Drives...

  • Thread starter Thread starter Ed Edelenbos
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Ed Edelenbos

Hopefully this is on topic. It is for a machine built around an AsRock mb
(made by asustek) so maybe it fits.

Anyone have comments on (for general useage, i.e. net, typing, a little bit
of games, a general home computer):

a) White label drives... any warnings? any good comments?

b) 2M vs. 8 M buffers... for general useage, will the 8M buffer buy me much
speed wise?


If it matters... 1.7G celeron (upgradeable to P4 w/533 fsb) and ata133 max.

Thanks for any comments

Ed
 
Hopefully this is on topic. It is for a machine built around an AsRock mb
(made by asustek) so maybe it fits.

Anyone have comments on (for general useage, i.e. net, typing, a little bit
of games, a general home computer):

a) White label drives... any warnings? any good comments?

b) 2M vs. 8 M buffers... for general useage, will the 8M buffer buy me much
speed wise?


If it matters... 1.7G celeron (upgradeable to P4 w/533 fsb) and ata133 max.

Thanks for any comments

Ed
Click to expand...

The 8MB buffer does make a difference over a 2MB, it's like adding a
couple hundred MHz to the CPU. ;p
 
"Ed Edelenbos" said:
Hopefully this is on topic. It is for a machine built around an AsRock mb
(made by asustek) so maybe it fits.

Anyone have comments on (for general useage, i.e. net, typing, a little bit
of games, a general home computer):

a) White label drives... any warnings? any good comments?

b) 2M vs. 8 M buffers... for general useage, will the 8M buffer buy me much
speed wise?


If it matters... 1.7G celeron (upgradeable to P4 w/533 fsb) and ata133 max.

Thanks for any comments

Ed
Click to expand...

When buying a disk drive these days, it is all about "warranty".
What are the warranty terms of your OEM drives ?
That is the question I would be asking.
Warranty info might be hard to find, so keep digging.
(Plan a backup strategy too - drives are designed to fail -
the short warranty is the proof.)

For drive selection, visit http://www.storagereview.com/
They have a performance database here:

http://storagereview.com/comparison.html
(See "Idle noise" and "Net Drive Temperatures")

I select drives based on lowest noise and lowest temperature rise,
on the assumption that the lower the "self heating", the longer
the life will be. The last drive I bought was a Seagate 7200.7 ,
as a compromise between performance and those other factors.

As for the size of the buffer, I don't see a lot of conversations
about 2MB versus 8MB any more, so I take it the 8MB wasn't doing
much for people. I've never owned one (and wouldn't spend extra
money to find out :-)

As long as the machine has enough memory for the mix of applications
you plan on running at any one time, there won't be any swapping
to/from disk on a regular basis, so drive performance won't be
much of an issue. Any 7200 rpm drive should have a high enough
sustained read/write rate to keep you happy.

HTH,
Paul
 
Paul said:
When buying a disk drive these days, it is all about "warranty".
What are the warranty terms of your OEM drives ?
That is the question I would be asking.
Warranty info might be hard to find, so keep digging.
(Plan a backup strategy too - drives are designed to fail -
the short warranty is the proof.)

For drive selection, visit http://www.storagereview.com/
They have a performance database here:

http://storagereview.com/comparison.html
(See "Idle noise" and "Net Drive Temperatures")

I select drives based on lowest noise and lowest temperature rise,
on the assumption that the lower the "self heating", the longer
the life will be. The last drive I bought was a Seagate 7200.7 ,
as a compromise between performance and those other factors.

As for the size of the buffer, I don't see a lot of conversations
about 2MB versus 8MB any more, so I take it the 8MB wasn't doing
much for people. I've never owned one (and wouldn't spend extra
money to find out :-)

As long as the machine has enough memory for the mix of applications
you plan on running at any one time, there won't be any swapping
to/from disk on a regular basis, so drive performance won't be
much of an issue. Any 7200 rpm drive should have a high enough
sustained read/write rate to keep you happy.

HTH,
Paul
Click to expand...

I agree with this post but would like to add that I didn`t worry too much
about hard drive temps untill I loaded a small programme that gave me the
temp of my hard drives and 50 to 53 deg C very quickly brought me out of my
dream world and I did something to get those temps down.
35C on HDD1 and 37C on HDD2 is normal now. HDD2 is mounted in a caddy so I
don`t expect it to run at the same temp as the exposed drive. I now expect a
decent working life from my drives though.
 
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