[ChrisMayhew]

Hello guys & gals.

I currently am running 2 7200 IDE Drives.

What id like to know is is a SATA II Raid worth it? I have heard many different things about it and i am currently deciding if to get a 2 SATA II Drives and raid them.

Mainly on my computer i play alot of games, mostly MMO's with massive amounts of players to load up. I also sometimes run 2 MMO Clients at a time.

Would i benefit from SATA II Raid or not?

Thanks for any answers

 

[8210GUY]

My instinct says yes you would benefit from it, but as I don't know about gaming issues someone may know more on this than I do, hope that helps a bit anyway.

 

[ChrisMayhew]

Well at the moment if i go on Battlefield 2142 it can take sometimes up to 4 minutes to load into a game, by this time the game can be pretty much over (It has to load all the game files).

I have also heard alot that the raid fails alot and causes you to lose data quite alot, is this true?

The good thing is my motherboard supports SATA II so all i really need to spend is the price of the hard drives and then i can try it

 

[Tumbleweed36]

Hi,

While as 8210GUY says, there would be an improvement for you. HOwever, don't expect the improvement to be something special or just outstanding.

If you would purchase a couple of Raptors (faster spin speed), then raid those, you should see a nice gain. Do they fail more, well, that depends upon how you judge it. With two drives being in the array, there is a slightly bigger chance of failure because you have to have two drives that do not fail, so the failure has actually two chances to fail instead of one. So, you can call it what you want, but the more components in anything, the higher of a chance that something can go wrong.

That is not because of the array or the drive, but just plain common sense. The more parts, the bigger chance of failure. That is my opinion.

 

[ChrisMayhew]

Hi,

While as 8210GUY says, there would be an improvement for you. HOwever, don't expect the improvement to be something special or just outstanding.

If you would purchase a couple of Raptors (faster spin speed), then raid those, you should see a nice gain. Do they fail more, well, that depends upon how you judge it. With two drives being in the array, there is a slightly bigger chance of failure because you have to have two drives that do not fail, so the failure has actually two chances to fail instead of one. So, you can call it what you want, but the more components in anything, the higher of a chance that something can go wrong.

That is not because of the array or the drive, but just plain common sense. The more parts, the bigger chance of failure. That is my opinion.

Ah that's cool then.

I have looked at the raptor drives but at the moment i think they are a little out of my price range. So i might just get 2 normal SATA II drives and see how that goes.

Thank you for the posts

 

[Tumbleweed36]

Hi,

That might be a good plan for you, because the Raptors are very expensive in comparison. However, the fastest by any swing of the imagination. Two of the regular drives like you describe will do a nice job for you, so go for it. Have a great day.

 

[8210GUY]

Just remember to use your existing drive(s) as slaves and back up ALL data you can't afford to lose to those drives once you install the new Sata drives, thats about as safe as you can get if worried about losing files you can't afford to.

 

[ChrisMayhew]

So i could actually have 2 SATA drives installed for Windows and games, and then data onto my IDE drives?

That would be pretty cool

 

[8210GUY]

Yes, the Sata drives use their own cables leaving the ide connection free for use as it currently is, so as long as you have enough power and leads what I'd suggest is install your OS to the Sata drives, copy the data you want to keep over to them, then format the ide drives then copy the data back over, then anything you can't afford to lose save to the ide drives.

One thing when installing the OS to the Sata drives, unplug the ide drives first, otherwise your OS wont be seen as the C Drive, once installed you can plug them back in and they will be assigned new drive letters automatically.
Also before plugging them in make sure you set the raid drives to boot first in the bios, otherwise it will try and boot from the ide drives, and remember to install the raid drivers by pressing F6 at the prompt when installing the OS or it wont see the drives to install to, hope this helps.

 

[ChrisMayhew]

Yes, the Sata drives use their own cables leaving the ide connection free for use as it currently is, so as long as you have enough power and leads what I'd suggest is install your OS to the Sata drives, copy the data you want to keep over to them, then format the ide drives then copy the data back over, then anything you can't afford to lose save to the ide drives.

One thing when installing the OS to the Sata drives, unplug the ide drives first, otherwise your OS wont be seen as the C Drive, once installed you can plug them back in and they will be assigned new drive letters automatically.
Also before plugging them in make sure you set the raid drives to boot first in the bios, otherwise it will try and boot from the ide drives, and remember to install the raid drivers by pressing F6 at the prompt when installing the OS or it wont see the drives to install to, hope this helps.

Sounds good, thank you for the advice.

I'll order some next week and if i run into any problems i'll check back here.

 

[Tumbleweed36]

Hi,

Well, it looks like old 8210GUY has been at my computer again when I was not at home, because what he described is exactly how mine is set up. :wave: I use XXclone in my signature and clone everything on the Sata drives over to my IDE drives.

 

[ChrisMayhew]

Well i have been having a look at WD Raptor drives.

I found these: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-095-WD

They are pretty cheap, not massive amounts of space, but as already said above i can keep my ide drives for anything i need to store and just keep games and windows on them raptors.

One question i have to ask is are they really SATA II or just SATA and what's the difference in the SATA and SATA II?

Do they do the Raptor drives in SATA II if they aren't?


Im guessing with the Raptors i would notice an increase with them in a Raid 0?

 

[linderman]

the raptors are the fastest non-scsi drive there is to date! and the formation of a raid array makes them even faster!


the standard sata 150mb/s theoretical capability) versus the Sata -2 (300 mb/s theoretical capability) is just sellign hype.


no single sata drive has broken the 100mb/s sustained goal yet to date! so therefore you could buy theoretical 1000mb/s drives and it would not mean squat!

you will be impressed with the raptors in a raid configuration.


enjoy

 

[ChrisMayhew]

So i am better off getting the SATA 36gb 10,000 Raptors over the SATA II 7200's

I was kinda of thinking that myself anyway, but i thought id check.

I have been reading up on the difference between IDE, SATA, SATA II and it seems 2 Raptors in a raid are pretty fast

So i think i'll go for the 2 raptors

 

[linderman]

i see where you can buy them used with tons of warranty remaining on ebay for $35.00 bucks how can you beat that !