10,000 RPM Raptor or SATA II??

[Lan]

I've just finished the first step in a major upgrade to my computer system. Now I want to start the next step and research hard drives. This computer is used mostly for gaming, though there is the distinct possibility that I will be recording/viewing/editing home movies in the near future as well.

My question is this: which would I be better off using? Should I get a Raptor or two, or should I look into one or two SATA II drives?

I haven't determined if I am going to setup a RAID 0 or not (if I do it will be for a data partition only, not for the system drive) but I am considering it as I want the performance boost. My system as it exists right now is below. Thanks!



My Current Setup
-------------------------

CPU - AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+
MoBo - Gigabyte GA-K8N Pro-SLI
RAM - 2GB Corsair XMS PC3200 (2x 1GB using 2-3-3-5)
Video - eVGA 7800GT (manufacturer OC to 450 GPU & 1100 RAM)
Hard Drive - 120GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.7
Audio - Sound Blaster Audigy 1 Gamer

 

[admiral25]

I've just finished the first step in a major upgrade to my computer system. Now I want to start the next step and research hard drives. This computer is used mostly for gaming, though there is the distinct possibility that I will be recording/viewing/editing home movies in the near future as well.

My question is this: which would I be better off using? Should I get a Raptor or two, or should I look into one or two SATA II drives?

I haven't determined if I am going to setup a RAID 0 or not (if I do it will be for a data partition only, not for the system drive) but I am considering it as I want the performance boost. My system as it exists right now is below. Thanks!



My Current Setup
-------------------------

CPU - AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+
MoBo - Gigabyte GA-K8N Pro-SLI
RAM - 2GB Corsair XMS PC3200 (2x 1GB using 2-3-3-5)
Video - eVGA 7800GT (manufacturer OC to 450 GPU & 1100 RAM)
Hard Drive - 120GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.7
Audio - Sound Blaster Audigy 1 Gamer

raptors are for you os/game/swap files, you need data storage then get sata hard drives 250gig or higher with 16mb buffers. I dont know if you mobo supports raid 5, but if so I would get 3 drives of the same size so if one fails you wont loose all your data(thats what happends if you have raid0 and 1 drive fails).

 

[bourgeoisdude]

In many ways SATA-II is hype. If you use one or even two SATA drives I can't find any that would go beyond the 150MB/sec that the SATA interface supports (SATA 1 or SATA 2). Using four drives in RAID 5? SATA-II has benefits. Otherwise the only difference in the two is the interface but the physical drives aren't that fast yet anyways. I suppose the SATA 2 drives with 16MB cache the cached memory is faster but that makes little if any difference. Go Raptor if you want more speed.

 

[Preecher]

From what I have read, RAID 0 really wont improve performance at all... well, at least you won't really notice it AND you just doubled your chances of having a catostrophic failure. The only reason to really use RAID is if you want redundancy, in which case you would want to go RAID 1 or RAID 5 (I am sure there are plenty of threads on RAID to help you choose).

Ok.. so since you are gaming, nix the RAID.

As far as SATA II vs the raptors... I dont know for sure but those raptors perform really really really well and WD makes a reliable product.

If you look at the stats on WD's site..

The raptors (10k rpm drives) will do:

INTERFACE | RPM | SIZE | AVE SEEK TIME | BUFFER
1.5 Gb/s Serial ATA | 10,000 | 150 GB | 4.6 ms | 16 MB

Where the SATAII drives by WD are like :

INTERFACE | RPM | SIZE | AVE SEEK TIME | BUFFER
300MB/s SATA II | 7200 | 500 GB | 8.9 ms | 16 MB

So, if I read this correct, the Raptors blow away the SATAII drives as far as througput. Am I reading this info correctly?

Hope this info helps more than it hurts

 

[handym3000]

only the raptor 150 gig does, the rest of the raptors have different specs.

 

[Hawkeye22]

In many ways SATA-II is hype. If you use one or even two SATA drives I can't find any that would go beyond the 150MB/sec that the SATA interface supports (SATA 1 or SATA 2).

My drives listed in my sig are in raid 1 and HDTach shows a burst speed of 170MB/s. Average read/write is 50Mb/s. Granted you won't be pulling over 150Mb/s very often, but it can happen.

 

[Preecher]

Yea.. the 150GB's have 16mb cache, the others have 8mb. Aside from that, all the raptors have very similar specs.

 

[linux_0]

The raptors make a great OS / swap drive + any software you use frequently.

Normally I recommend a single Raptor for the OS / swap + frequently used apps and one or more WD2500KS drives either in single drive configuration or in RAID 1 for long term data storage.

I recommend the WD2500KS because it has the highest performance and one of the lowest costs per GB in its class. 250GB drives average about $0.384/GB other capacities have a higher cost / GB and Raptors cost a relatively outrageous $2.00 - $2.50 / GB


You should NEVER use RAID 0 for important data unless you have a PROPER backup in place.

RAID 0 would improve your performance quite a bit at the expense of data security.

