access time all that matters'? i could just get the 16mb cache 74 gb raptor instead of another 36gb, better choice?
 
I have 3 WD 1TB Blacks (they are in raid5 tho) but I love them, even in raid5 they are freaking fast :) So I would suggest them, depending on your budget, for about $350 you can get 2x 1TB WD blacks put them in RAID0 and get a 1 TB backup external (or internal) for your important data.
 
I guess I am just sick,I have to have speed,I am speed freak.I have the velociraptor 300 giger and I selling it to get a ssd.I tried one of those and when you have an access time of .01,its unreal.It just feels so snappy when you are opening and doing all kinds of stuff at once.
 
It doesn't sound like the point is getting across here - ditch the 36 gig raptor if you really want a speed boost.

Blue ice is 100% correct in that what you gain in seek times you lose many times more with the speed of the drive. If you can afford it, get a 80GB velociraptor, if not, get one of those WD6401's.

If you add another 36 gig raptor you are sticking with old, outdated tech and you have to consider how old the drive you have is as well as the drive you are buying. They could (possibly, I don't know specifically) be completely different revisions adding an increased risk of failure in a RAID 0 config.

I know it's hard to believe but the 'cheap' HDDs of today absolutely spank the high performance HDDs of years past. If you don't need the space, short stroke the disk or even set aside space to back up a friends computer or something...there HAS to be something you can do with the space on a separate partition.
 
Ditch that old 36GB Raptor man. The new Velociraptors are the only Raptor that can compete against the newer WD 320GB platters drives, and even then it's somewhat cost prohibitive.
I own a total of 5 VR's between 2 boxes, so I like 'em, but I know I paid a lot for that little bit extra. 2 WD6400xxxx's in RAID0 is where it's at right now for price/performance.

Me? I'm dumpin' the 5 VR's and grabbing 5 OCZ Vertex SSD's in about a week when they come out...

But I'll still be keeping my WD6400AAAKS's for my static storage.
 
yeah, i just checked out those new vertex drives and i have to say, it does look very tempting. also, i was unaware that they even made 80gb velociraptors. where do you get those?
 
You may want to google it like the other posters stated. When I did a month ago, I came a cross a thread where someone was "shortstroking" a 640AAKS and it was beating the Raptors easily for an OS. I wasn't familiar with the term at the time, but basicaly it was just partitioning the first section of the HD for the OS. The added speed the larger drives were gaining was due to the density of the platters and it improved everything ! After having the 36's myself, then a 150, I went out and bought a VL300. After more research I returned it and bought the 640 AALS, set the partition for the OS at 100gb, saved the other 540gb for data storage, have one less thing to go wrong with my pc, and stuck the $220 price difference back in my pocket ?

It's your choice. When you're looking at the benchmarks, focus on the real world apps not the synthetics, as 100% gain in a synthetic may gain you 1 second on a 15 second operation in the real world.
 
very true, the only problem with that is..i tend to reformat my hard drives frequently and reinstall everything so i wouldnt be able to use the rest for data storage
 
shroomiin said:
very true, the only problem with that is..i tend to reformat my hard drives frequently and reinstall everything so i wouldnt be able to use the rest for data storage
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They are two partitions, you would only need to reformat the OS partition if you are reinstalling the OS, the second partition you don't touch, so your data will be fine. If you want to spend the money on a new VR, hey, go right ahead, but I think price for the performance is not worth it, when you can get a 640 drive and short-stroke it and still have more space.

The time needed to seek between two tracks is reduced through both mechanical improvement, as it enables the disk head to be moved more quickly, and track density increase, which reduces the physical separation of the tracks, and hints shorter seek time. So please forget about rpm with these old raptors. If you want some good info on the matter (it's a long read) there is a write up by IBM here.
 
alright well, if the wd black drives are just as fast if not faster than the old drives im kind of convinced now. i was unaware that i could reinstall my os on a partition without having to reformat the entire drive.
 
so in the end heres what i can do...get an ssd drive for 90 or a wd black for 80. obviously the $/gb is way different.
 
shroomiin said:
alright well, if the wd black drives are just as fast if not faster than the old drives im kind of convinced now. i was unaware that i could reinstall my os on a partition without having to reformat the entire drive.
Click to expand...

I'm sure you know what dual booting is, so think of it this way, if you could not format and install an OS on one partition, how would you make a dual boot drive without erasing the first OS?

shroomiin said:
so in the end heres what i can do...get an ssd drive for 90 or a wd black for 80. obviously the $/gb is way different.
Click to expand...

What SSD are you looking at? You do know all the trouble the SSD's have right? IF I were to get an SSD right now I would wait a few weeks for the OCZ Vertex drives to come out and get a few reviews as they are the only "cheap" SSD drives right now that don't use the JMicron controller.
 
yes, what i think i might do in the end is get a wd black drive for right now. is there any one specific model i should be looking at? anything different about the different sizes like platter size or whatever? is the 1tb version any better performance than the 500 and 640 gb models?

then once i get enough money i will get a vertex ssd 60gb just for my os

in the end i could use my baby raptor for something...load xp pro on it and leave it in my case just for when i need it? or i could sell the thing. the wd 250gb i have now could also either be sold or kept for a later need
 
Well, from the get go it sounded like you wanted better performance and more space, but at as little cost as possible, am I right in assuming this? If so, my choice would be the WD6401AALS. Also, before you go and get all set to get a Vertex, wait for some reviews to come out, they could have just as many problems as the current MLC drives, excluding the Intel of course. If they do perform well I think I would go for two of the 30GB ones in RAID0 rather than one 60GB drive, as the 60GB model is almost exactly twice the price as the 30GB one.
 
I own a 36 gig Raptor that is running my second system, and I would not drop a penny to continue to use that old technology. Specially if you want to RAID 0 them. You are basically taking 2, 5 year old drives and trusting your entire system to them. This is a classic case of throwing good money after bad. Unless someone gave you a 36 gig Raptor, and your mobo already supported raid, then don't even think about it.

Don
 
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