Buying a new Hard Drive - What's the best option? 1

[Anastasis]

Hi - I have a 120Gb internal HD on my PC which is creaking a bit under the weight of a lot of files (only 10Gb free currently), over half of which is digital video I have stored on the drive.

When I got the PC two years ago, I never thought that I would get anywhere close to filling up the available space, but it is amazing just how quickly you expand to fill what you have.

Anyway, I think the time has come to get a second hard drive, but what is the best option for me? The main use would be to expand on space for working with digital video files.

Do I...

1. Buy a bigger single internal HD and transfer everything on to that? Doesn't seem sensible really, does it?

2. Buy a second internal HD? 160Gb or bigger internal drives are quite cheap now.

3. Buy an external HD and transfer all of my digital video files on to that and use that for DV exclusively in the future, thereby freeing over half of my master HD?

And if (3) is the best option, should I (a) buy a USB 2.0 or (b) a Firewire external drive, or (c) doesn't it really matter?

4. Do something else?

Thanks in anticipation of your help and advice on the pros and cons of these options.

 

[cdogg]

Yes. I was just pointing out that SATA integrated on a motherboard runs more efficiently than a controller card. In addition like I mentioned, PCI is limited to 133MB/s reducing SATA's rated bandwidth of 150MB/s. Also a crowded PCI bus (even if you only have one or two PCI cards installed) will lower the performance even more.

That's not to say a controller card is a bad idea. On the contrary, it does provide you with an additional one or two channels. This in turn allows you to spread out your drives, perhaps even eliminating the need for any to share the same channel. Just don't be fooled into thinking that an SATA controller card is going to be any more valuable than an IDE.

On the flipside, SATA drives are becoming more and more advanced. Early drives weren't impressive and performed equally to other IDE drives. The extra bandwidth SATA provided (17MB/s) didn't seem to make much difference (drives aren't fast enough alone to use up what PATA can supply). But enhancements such as Native Command Queuing (NCQ) are starting to hit the SATA market - part of the 2nd-generation SATA movement. You can see as much as a 25% performance increase in some benchmarks from it, easily giving it the edge over any 7200RPM IDE drive. You can read more about it here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20041116/index.html

The problem is that many get caught up in all the hype. I'm a slow adopter I suppose, and live precariously along the lines of "I'll believe it when I see it"! Or more appropriately, I'll see it when I "need" it!


[maroon]Bottom line in your situation:[/maroon][navy] Don't worry about having to switch over to SATA. It's not going to give you any noticeable boost over onboard IDE, especially since it appears you have a crowded PCI bus.[/navy]


~cdogg
[tab]"All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind";
[tab][tab]- Aristotle
[tab][navy]For general rules and guidelines to get better answers, click here:[/navy] faq219-2884

 

[garebo]

As for the removables, they are great. I have used them for years. The suggestion to get a few of them is good too.
I have win xp pro on one, then i have a backup hard drive in another. If i have a prob with one drive i can pop the other in to get access to the net and solve my prob with the first one!
Also, i have win 2k on another caddy.
You pop one out and pop the other in and boot up. The bios sees the new drive and sets it up in milliseconds and all goes well.
Also, you can use them to store mp3's and video. If you have a second computer you can use the caddy to transfer stuff as well.
Also, you can use a second one in your computer and back up your system files and data to it for safe-keeping.
I have 8 of them all the same. If you can, get the ones with the most fans in them. A few extra dollars spent can be worth it, but in the end the standard units work well too. The keys you get for them are universal so you dont even ahve to worry about losing one. I could send you one of my keys and it would work.
They are terrific! They werent always so great about 7 or 8 yrs back but they are now. Even back then the problem was the mobo bios and not the drawers themselves.




Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[Anastasis]

cdogg & garebo

Thanks again for your updates of information. I still haven't gone out and bought a drive and caddy as I have to wait until the end of the month before I will have the money. Of course that is not really a problem as prices are falling rather than rising.

In respect of price and what you get, 200Gb seems about the optimum at the moment. Whilst you can spend more and get more Gb's per pound (yes, I am based in the UK), there seems to be a big price jump to go from 200 to 250Gb. The best price I can find in the UK at the moment for a 200Gb drive is £65.50 (about 125 dollars) here:

http://www.dabs.com/uk/channels/components/harddiskdrives/internalide/productView.htm?quicklinx=3HV9

I presume getting one rated as UDMA133 7200rpm 8MB cache is better than one with a lower rated UDMA, rpm and cache?

On the matter of the caddy, I have spotted this one which seems very cheap at £3.39 (about 7 dollars).

http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/prod...2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=72253

Will it be any good? Also, another question on these, do I need to buy a caddy for every drive I want to take out? By that I mean presumably these caddies come in two parts, one the bit that houses the drive and can be taken out and one bit that sits in the PC permanently. If that is the case, then presumably as has been suggested I need to buy more than one so as to be swappable in the future, or are the internal drawers universal?

Thanks for your help an advice on these again guys. Outside of this forum it's not that easy to get the sort of impartial information you have so expertly provided, so thanks.

