74GB Raptors in RAID 0

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Hi, I was thinking of getting two of these - Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10,000RPM SATA 16MB Cache and putting them in RAID 0.

Does anyone know what speed increase I should expect from these?

Is the 150GB versions any faster than the 74GB versions?

Thanks for any advise.

eon
 
eon said:
Does anyone know what speed increase I should expect from these?
Compared to what?

eon said:
Is the 150GB versions any faster than the 74GB versions?
If comparing the 16mb cache versions then not really. They might not perform exactly the same in every benchmark but should have similar performance overall.
 
Next to no speed increase using 2 Raptors in RAID-0 in real world applications.

Coupled with the fact that your data is more prone to loss (one drive goes down you lose the lot) and you can see it's really not worth it!

IMO a single 150GB would be faster than 2x74GB.

Anandtech said:
If you haven't gotten the hint by now, we'll spell it out for you: there is no place, and no need for a RAID-0 array on a desktop computer. The real world performance increases are negligible at best and the reduction in reliability, thanks to a halving of the mean time between failure, makes RAID-0 far from worth it on the desktop.
 
I disagree with anandtech's quote ( maybe it was written a while ago) but with cheap 7200rpm disks available with huge capacities I dont see why Raid 0 is such a bad idea - admittedly I would probably go 0+1 but even so

Saying that I wouldnt use raptors as they are sinularly as fast as 7200rpm discs in RAID 0 or there abouts and dont get any beneficial performance boosts in raid configs as far as I have seen
 
Yeah you can't rule out RAID 0 completely. That was a bit of a foolish blanket statement by Anandtech although I do trust nearly everything else said on that site.

There are performance increases to be had in going RAID 0 in certain areas more than others but it all comes down to whats more important to you; best performance or best bang/buck.
 
Imy said:
Compared to what?


If comparing the 16mb cache versions then not really. They might not perform exactly the same in every benchmark but should have similar performance overall.
Just to a normal 7200RPM drive.


Tute said:
IMO a single 150GB would be faster than 2x74GB.
FrankJH said:
Saying that I wouldnt use raptors as they are sinularly as fast as 7200rpm discs in RAID 0 or there abouts and dont get any beneficial performance boosts in raid configs as far as I have seen
So basically I'm better off just getting a single 150GB Raptor and not bother with the whole RAID chestnut.

Thanks for the advise guys, I'll prob get this on monday (pay day :D ) with whatever TFT I end up choosing.

eon
 
My next rig will have a 150GB Raptor as the core drive. I've got a 36GB Raptor atm and yes it's noisy, but noise doesn't bother me at all, even when sleeping and it's defragging. And i'll vouch that they're fast, reliable drives.

Although whether Raptors are the "fastest" drives seems to be a topic of hot debate, some claim it is, some claim it can be matched by a 7.2kRPM drive which also has the benefits of being cheaper per GB.
 
Depends on what you're doing, a better sustained transfer rate would be better for larger files, but for smaller files then a raptor is better.

In spite of that I believe that the new raptors come out on top on both of these counts.
 
I have got my windows setup on a raided pair of 8mb Raptors with a 320Gb 7200.10 as main storage my HD Tach scores are as follows


HD Tach score for a pair of 8mb 74Gb Raptors

Raptors.jpg



HD Tach score for a single 320Gb Seagate 7200.10

7200.10.jpg


As you can see the raided raptors FAR FAR out score the single 7200.10 If you compare these results to the scores that jbloggs posted you can also see that the single 7200.10 is on a par with a single 16mb raptor but again nowhere near a raided set. I can only guess also that a pair of 16mb raided would be even quicker.

In real world terms I have noticed a real difference in load up times for windows and games, I use the raid set for main windows drive and and another partition for games all the rest of my stuff is on the other drive.

The little green progress bar on windows load up does not even get across the second time before going on to the welcome screen. With one raptor the bar used to go across about two too two and a half times before going to the welcome screen.

As for backup I have a pair of external drives that Ghost backs up to each night as the system is on 24/7 this does not intrude on my use of the computer. I have been backing up like this for the last five years and have never had a data loss of any kind. I shall soon be upgrading to two 16mb raptors as my warranty is soon to run out on this current pair, so will let you know what the speed increase (if any) is like then.
 
Thanks for the details Entai. I've only been using a single raptor thus far but you've re-assured me on my decision to go dual-raptor in my next gaming machine.
 
Entai, from the loooks of things the Seagate drive is seriously held back by being on a Sata1 board, rather than having its full potential on a sata2 board as jbloggs shows.
Seriously tempted by one of those 7200.10 drives though :)
 
Hmm those Seagate's do look pretty nice and the RAIDing seems a bit better as well.

ATM I'm thinking of getting a 150GB Raptor (for windows, apps etc) and 320GB Seagate 7200.10 (storage).

I could always put in another Raptor at a later date if I fancied a speed increase.

Theres a pretty nice review of the Seagate over at AnandTech: click.

Thanks for all the info.
 
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