Do I need a faster harddisk?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Bob
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B

Bob

Hi,
I have Xp + amd 2400 + 512 mb + 80 gb 8k WD harddisk.
If I Quickpar 90 50mb files and at the same time Winrar the files for
an other dvd my computer comes to a halt (maybe at the same time
burning a dvd).
WindowsTask Manager says my CPU usage is 70% and my PF Usage is 350
MB. I have memory and cpu to spare, so I would think the weak point is
the harddisk.
Am I right or is Windows Task Manager not accurate?
Bob
 
Bob said:
Hi,
I have Xp + amd 2400 + 512 mb + 80 gb 8k WD harddisk.
If I Quickpar 90 50mb files and at the same time Winrar the files for
an other dvd my computer comes to a halt (maybe at the same time
burning a dvd).
WindowsTask Manager says my CPU usage is 70% and my PF Usage is 350
MB. I have memory and cpu to spare, so I would think the weak point is
the harddisk.
Am I right or is Windows Task Manager not accurate?
Bob
Click to expand...

Your CPU is the weak point. The information can be read/written from the
hard drive faster than the CPU can process it. But you are running several
VERY CPU intensive processes at the same time. -Dave
 
Hi,
I have Xp + amd 2400 + 512 mb + 80 gb 8k WD harddisk.
If I Quickpar 90 50mb files and at the same time Winrar the files for
an other dvd my computer comes to a halt (maybe at the same time
burning a dvd).
WindowsTask Manager says my CPU usage is 70% and my PF Usage is 350
MB. I have memory and cpu to spare, so I would think the weak point is
the harddisk.
Am I right or is Windows Task Manager not accurate?
Bob
Click to expand...


When I Quickpar files on my XP 3200, with PF at 480 the CPU usage is around 40%.
However, when I get to the repair stage the CPU usage jumps to 100% and remains
there until the repair is finished. I would think that your problem is in
trying to multitask while doing a very CPU intensive program. I guess my
question is "why", when Quickpar doesn't take very long to do?

Ed
 
Dave said:
Your CPU is the weak point. The information can be read/written from the
hard drive faster than the CPU can process it. But you are running
several
VERY CPU intensive processes at the same time. -Dave
Click to expand...

Huh? CPU speed is measured in GB/s, whereas HDD speed is measured in MB/s.
How can the CPU be slowing down the hard drive?
 
Dave said:
Your CPU is the weak point. The information can be read/written from the
hard drive faster than the CPU can process it. But you are running
several
VERY CPU intensive processes at the same time. -Dave
Click to expand...

Huh? CPU speed is measured in GB/s, whereas HDD speed is measured in MB/s.
How can the CPU be slowing down the hard drive?
 
When I Quickpar files on my XP 3200, with PF at 480 the CPU usage is around 40%.
However, when I get to the repair stage the CPU usage jumps to 100% and remains
there until the repair is finished. I would think that your problem is in
trying to multitask while doing a very CPU intensive program. I guess my
question is "why", when Quickpar doesn't take very long to do?

Ed
Click to expand...
I was planning to build in a second harddisk. Maybe a WD Raptor
(rather expensive) as master disk. My example was rather extreme, but
I always had the feeling that the hard disk slows down and that in my
case CPU and Ram are enough. And your right Ed multitasking slows down
terribly.
Bob
 
'DMA is enabled on the hard drives?

Bob said:
I was planning to build in a second harddisk. Maybe a WD Raptor
(rather expensive) as master disk. My example was rather extreme, but
I always had the feeling that the hard disk slows down and that in my
case CPU and Ram are enough. And your right Ed multitasking slows down
terribly.
Bob
Click to expand...
 
Bob said:
Hi,
I have Xp + amd 2400 + 512 mb + 80 gb 8k WD harddisk.
If I Quickpar 90 50mb files and at the same time Winrar the files for
an other dvd my computer comes to a halt (maybe at the same time
burning a dvd).
WindowsTask Manager says my CPU usage is 70% and my PF Usage is 350
MB. I have memory and cpu to spare, so I would think the weak point is
the harddisk.
Am I right or is Windows Task Manager not accurate?
Bob
Click to expand...

Yeah, with 70% cpu usage showing it's most likely disk constipation. It's
bad enough that you have such intensive disk activity going on trying to
keep up with the demand but if the files are at any distance at all from
each other on the hard drive it's wasting a lot of time seeking between them.

See what your CPU usage is when you do one thing at a time. I'll bet it
goes up because the hard drive is able to stream the single data set faster
than seeking between two, or more.
 
Dave said:
Your CPU is the weak point. The information can be read/written from the
hard drive faster than the CPU can process it. But you are running several
VERY CPU intensive processes at the same time. -Dave
Click to expand...

Huh? If the data was coming in faster than the CPU could handle it then why
is it sitting idle 30% of the time?
 
Bob said:
If I Quickpar 90 50mb files and at the same time Winrar the files for
an other dvd my computer comes to a halt (maybe at the same time
burning a dvd).
WindowsTask Manager says my CPU usage is 70% and my PF Usage is 350
MB. I have memory and cpu to spare, so I would think the weak point is
the harddisk.
Am I right or is Windows Task Manager not accurate?
Click to expand...

Probably neither.

You are trying to do too many CPU- and I/O intensive tasks at the same time. If
you're burning a DVD on a single-CPU machine, stop trying to do other stuff at
the same time.
 
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