RAID 0 provides a nearly N * P increase in Performance ( P ) where N is the number of drives in the array. However the probability of catastrophic failure ALSO increases by a factor of N.

At the risk of sounding redundant:

You should NEVER use RAID 0 for important data unless you have a PROPER backup in place.

When RAID 0 breaks it is virtually impossible to recover any of the data.

Again:

You should NEVER use RAID 0 for important data unless you have a PROPER backup in place.

Important Note: Even though RAID 1 is redundant it still does NOT constitute a proper backup because there are still single points of failure. Therefore for proper data security you have to backup your RAID 1 array as well.


PS SATA II is indeed a lot of HYPE. I recommend the WD2500KS because it is quite fast and has a 16MB buffer NOT because it is SATA II.

 

[moparman390]

I feel that SATA2 is over-rated as even a 10,000 RPM Raptor cannot read/write data fast enough to exceed the bandwidth of SATA 1.5Gb/s.

I would recommend going with a Raptor as your system drive for your OS/Apps/Games to make these load and run faster. I recommend another large capacity drive for your bulk storage.

I am not a fan of RAID 0, because you increase your chances of failure and you lose everything on the array when one drive fails. There is no real (significant) preformacne gain with a RAID 0 (with two drives in home use). So if you want the capacity of two large drives keep them seperate, that way at least all your eggs won't be in the same basket.

If you want redundency add another one of the large capacity drives in a RAID 1. This way a copy of all your eggs will be in another independent basket.

I went with a 74GB Raptor as my system drive and two 320GB WDs for storage drive. The two 320GB drives are in a RAID 1, so they mirror each other automatically backing up all my files/pictures/music/videos against a HDD failure.

Either way you still need an optical media backup solution or something like that.

 

[Lan_d]

ive got a 10k raptor its fast and i cant fault it whatsoever i use wd harddrives for all my computers i generally prefer them

 

[Lan]

Wow, quite a few answers already.

So, so far it looks like the general consensus is to use a Raptor for my system drive, as well as where I install my games to, probably the 74GB? Then get a different bigger drive for my storage.

As for RAID 0 I know about having a backup. I backup my current computer to the server I run at home right now on a weekly basis. Then I backup the important stuff to DVD monthly. Unfortunately I do not have RAID 5 availible to me without getting an expasion card, and I don't want to go that far.

To linux: Thanks for the recommendation, that will significantly drop my budget so I won't be required to get a 150GB Raptor.

All this being said it sounds to me that RAID 0 is generally considered bad for a gamers machine then? Because with my backups in place I was considering 2 74GB Raptors for my game installs as well as storage that will give me good performance. I personally don't care how fast Windows boots, so I wasn't going to worry about it. Are you saying I should worry about it? And if so, why? Thanks for the help.

 

[linux_0]

The WD2500KS is about $96 on newegg + $4.99 S&H which is a real bargain considering it has a 16MB buffer vs other 250s which sell for $85-$135

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822144701


http://www.storagereview.com/comparison.html

Maximum read on the WD2500KS is about 61.3MB/sec which is QUITE respectable

The Raptor WD740GD gets about 71.8MB/sec

and the Raptor WD1500ADFD about 88.3MB/sec


Of course on the high end nothing beats the 15K Maxtor, Fujitsu and Cheetah U320 SCSI drives. They score 93 - 97MB/sec

 

[michaelahess]

Burst is coming off the HD cache, you can't use that as a determining factor for speed unless you have apps that have predictable, intermittent access patterns. 50-70 is about where you'll sit, well away from the 150 theoretical.

If you have them in raid, I believe each sata port has it's own bandwidth so sataII won't directly benefit raid, someone correct me on that point if I'm wrong.

 

[corvetteguy]

i think raptors are waste of money for gaming, as you can see in my other thread in this section where i got yelled at quite a bit, lol. Also think that data security is overdone a lot, also in my other thread. Plus, if you plan on having lots of movies you'll need good capacity, which the raptor is not a high capacity drive. I think the western digital se 16 250gig is the best price/performance/capacity drive around, but that's just my opinion. I quess the reason i think RAID 1 is dumb is because i keep all my important files seperatly on a mini harddrive, not for fear of hd failure, but the many viruses my computer accumulates with no virus protection. RAID is not a bad thing, just a waste of money in my opinion that could be spent on a better video card.

 

[clue69less]

From what I have read, RAID 0 really wont improve performance at all... well, at least you won't really notice it AND you just doubled your chances of having a catostrophic failure.

It depends on who you believe. I've seen credible test data that shows RAID0 to be faster than non-RAID by about 40% for bootup, app loading, large file transfer, etc. Aside from a couple of tests like the above that are in agreement, I've seen unsubstantiated claims that RAID0 does no good. No test data to back them up, etc., just claims. Search google for "RAID0 test Raptor".

 

[bourgeoisdude]

SATAII wasn't a hype to me, it was exactly the way I expected and that was adding more features.

