HDDs and real speed of the computer

[Charles]

Hi,

I have a Pentium IV HT with 2Gb DDR Ram memory, a P4C Deluxe Asus
mother board, and still, I want to increase the speed of the computer.
I want the applications and the OS to appear instantly.
I think I can gain speed changing the HDD. I'm thinking about setting
up 2 Western Digital Raptors SATA in RAID. I'm also thinking about
changing for a Seagate Cheetah 15,000RPM SCSI drive. Is it possible to
put two SCSI drives in RAID so that I would benefit from the
equivalent of a 30,000RPM HDD ? (I doubt)
What would you suggest to have the fastest HDD configuration ? I want
to spend les than $1,000 in this.
Thanks,

 

[ElJerid]

Hi,

I have a Pentium IV HT with 2Gb DDR Ram memory, a P4C Deluxe Asus
mother board, and still, I want to increase the speed of the computer.
I want the applications and the OS to appear instantly.
I think I can gain speed changing the HDD. I'm thinking about setting
up 2 Western Digital Raptors SATA in RAID. I'm also thinking about
changing for a Seagate Cheetah 15,000RPM SCSI drive. Is it possible to
put two SCSI drives in RAID so that I would benefit from the
equivalent of a 30,000RPM HDD ? (I doubt)
What would you suggest to have the fastest HDD configuration ? I want
to spend les than $1,000 in this.
Thanks,

--

Put 2 SATA drives in block striping RAID. But you will loose security: if
one of both disks crashes, you'll loose all your data. Putting your disks in
mirroring will also increase the read (about the same as block striping),
but not the write. But in this case, you double the security level. If you
want both speed and reliability, you'll have to put 4 disks in RAID 01
(mirroring + striping). Whatever you do, it will cost you less than 300 $.

 

[Charles]

Put 2 SATA drives in block striping RAID. But you will loose security: if
one of both disks crashes, you'll loose all your data. Putting your disks in
mirroring will also increase the read (about the same as block striping),
but not the write. But in this case, you double the security level. If you
want both speed and reliability, you'll have to put 4 disks in RAID 01
(mirroring + striping). Whatever you do, it will cost you less than

300 $.

Thanks. What kind of SATA HDDs do you suggest so that the maximum
thansfer rate won't be more that what the bus can handle but will take
advantage of its full resources?
The SATA ports can have a maximum traffic rate of 150MB/sec.
(http://www.asus.com/products/mb/socket478/p4c800-d/overview.htm)
but the RAID bus I don't know...
Thanks again,

 

[Spajky®]

I have a Pentium IV HT with 2Gb DDR Ram memory, a P4C Deluxe Asus
mother board, and still, I want to increase the speed of the computer.
I want the applications and the OS to appear instantly.
I think I can gain speed changing the HDD. I'm thinking about setting
up 2 Western Digital Raptors SATA in RAID.
What would you suggest to have the fastest HDD configuration ? I want
to spend les than $1,000 in this.

you answered already yourself a question ...

-- Regards, SPAJKY ®
& visit my site @ http://www.spajky.vze.com
"Tualatin OC-ed / BX-Slot1 / inaudible setup!"
E-mail AntiSpam: remove ##

 

[ElJerid]

300 $.

Thanks. What kind of SATA HDDs do you suggest so that the maximum
thansfer rate won't be more that what the bus can handle but will take
advantage of its full resources?
The SATA ports can have a maximum traffic rate of 150MB/sec.
(http://www.asus.com/products/mb/socket478/p4c800-d/overview.htm)
but the RAID bus I don't know...
Thanks again,

Handshake and disk cache avoid transfer rates higher than components could
handle.
There are many excellent SATA hard disks, but I allways use Maxtor with 8 MB
cache. Note that those drives don't need special power adaptors.

 

[Charles]

Eh! Ok, but what ? The SATA, or the RAID ?
Thanks,

 

[DaveW]

Two of the new WD 74GB SATA 10,000rpm drives in a RAID 0 array would be the
best bang for your fast buck. These drives will be on the market any day
now.

 

[Spajky®]

-- Regards, SPAJKY ®
& visit my site @ http://www.spajky.vze.com
"Tualatin OC-ed / BX-Slot1 / inaudible setup!"
E-mail AntiSpam: remove ##

 

[S.Heenan]

Two of the new WD 74GB SATA 10,000rpm drives in a RAID 0 array would
be the best bang for your fast buck. These drives will be on the
market any day now.

Newegg has them in stock right now. At $258USD for 74GB of storage, they
aren't exactly cheap, but they are plenty fast, especially in RAID0
configuration. I've not used these, but rather the 37GB version.

 

[DaveinOlyWa]

you want your applications to start instantly then get rid of windows

upgrading the hardware will provide a lot, but it sounds to me that
you will see only a slight improvement from what you already have.

i would recommend the Maxtor SATA drive as an excellent low cost
option. just make sure you get the 8 MB cache. that makes a world of
difference.