Is a Raptor worth it over SATA 7200

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

I know this has been beat to death, but I had a few questions:

RE: SATA 74GB Raptor vs. SATA 7200 8mb HD

First of all here are the basics to my system:
Asus A7N8X Deluxe
Barton 2500 OC to 3200+
1024 GB RAM
OLD 7200 2mb 60GB HD
420 Watt PS
Radeon 9600 PRO

Clearly the HD is an issue in my system.

Here is my estimate of computer usage:
AutoCAD (my wife) - 10%
Surfing, general use - 20%
Excel, Word, etc. - 15%
Gaming - 25%
Video editing - 5%
Photo transfer and editing with Photoshop - 25%

I'm debating between getting a 74GB Raptor or a 120GB +
Seagate/Hitachi SATA 7200 8mb. From what I've read, I probably won't
go with a RAID-O setup:
http://www.storagereview.com
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101

I guess RAID 1 is an option, but I don't know if I can afford (2)
Raptors right now.

Would the speed advantage of the Raptor be something I would
appreciably notice?

I imagine it would help with larger image files, larger video files,
and maybe even autoCAD, but I haven't seen any real world stats on
this.

Also, would I need more cooling with the Raptor? I hear they run hot.
My CPU is around 40 C core temp right now, and I'm hoping that
upgrading to SATA and getting rid of some IDE cables will help that go
lower.

A HD cooler is not out of the question, but I don't want the case to
be so loud it sounds like it's about to take off.

Thanks for any input.
Chris

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

On 15 Jul 2004 07:26:54 -0700, FarmerC@health.missouri.edu (Chris
Farmer) wrote:

>I know this has been beat to death, but I had a few questions:
>
>RE: SATA 74GB Raptor vs. SATA 7200 8mb HD
>
>First of all here are the basics to my system:
>Asus A7N8X Deluxe
>Barton 2500 OC to 3200+
>1024 GB RAM
>OLD 7200 2mb 60GB HD
>420 Watt PS
>Radeon 9600 PRO
>
>Clearly the HD is an issue in my system.

How did you determine that?

>Here is my estimate of computer usage:
>AutoCAD (my wife) - 10%
>Surfing, general use - 20%

Hardly uses the HD

>Excel, Word, etc. - 15%

Hardly uses the HD. (waits on user input)

>Gaming - 25%

Hardly ever uses the HD. Usually games just use the HD when loading a
new level.
CivIII was a rare exampe that did use the HD a lot with certain
actions.

>Video editing - 5%

Might use the HD depending on the editing hardware and software

DV editing doesn't actually need a high transferrate. DV is something
like 6MB/s
Smart editing programs only edit the part of the video that has
changes. That doesn't put a high strain on the HD either.

>Photo transfer and editing with Photoshop - 25%

Editing is done mainly in RAM. Saving and opening uses the HD.

>I'm debating between getting a 74GB Raptor or a 120GB +
>Seagate/Hitachi SATA 7200 8mb. From what I've read, I probably won't
>go with a RAID-O setup:
>http://www.storagereview.com
>http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101
>
>I guess RAID 1 is an option, but I don't know if I can afford (2)
>Raptors right now.
>
>Would the speed advantage of the Raptor be something I would
>appreciably notice?

I don't think so.

>I imagine it would help with larger image files, larger video files,
>and maybe even autoCAD, but I haven't seen any real world stats on
>this.

The question is what your program needs.

When you edit large photos you want to have enough RAM to edit them in
RAM. When a faster HD just makes saving the picture a bit faster I
think it is a waste of money.

I don't have autoCAD but I can't imagine that it would need a lot of
harddisk performance.

You would only notice the harddisk in Word when you open a huge file
with large images. But that's execptional.

You could run performance monitor during the day when you are
working. (assuming you use windows) That way you can see how much the
applications use the disk.

You could then look at the amount of MB/s used and the average disk
queue length. That last value should stay below 2.

When one of those two values gets high when you use applications you
can consider buying a new drive.

>Also, would I need more cooling with the Raptor? I hear they run hot.
>My CPU is around 40 C core temp right now, and I'm hoping that
>upgrading to SATA and getting rid of some IDE cables will help that go
>lower.

I doubt whether that will help a lot. Unless your IDE cables are all
located just behind your fans and perpendicular to the airflow. But
that can usually be fixed easily but rearranging the cables.

>A HD cooler is not out of the question, but I don't want the case to
>be so loud it sounds like it's about to take off.

Run a case fan at 7V. Even an el-cheapo fan will then be quiet.
Hang it in your case pointing at the harddisks. This should provide
enough airflow to cool them.

>Thanks for any input.

Hope this helps.

Marc

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

Chris Farmer wrote:
> I know this has been beat to death, but I had a few questions:
>
> RE: SATA 74GB Raptor vs. SATA 7200 8mb HD
>
> First of all here are the basics to my system:
> Asus A7N8X Deluxe
> Barton 2500 OC to 3200+
> 1024 GB RAM
> OLD 7200 2mb 60GB HD
> 420 Watt PS
> Radeon 9600 PRO
>
> Clearly the HD is an issue in my system.
>
> Here is my estimate of computer usage:
> AutoCAD (my wife) - 10%
> Surfing, general use - 20%
> Excel, Word, etc. - 15%
> Gaming - 25%
> Video editing - 5%
> Photo transfer and editing with Photoshop - 25%
>
> I'm debating between getting a 74GB Raptor or a 120GB +
> Seagate/Hitachi SATA 7200 8mb. From what I've read, I probably won't
> go with a RAID-O setup:
> http://www.storagereview.com
> http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2101
>
> I guess RAID 1 is an option, but I don't know if I can afford (2)
> Raptors right now.
>
> Would the speed advantage of the Raptor be something I would
> appreciably notice?
>
> I imagine it would help with larger image files, larger video files,
> and maybe even autoCAD, but I haven't seen any real world stats on
> this.
>
> Also, would I need more cooling with the Raptor? I hear they run hot.
> My CPU is around 40 C core temp right now, and I'm hoping that
> upgrading to SATA and getting rid of some IDE cables will help that go
> lower.
>
> A HD cooler is not out of the question, but I don't want the case to
> be so loud it sounds like it's about to take off.
>
> Thanks for any input.
> Chris

I have a virtually identical setup with 2x WD360 in RAID-0 and a 120GB
spare drive for backups. The question of whether a faster HDD helps
is totally dependent upon your usage pattern. How many times do you
reboot your computer and load programs from the disk? Playing most
games also requires reloading other programs from disk, because the
cached data is removed from memory to make space for the game.

If you're like me, you do this several times daily. Since raw disk
speed would improve by 50-75% in your case, the average time for
loading an application would drop from say 6 seconds to 2 seconds. I
find that these multi-second time savings are very noticeable and
useful. Nowadays, I can't stand to use other computers, because I
really dislike waiting for programs/large files to load.

FYI, I have a case fan in front of the bays where the Raptors are
positioned. Whether or not you can position a fan in your case, it is
a good idea to make sure there is enough airflow around the drives.