New Hard Drive - Advice Reqd!!!
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Posted on Jul 15, 2004 07:09 am
cocofromscotland
Hello!
Member Since: Jan 12, 2004
Hi Guys
I am looking at a new hard drive to compliment my current system (2.2ghz celeron, 756RAM, 80GB HD).
I am looking at a few here. Here's my shortlist:
1. 120 GIG ATA100 7200RPM
Price: £65.00
2. 160 GIG ATA100 7200RPM 8MB BUFFER
Price: £75.00
3. 80 GIG ATA100 7200RPM SATA
Price: £52.00
OR...
36.7 GIG WD RAPTOR 10000 RPM SERIAL ATA
£90.00
Now, I know these are all different and I would obviously go for the highest/fastest possible drive in my budget but:
Whats the real main difference between 1, 2 and 3 (not counting size) i.e. what are these buffers for and whats the difference between 1/2 and 3 i.e. SATA?
I know this raptor baby is meant to be good (and its faster) but the capacity is considerably less. I have ported my entire CD collection to my PC which I use as a jukebox (wired via my HIFI) so I need more space for this plus I record at 32BIT using Cubase (monster files sizes!!).
So...If you had an 80GB HD (as I do now) and over half this is now used (and cant be freed) - which would you go for and why? Budget MAX is £100.
Cheers guys.
Coco.
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Jul 15, 2004 07:16 am Well, for the SATA, the first thing you have to find out is if your board supports SATA, given it's a 2.2, and a Celery no less, I doubt it does, but it may. SATA is a new, faster interface, that, if your board supports it, go for that.
One thing to note is that except for the Raptor, you don't mention any brand names. I am NOT a fan of Western Digital at all, seen WAY too many problems with them thru the years, but everybody has their different experiences to draw on.
If you can not use SATA, I guess I would go for number 2 since there is such a minor price difference between 1 and 2.
Jul 15, 2004 08:24 am Cheers DB. There was no mention of a brand on the site where I spied the drives (its a local computer shop in Edinburgh) but the prices seemed good!
I take it the way to go is just use the secondary drive for ALL my audio work and keep all the other junk on the primary drive i.e. the boot drive with XP etc and all my other apps?
Should I install any of my programs on the new drive i.e. Cubase or just leave them where they are? I am thinkin this new drive will be on the Primary Slave - dunno - never added a hard drive.
Cheers DB...
Coco.
Jul 15, 2004 08:27 am No real "right way" to use it. Personally, I keep my OS and apps all on the primary drive and only audio and video and such on the secondary. I have my drives like so:
Primary:
Master: OS/app drive
Slave: CD Burner
Secondary:
Master: audio drive
Slave: DVD player
mongoapprentice burninatorMember
Since: Jul 15, 2004
Jul 15, 2004 11:45 am Hey all... new here...
Another thing to notice - that 8mb buffer on #2 might help speed your disk access up a bit. (I'm assuming that because #1 doesn't have a buffer listed, it's the standard 2mb buffer, which is probably perfectly servicable as well..)
And, as long as there isn't a reason not to do it, you're probably better off installing that new HDD on the Secondary IDE channel. That way, your system drive and audio drive will have their own dedicated connections when you're recording or doing other disk-intensive functions. Will it really make or break your system? No way. But as long as you're doing it, you may as well do it that way. ;-)
-Mongo
Jul 15, 2004 06:11 pm Cheers guys...option 2 is lookin good with a re-routing of drives!
Ta.
Coco.