There are no such thing as 'hype' in this world, only stupid people.

I'm not sure what to tell you, except that you obviously haven't read the other comments in this forum. Anything else I say would be--well...rude :?

 

[rippleyaliens]

It is all about the RPM / Spindle count.
personally i would go with the 150gb raptor drive. In sata world,. ,it is the best so far.
what is the difference with 10k and 7200,, well other than the 25%+ speed, which means, faster access, seek, and faster data transfer...

Me personally i use a scsi raid for my os, and sata for the Data..
I stripe 7x 36gb 15k drives, with a u160 controller. And my IO is nice. Not insane, but it is very fast. Not gonna say 3x as fast, but it is indeed faster than my 6x200gb sata raid., and both arrays are striped. ( i move lots of data, but i back up daily)...
Up to you, but if budget is a factor, then i would go with 3x 200 sata'ss...
stripe the first 2, and use the other for data ($300.. ) same price as a 150 raptor..

 

[Lan]

Thanks everyone. I ended up deciding on a Single Raptor for the OS, games, and apps, and kept my exsisting Seagate 120GB for data, and got a second 7800GT instead of anything else real fancy.

I am already considering a Second Raptor and that 250GB (which will free up my 120GB for a guest/wife machine using my old hardware), but if I do, it won't be within the next few weeks or anything. Thanks for all the replies!

 

[corvetteguy]

It is all about the RPM / Spindle count.
personally i would go with the 150gb raptor drive. In sata world,. ,it is the best so far.
what is the difference with 10k and 7200,, well other than the 25%+ speed, which means, faster access, seek, and faster data transfer...

Me personally i use a scsi raid for my os, and sata for the Data..
I stripe 7x 36gb 15k drives, with a u160 controller. And my IO is nice. Not insane, but it is very fast. Not gonna say 3x as fast, but it is indeed faster than my 6x200gb sata raid., and both arrays are striped. ( i move lots of data, but i back up daily)...
Up to you, but if budget is a factor, then i would go with 3x 200 sata'ss...
stripe the first 2, and use the other for data ($300.. ) same price as a 150 raptor..

data density on each platter also has a lot to do with it, not just RPM

 

[maury73]

Hi there,

just a little lines to clarify some mistakes I read in theese posts (sorry for my poor english!)

1. SATA II doesn't mean 300MB/s!!!
It is simply a reviewed specification of SATA, with some more features and commands, but not necessarily it must go to 3Gbps: the official technical specification states it CAN run up to 3Gbps, not MUST!
So read carefully the drive and controller technical sheets: they should clearly state the speed is 300MB/s in order to be sure of that.
As an example, Silicon Image sells 2 models of SATA II chip controllers with 1.5GHz maximum frequency.

2. 150MB/s are always enough, even if you had a dozen of drives in RAID0!
Remember that SATA is a Point-to-Point connection, not a shared bus like PATA or SCSI: every device has its own dedicated cable and controller channel, so you have always the full bandwidth on every device, and the fastest magnetic drive with SATA interface reaches a maximum sustained throughput of 85MB/s.
The problem instead can be with the system bus bandwidth: Intel's stupid FSB architecture doesn't leave more than 133MB/s for SATA controllers with fast PCIe graphic cards running at maximum load, while AMD HyperTransport system can provide over 500MB/s.

So, if you want a really fast HDU to allocate a large DB datafile, go straight for a battery of Raptors: in an RDBMS application threy're over 3 times faster than any other PATA/SATA unit.
For gaming... it's much better to have more RAM to avoid swap usage than a fast HDU set! I think you can use a Raptor (if you want) as system drive and a large SATA II HDU as data storage.
And of course... do frequent backups: latest years HDUs are fast, but so weak!!!

maury73.

 

[maury73]

Absolutely not!

Not addicted to serial communication protocols, eh?

To be exact, I should write "less than 300MB/s", because 3Gbps is the RAW interface speed, or in other words, 3GHz is the frequency at which the electrical signals switch.
You must subtract the synchronization and clock bits, the ECC bits and of course the command sequences and protocol overhead.

Subtract this overhead and you get something like 285-290MB/s effective data transfer rate if you are very luck!

maury73.

 

[clue69less]

Me personally i use a scsi raid for my os, and sata for the Data.. I stripe 7x 36gb 15k drives, with a u160 controller. And my IO is nice. Not insane, but it is very fast. Not gonna say 3x as fast, but it is indeed faster than my 6x200gb sata raid., and both arrays are striped. ( i move lots of data, but i back up daily)...
Up to you, but if budget is a factor, then i would go with 3x 200 sata'ss...
stripe the first 2, and use the other for data ($300.. ) same price as a 150 raptor..

Sata for the data... I used to say "serial ATA" in my head all the time but maybe I'll convert to "sata" as a word the way some people do and get the sata-data rhyme.

Holy cow, assuming you're talking about your home rig, you've got 13 drives? Are any outboard? What kind of PS arrangement do you have? Will they heat the room? Any specific cooling?