Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - Purchasing a new Hard Drive

Martian · 09-22-2005, 08:18 PM

Hard drives are either IDE or SATA. The two don't work with each other, but which one you have is very obvious. IDE uses a flat ribbon cable, whereas SATA uses a much smaller one. If your drive is a couple years old make sure you get IDE (aka Parallel ATA, as opposed to Serial ATA), as that will be what it is.

Cache has a large effect on performance. It affects your transfer rates, whereas RPM affects seek times. I'd rather have a drive with a lower RPM and higher cache. If you want jaw dropping performance.. well, you're not going to get it from PATA. But you can get reasonably close with a 7200 RPM 8mb cache drive. 10 000 RPM isn't worth the benefits in performance and in my experience tends to be unreliable, motors seem to burn out on those frighteningly often.

In terms of brands, everyone has a different answer, but I've had really good experiences from Maxtor and Seagate and tend to use Maxtor in any computer I put together. Western Digital tends to suffer from reliability issues and there aren't really any other brands worth mentioning. But brands are a highly subjective thing in this as anything else, so pick what you prefer. Or wahts' cheapest, or what's most expensive. Whatever works for you.

09-22-2005, 08:18 PM	#2 (permalink)
Martian Young Crumudgeon Location: Canada	Hard drives are either IDE or SATA. The two don't work with each other, but which one you have is very obvious. IDE uses a flat ribbon cable, whereas SATA uses a much smaller one. If your drive is a couple years old make sure you get IDE (aka Parallel ATA, as opposed to Serial ATA), as that will be what it is. Cache has a large effect on performance. It affects your transfer rates, whereas RPM affects seek times. I'd rather have a drive with a lower RPM and higher cache. If you want jaw dropping performance.. well, you're not going to get it from PATA. But you can get reasonably close with a 7200 RPM 8mb cache drive. 10 000 RPM isn't worth the benefits in performance and in my experience tends to be unreliable, motors seem to burn out on those frighteningly often. In terms of brands, everyone has a different answer, but I've had really good experiences from Maxtor and Seagate and tend to use Maxtor in any computer I put together. Western Digital tends to suffer from reliability issues and there aren't really any other brands worth mentioning. But brands are a highly subjective thing in this as anything else, so pick what you prefer. Or wahts' cheapest, or what's most expensive. Whatever works for you. __________________ I wake up in the morning more tired than before I slept I get through cryin' and I'm sadder than before I wept I get through thinkin' now, and the thoughts have left my head I get through speakin' and I can't remember, not a word that I said - Ben Harper, Show Me A Little Shame Last edited by Martian; 09-22-2005 at 11:00 PM..