hard drive

[|D|-Char-ley_Killa]

I am getting a new hard drive for my computer, and I need a SATA. I would like to get a western digital 160gig. But there are several different types and im not sure which one I should get. There is the
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822144415
and the
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1089595&sku=TSD-160JD
I dont know if they are both the same or if they are different.PLZ HELP

[|D|-Char-ley_Killa]

anyone

[DimeBagWhore]

Looks like the same drive except that one of them has newer and faster SATA interface.

[|D|-Char-ley_Killa]

what one?

[DimeBagWhore]

The cheaper one. The SATA 3 gig interface (sometimes called SATA II or SATA-300) has double the speed of the SATA-150 interface. But it might not make any difference to performance if you mobo can't utilise the extra speed.

[|D|-Char-ley_Killa]

thx!!!

[jdrou]

Faster interface shouldn't make a difference since no single drive is close to using the full speed of the SATA150 yet. I would seriously consider getting a bigger drive though. 160 may sound big if you're upgrading from small drive but with the sizes of games these days plus the mods you can fill that pretty quick. I hate having to remove software to make space. I always end up wanting to reinstall it later.

[Akuma]

Not to sure about that.......from all the CPU techs iv spoken to the sata2
with 10,000rpm,s makes a huge diffrence.
I for one will make sure its in my next mobo's.>>NF4 Ultra.

[|D|-Char-ley_Killa]

I alrdy have a 80 gig, this is just gunna be my storage drive.but later when I get my new mobo It will be my main drive

[JoeHova]

Yeah I'd say get a raptor 10,000rpm/s. I'm planning on adding one for my games etc.

[|D|-Char-ley_Killa]

the raptor is out of my budget I wish I could get one!, and I want more than 74 gigs

[jdrou]

Not to sure about that.......from all the CPU techs iv spoken to the sata2
with 10,000rpm,s makes a huge diffrence.

The 10,000rpm makes a huge difference, not the SATA. Interface tech is always much faster than current hard drive speeds. The only time you will get the interface speed is when reading from the drive's buffer RAM. I don't think any current ATA drive exceeds 80MBps, let alone 150MBps. Maybe in a striped array, but not a single drive.

[<DP>ControlFreak]

Hello,
The true information you seek can be found here:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/
What's in a name? SATA II Misconceptions

And the following will also prove enlighting
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/
SATA II to the Power of 3.0Gb/sec: Three Drives Reviewed

The following end to the above sums it up pretty well for most people:

If you like to keep up with the standards than the new SATA300 drives are a great addition to the storage arsenal, but for now SATA150 has yet to reach maturity and higher capacity SATA300 drives should be on their way soon enough. Holding out may not be such a bad idea for consumers who value disk space more than higher transfer rates.


The truth is out there, if your willing to do the research.

I think you will also find the following find the following intresting as it applies to game performance:

Real World Tests - Game Level Load Times

We have changed our Game Level Loading Time test to include two of the latest games, Doom 3 (http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2454&p=10#) and Half-Life 2. Because of their high resolution (http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2454&p=10#) textures and the large levels, the loading time for the levels of each game are long enough to help show a difference between each drive.
We have also included an older strategy game Command & Conquer: Generals because of its longer level load times. Though the game is a couple years old it still proves to be a good measure of performance data loading performance.

http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/3way%20sata%20ii%20shootout_06230590637/7792.png
Though 30.767 seconds may not seem like much of a performance boost from Seagate's Barracudas' ~32sec chart toppers, Western Digital's (http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2454&p=10#) WD1600JS came in at first which is a huge improvement over its 10,000RPM Raptor cousin. And even with NCQ enabled, the HD160JJ and T7K250 were not able to keep up quite as well with 33-36sec loading times

http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/3way%20sata%20ii%20shootout_06230590637/7793.png
The Barracudas still hang on to first place spots when loading Half-Life 2's d1_canals_01 map. Our SATA300 drives barely broke the 20sec mark.

http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/3way%20sata%20ii%20shootout_06230590637/7794.png








This is probably more than you ever wanted to know, but the subject is confusing at best, I think it boils down to some of the newer SATA 300 drives really being no faster in real world performance. As you will see going from a SATA 150 to a SATA 300 drive really doesnt double the performance as you would thik it would from the way they are named. Sorry for the long post, I'm new on the forum as a registered user, and dont have the hang of the format commands as of yet.

Greg Williams