Western Digital Raptor 74GB = Buy a pair for $160

I wouldn't waste my money on those at this point. You can get larger capacity drives that are faster for less.
 
Blue Fox said:
I wouldn't waste my money on those at this point. You can get larger capacity drives that are faster for less.
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QFT

Granted these Raptor drives do have good seek times but thats all they really have going for them. The WD6400AAKS and WD6401AALS 640GB drives are just as fast, if not faster, as those Raptors yet cost only $75 and $80 respectively.
 
Sweet!
For $100 I can install Vista Ultimate and two games of my choice! :p
 
My 74 GB 8MB cache raptor from 5 years ago is still chugging along as my OS / Steam drive :p This thing was a pretty penny back then.

I am usually the first one on the server after changing maps in TF2.
 
NoNRG said:
My 74 GB 8MB cache raptor from 5 years ago is still chugging along as my OS / Steam drive :p This thing was a pretty penny back then.

I am usually the first one on the server after changing maps in TF2.
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I'm always the 1st on changing server with my wd6400aaks :p
 
Rydawg5143 said:
I'm always the 1st on changing server with my wd6400aaks :p
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I have one of those also... We should have a loading duel someday!

Edit: Are you in RAID on those? One 5 year old drive > two current drives if they are near equal.
 
Fail post. Bad price, these are the older tech, which means that they are mostly slower than the 640GB Black edition that is about the same price.
 
Well, I wouldn't call it a "fail post," more accurately just not quite so "Hot" I suppose.

For use as a system drive, the two Raptors in RAID 0 will obviously outperform the WD 640GB all by itself in terms of average read/write speeds and most certainly in terms of random access speed. So in that respect, it's useful to some degree, but in terms of pricing, just not so "Hot."
 
I've been running into this issue basically. I have 2x 74GB Raptors with 16mb cache, they are in Raid 0. I'm starting to hurt for space with all of the games that I've got on here. Not to mention, other applications. Would I see basically the same performance going with 2x 640GB Black edition AALS drives?
 
I don't think the price is bad. If you are building a simple system that you want a fast boot drive for someone -- 74G is MUCH more usable than 36G.

That being said, I recently (2 months ago) bought slightly used 74G rappers for $50 a pop, still with 1-3 years warranty.
 
These are LOUD when doing heavy seeking and writing. If you have vista, I would not recommend this older generation of raptors because indexing and superfetch are almost always running and thus making noise. I have 2 in raid, and whenever I create a restore point, install windows updates, or enable indexing + superfetch, I hear wwrrkrkkrrkrkkrkrkrkk.. kuuuhhukhuhkuhkhuhhkuhkuh.. wwrkkkkkrkrkrkrkrk.. hkkhkhkhkkhkhkhk

But 2 of these in raid 0 sure makes everything open quickly.
 
These are pretty old, should be about $50.00 each, even then I would have to think about
it. Most of the newer drives meet or exceed the speed of these, so I really don't know
what the benefit of getting these would be? I am quickly filling up my 2TB Raid 0
storage, so I don't think these are going to be big enough.
 
ZV3001 said:
These are pretty old, should be about $50.00 each, even then I would have to think about
it. Most of the newer drives meet or exceed the speed of these, so I really don't know
what the benefit of getting these would be? I am quickly filling up my 2TB Raid 0
storage, so I don't think these are going to be big enough.
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These are not storage drives, they are boot drives.

I doubt newer drives exceed these in all respects. 10,000rpm > 7,000 rpm especially in seek times, however when ssd's get down to $100 or so (I have a 30GB $100'ish ocz vertex on order)....
 
I bet everyone in these forums has already had at least 2 of every generation of this drive lol. They were great back in the dawn of time though for sure.
 
I never was able to get any original Raptors, so I kept waiting and waiting... finally got the fastest ones of all, the 80GB Velociraptors, couldn't be happier at this point. Sure an SSD would potentially offer some faster access and a bit snappier performance, but at a cost that far exceeds what I paid for these. .1ms or 6ms... I can live with a little slower access times knowing I've got plenty of cash left in the pocket compared to what I'd have if I had chosen an SSD... ;)
 
I picked up 3 of these used on CL for 100 bucks a few months ago, sold one for 40 and use the other 2 raided for my OS/games.. Soo freakin sweeet...

Going from a seagate 7200.11 I can say there is a very noticeable difference in general reaction times in just about everything.

Sustained transfer rates are not quite as good.. but all the big files live on the 1.5tb 7200.11 anyway.
 
Well, I think it's neck and neck for most oft he scores, but the Raptor surpasses the 640GB in random access.
 
i used 2 of these in raid0 for 4 or 5 years of trouble free service as boot drives. now i have 1 80gb vraptor. i can only have about 3 games at a time on it, but thats ok.
 
I'm still using the same raptor 74gig I was using when I had a 2.4C. The thing cost me a fortune and im going to get my money's worth before I retire it! That said, they are a but slower than a modern 500gig drive, but with faster seek.
 
Jakalwarrior said:
I'm still using the same raptor 74gig I was using when I had a 2.4C.
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yep, same here. Definitely the best investment from my 3.2e rig considering it's the only component i'm still using from it. the ddr400 is gone, CPU is gone, 6800gt is gone, and the PSU is gone. I guess i still have the case though.
 
vanilla_guerilla said:
i used 2 of these in raid0 for 4 or 5 years of trouble free service as boot drives. now i have 1 80gb vraptor. i can only have about 3 games at a time on it, but thats ok.
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You gotta get another 80Gb V Rap and RAID 0 them...that's what I did...
 
easy to say. hard to find. i am going to buy a 150gb vraptor and raid 0 it with the 80. simply because the 74gb vraptors cost almost as much as a 150.
 
Did not realize the old raptors are now consider slow pokes compare to the WD Black drives.

Any mods feel free to close the thread then.
 
vanilla_guerilla said:
easy to say. hard to find. i am going to buy a 150gb vraptor and raid 0 it with the 80. simply because the 74gb vraptors cost almost as much as a 150.
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Check with Flecom....he had a bunch, that's where I got my 2 80's and my 160....which I havent even hooked up yet..:)
 
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