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billege · 05-24-2004, 10:46 PM

Did you find the proc at "rip offs are us?"

newegg is selling a
AMD Athlon 64 3200+ for $282. Yes, it's in stock. If you want a whitebox, it's $270.

RAM wise, newegg'll sell you 1GB of Corsair (latency: 2.5) for $187. It's in stock too.

SATA is a good choice, but it's not faster than a EIDE drive. A lot of people forget that.
SATA is not a better HD, it's a better HD interface. It does, and will allow faster transfer rates than EIDE, but the drives themselves have a lot of improving to do yet.
The bennies for SATA are: the improved cable and higher theoretical transfer limit of 150mb/sec.
Hard drives are only sustaining transfer rates in the 64MB/sec range. Burst rates of 90MB/sec are happening, but you can see that 90MB/sec is still pretty far from the IDE ceiling of 133MB/sec.
The SATA "speed limit" of 150 is only impressive for people who forget that the HD is only capable of pushing about half that consistantly.

If cost is your concern, the EIDE version of the 160GB drive is 103, the SATA is 123. Is the skinny cable worth 20 bucks? That's up to you.

The segate and the raptor is an apples to oranges comparison. They are built for completely different performance goals. You'll have to decide what you're after, and what you're willing to sacrifice.

Since that board supports RAID on its SATA side, that's a compelling reason to buy SATA.

If you want to get really clever, buy your two raptors, and run them in RAID 0 (thus sacrificing data safty for speed) and keep your system and apps files on those fast buggers.

Then you buy your cheap EIDE 160GB behemoth for mass storage, a month later.

Or get really insane and buy two SATA 160GB drives and run THEM RAID 0 on the other two SATA channels you've got.

Then you'd have your scarey fast raptors in RAID 0 for sys/apps, and pretty durn fast 160s in RAID 0 for media.

Certainly not a good setup if you're worried about drives breaking, but it'd be quick.

05-24-2004, 10:46 PM	#6 (permalink)
billege Watcher Location: Ohio	Did you find the proc at "rip offs are us?" newegg is selling a AMD Athlon 64 3200+ for $282. Yes, it's in stock. If you want a whitebox, it's $270. RAM wise, newegg'll sell you 1GB of Corsair (latency: 2.5) for $187. It's in stock too. SATA is a good choice, but it's not faster than a EIDE drive. A lot of people forget that. SATA is not a better HD, it's a better HD interface. It does, and will allow faster transfer rates than EIDE, but the drives themselves have a lot of improving to do yet. The bennies for SATA are: the improved cable and higher theoretical transfer limit of 150mb/sec. Hard drives are only sustaining transfer rates in the 64MB/sec range. Burst rates of 90MB/sec are happening, but you can see that 90MB/sec is still pretty far from the IDE ceiling of 133MB/sec. The SATA "speed limit" of 150 is only impressive for people who forget that the HD is only capable of pushing about half that consistantly. If cost is your concern, the EIDE version of the 160GB drive is 103, the SATA is 123. Is the skinny cable worth 20 bucks? That's up to you. The segate and the raptor is an apples to oranges comparison. They are built for completely different performance goals. You'll have to decide what you're after, and what you're willing to sacrifice. Since that board supports RAID on its SATA side, that's a compelling reason to buy SATA. If you want to get really clever, buy your two raptors, and run them in RAID 0 (thus sacrificing data safty for speed) and keep your system and apps files on those fast buggers. Then you buy your cheap EIDE 160GB behemoth for mass storage, a month later. Or get really insane and buy two SATA 160GB drives and run THEM RAID 0 on the other two SATA channels you've got. Then you'd have your scarey fast raptors in RAID 0 for sys/apps, and pretty durn fast 160s in RAID 0 for media. Certainly not a good setup if you're worried about drives breaking, but it'd be quick. __________________ I can sum up the clash of religion in one sentence: "My Invisible Friend is better than your Invisible Friend." Last edited by billege; 05-24-2004 at 10:49 PM..