Anybody use WD Raptors?
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One of the drives in my RAID mirror died the other day and I'm trying to decide on how to replace this. It was a 2x160GB drive setup and my options are:
A) To buy a new 160GB and just keep the mirror.
B) To buy a 36 or 74GB raptor and use it as my main drive and the extra 160GB as a storage drive. (In this case I would make sure I have a nightly backup running to my server with RAID).
A 74GB raptor costs a little over double a 160GB sata drive, so I'm wondering if anybody has experience with them and if they found the cost worth it?
Thanks :)
Option A)
The raptor drives are overpriced for what they offer. If speed is what you want you could always use RAID 0 and do the nightly backup running to your server.
The raptor drives are overpriced for what they offer. If speed is what you want you could always use RAID 0 and do the nightly backup running to your server.
You should look into the Maxtor Maxline 3. According to benchmarks it has pure disk performance at least, if not better then, the Raptor. Not to mention it starts around $120 for a 250GB drive with a 16MB buffer and 5 year warranty.
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No I don't work for Maxtor. [wink]
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Author
Quote:Original post by Kestrel
Option A)
The raptor drives are overpriced for what they offer. If speed is what you want you could always use RAID 0 and do the nightly backup running to your server.
I actually used to do that until I ran a few little tests and realized that I wasn't gaining anything. Sure in the odd benchmark test you might score one point higher, but in practical use RAID 0 actually gained nothing in the speed category.
Also thanks above for the recommendation on those MaxLine III drives, I'll have to check those out. One of the major things that put me off the raptors is that I've owned about 9 HDDs in the last 5 years, and only 3 died... those 3 were the only WD drives I had, whereas the other 6 (Maxtor / Seagate) are still running.
I have a raptor 36 gig, for sys. drive & paging. Fast? F**k yeah! I haven't benched it, but basically, it makes forget how tedious win2k can be at startup, which is a good thing.
Expensive though for what they bring. And they are very noisy when reading (sounds like a bad 90's throwback). I don't think I'll buy another one, but get a fatter, slower disk instead (and much quieter), even if it means an extra 5-10 secs at startup.
Expensive though for what they bring. And they are very noisy when reading (sounds like a bad 90's throwback). I don't think I'll buy another one, but get a fatter, slower disk instead (and much quieter), even if it means an extra 5-10 secs at startup.
I use a Raptor and can say it is incredibly fast for a HD, though it runs a bit hot if you don't have a fan near it (and as for noise, I can't say that I've ever heard mine). As for the suggestion of maxtor, The only reason I would use a Maxtor hard drive would be if it was free, as I and many of my friends have had trouble with them in the past, its not so much about the money either, but thats alot of data to lose. You should try to stay with Western Digital, Hitachi, or Seagate.
Two dev machines I work with:
both top of the line dell 7100s (I think thats the number)... so that means dual core 3ghz P4s with x850 xt pe's... One has a 120 gig seagate HDD (probably 7200rpm), the other has dual stripped 72gb raid raptors. The difference in performance? ohh, my, god.
That said, the segate is a noisy bugger. Sounds like stones rattling down a drainpipe. And frankly my laptops hard drive feels faster than it.
For my desktop PC back home I have a 160gig samsung drive. It not only feels very fast but pretty much cannot be heard unless the fans are mostly off. Very quiet and runs cool too.
both top of the line dell 7100s (I think thats the number)... so that means dual core 3ghz P4s with x850 xt pe's... One has a 120 gig seagate HDD (probably 7200rpm), the other has dual stripped 72gb raid raptors. The difference in performance? ohh, my, god.
That said, the segate is a noisy bugger. Sounds like stones rattling down a drainpipe. And frankly my laptops hard drive feels faster than it.
For my desktop PC back home I have a 160gig samsung drive. It not only feels very fast but pretty much cannot be heard unless the fans are mostly off. Very quiet and runs cool too.
Quote:Original post by ender_341
The only reason I would use a Maxtor hard drive would be if it was free, as I and many of my friends have had trouble with them in the past, its not so much about the money either, but thats alot of data to lose. You should try to stay with Western Digital, Hitachi, or Seagate.
Funny, you can find people who say the exact same thing about WD, Hitachi and Seagate.
hmm... there must be something wrong with my drive, because it is very noisy (remember the noise old har drives made when reading? Like marbles falling down a drain pipe? That noise). Whereas my other drive is quiet as they come.
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