 

[cdogg]

There's not a huge difference between ATA/133 and ATA/100 drives. Just make sure you get 7200RPM and 8MB of cache. Also, chances are that your motherboard doesn't support ATA/133 since it is 2 years old (it might, but it would be borderline). You would need an add-in PCI card for ATA/133, which isn't worth going through the trouble. ATA/100 is fine.

Not sure about the caddy. I'm not one to mess with those![tab]



~cdogg
[tab]"All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind";
[tab][tab]- Aristotle
[tab][navy]For general rules and guidelines to get better answers, click here:[/navy] faq219-2884

 

[Anastasis]

I have just checked and my motherboard is an ASUS AV78X. The manual says the following about the IDE: 2x UltraDMA 133/100/66.

So I presume that means I am OK to get up to an ATA-133 drive as with the 200Gb one shown at Dabs? My current hard drive is a Maxtor 6Y120L0 120Gb so it would need to work alongside this.

 

[garebo]

Re: caddies
It depends what you want to use them for and how many computers will use them, or how many computers you have.
Dont forget that you can put any ide device in these caddies, that applies to cdroms, cd or dvd burners, zip drives, any ide! Not completely all of them work, but most do.
You can use them to back up your files and other data, music, video. You can use them to install another copy of your os and your drivers and have it ready in case our system goes down so you still have access to the net to get help or files needed to fix the other setup.
YOu can share with friends if they have an outer the same as yours.
YOu can turn your internal burner into a portable burner this way!
So many uses, it depends on how many computers you have or if friends will want one and want to share. Course you can keep it down too, you dont have to have a hard drive sitting in a tray, you can prepare a hard drive and have it ready to go and if your present system goes down, take caddy out and pop in new hard drive.
Still, i would suggest to anyone to get at least 3 or 4 of these, i would get a dozen at that price if i needed them.


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[Anastasis]

Thanks garebo. I never realised these things were so versatile.

Two questions please:

1) So really I need to buy more than one of the same make so as to be swappable in the future. I take it that the internal drawers are not universal?

2) The caddy available from Ebuyer via the link I gave (which seems very cheap maybe too cheap) says it is not hot-swappable. Would it be worthwhile getting this capability? I don't know how much more it would cost for one like that or if it would be worthwhile.

Thanks again.

 

[garebo]

First, i strongly suggest you get at least 3 or 4, you will wish you had down the road, especially if you cant get the same ones again. No, they are not compatible, they all have a very small circuit board on them and the connectors are set at different heights and so on. I would never considering swapping parts from one to the other, looking for trouble, just get a few of these they are dirt cheap.
As for hot-swappable, i dont really care about this feature. Thats only good in work/server/networking situations. For home situations, all you have to do is turn computer off and install a different caddy and boot up. You can even have 3 different caddies in all at one, you can put them all on a pci ide controller or hook them up to your ide on your mobo, all the same. Personally, i wouldnt pay extra for hotswappable units and they have also been known to be problematic at times, especially cheaper hot-swappable. YOu can buy plain cheap ones but i woouldnt but a cheap hot-swappable myself. Best to stick with what you already found and posted above, they will work fine. I suggest, though, that you figure out what you might need and even get an extra or 2 after that as the price is so low and if a fan goes on one of them you can just take it out but you can also take a fan from another one and install it to replace the fan. If you go to electronics store to buy one of these fans, the price will be more than the whole caddy you are buying now, trust me!!
Now you dont have to have these fans, but i always err on the safe side if possible.
Go ahead and get them and get as many as you feel comfortable with, depends on your needs and possible future needs, just add another in just for the fans if you should need them down the road. The fans are really the only parts that will wear out on the whole caddy unit. Again, you can do without them and i even fitted one of those hard drive fans that you can screw down onto a hard drive and fit it in a caddy just for fun, left the top off.
I never leave the top on the caddy, i figure the hot air gets trapped and better to leave the top off.
Some will say you get better fan results by leaving the top on, you get the suction created, but i think that is negated my the heat trapped inside if you leave the top on.
Who knows for sure, not me!
Stick with those at that website and you will be happy with them and what they can do for you!



Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[garebo]

Did i earn a star yet? lol.


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[Anastasis]

Thanks again garebo.

I think two then will be enough for my needs. I intend to get a 200Gb HD at the end of the month (who knows 250Gb drives might be optimally priced by then), but don't plan another drive for the foreseeable, at least not for another 12 months. By then, 300Gb+ will be cheap, so with total capacity of over half a terabyte I should easily have more than enough. (But then in my previous, now old 8yo PC, 2Gb was humongous!)

The next upgrade beyond that would be a new PC, so I can always revise my plan then. If I should find that two caddies are not enough, then at under £5 it wouldn't be too much of an outlay to buy a new set of 4 or 5 if my needs really did grow beyond my current expectations.

 

[garebo]

Its all in what you do, how much you use your computer, how many you have, etc. Varies with each person.
They are so handy.
One thing i forgot to mention is that even if you only get 1 or 2 caddies, you can still use a bunch of older, cheap hard drives, say 5 to 10 gigs, and set them up for use in your caddy.
You can format one and put your current os on it, just in case you have a problem with your current hard drive.
You can have a few hard drives set aside for caddy use.
Anyway, good luck to you, and i'm sure you will find the caddies to be the best money you ever spent on computer parts for such a low price!


Good advice + great people = tek-tips