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#1
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Building a new system: SCSI or IDE?
I'm assembling a new system in a couple of months, and am facing the
old dilemma: SCSI or IDE disks? I have traditionally insisted on SCSI disks because they're faster and more reliable. Lately I've been having some hearing problems, though, and the drive noise is bothering me. Thus I'm motivated to use IDE drives in my next system if I can do so without too much compromise. What about performance? If I run two or or three disk-intensive applications under Windows, will there be much practical difference between a pair of fast Ultra320 drives and a pair of fast IDE drives? I will have at least three IDE devices: two hard disks and a CD/RW or DVD drive. I'm assuming that each device should go on a dedicated channel. If so, should I get a mainboard with four IDE channels built in, or will an add-on adapter work equally well? What about reliability? Are modern IDE drives reliable enough for all practical purposes? (I define this to mean a negligible chance of failure over a system life of three years, with the drives running almost constantly.) Are there any popular brands or models which have particularly good or bad reputations? My mail address is jsachs177 at earthlink dot net. |
#2
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Jonathan Sachs wrote:
I'm assembling a new system in a couple of months, and am facing the old dilemma: SCSI or IDE disks? I have traditionally insisted on SCSI disks because they're faster and more reliable. Lately I've been having some hearing problems, though, and the drive noise is bothering me. Thus I'm motivated to use IDE drives in my next system if I can do so without too much compromise. What about performance? If I run two or or three disk-intensive applications under Windows, will there be much practical difference between a pair of fast Ultra320 drives and a pair of fast IDE drives? I will have at least three IDE devices: two hard disks and a CD/RW or DVD drive. I'm assuming that each device should go on a dedicated channel. If so, should I get a mainboard with four IDE channels built in, or will an add-on adapter work equally well? What about reliability? Are modern IDE drives reliable enough for all practical purposes? (I define this to mean a negligible chance of failure over a system life of three years, with the drives running almost constantly.) Are there any popular brands or models which have particularly good or bad reputations? My mail address is jsachs177 at earthlink dot net. I suggest neither SCSI nor IDE (meaning PATA) HDs, but SATA. SATA is the successor to PATA, with better performance and better cabling. I think that a good current choice would be SATA for HDs and PATA for DVD/CD stuff. Modern HDs have MTBFs, regardless of bus, on the order of 10 years. What you get in practice depends a lot on the environment; pay real attention to cooling (air flow) and make sure that your power supply choice is based on attributes other than price. -- Cheers, Bob |
#3
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Jonathan Sachs wrote in message ... I'm assembling a new system in a couple of months, and am facing the old dilemma: SCSI or IDE disks? SCSI has basically passed its useby date for all except the most demanding situations. Basically lousy value for money now. I have traditionally insisted on SCSI disks because they're faster and more reliable. Lately I've been having some hearing problems, though, and the drive noise is bothering me. Thus I'm motivated to use IDE drives in my next system if I can do so without too much compromise. What about performance? If I run two or or three disk-intensive applications under Windows, will there be much practical difference between a pair of fast Ultra320 drives and a pair of fast IDE drives? I doubt you'd be able to pick the difference in a proper double blind trial with your ears plugged. I will have at least three IDE devices: two hard disks and a CD/RW or DVD drive. I'm assuming that each device should go on a dedicated channel. No need. If so, should I get a mainboard with four IDE channels built in, or will an add-on adapter work equally well? 2 channels will be fine. What about reliability? Are modern IDE drives reliable enough for all practical purposes? (I define this to mean a negligible chance of failure over a system life of three years, with the drives running almost constantly.) Yep. Are there any popular brands or models which have particularly good or bad reputations? I like the WDs myself. I avoid the Hitachi/IBMs because of the atrocious record they got with relatively recent drives and the fact that they have a lousy RMA system. Best to avoid the Seagate Barracudas in your situation because they have chosen to disable AAM because of some stupid claim about patent infringement. That means that the currently buyable drives arent that quiet anymore. |
#4
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"Bob WIllard" wrote in message ... Jonathan Sachs wrote: I'm assembling a new system in a couple of months, and am facing the old dilemma: SCSI or IDE disks? I have traditionally insisted on SCSI disks because they're faster and more reliable. Lately I've been having some hearing problems, though, and the drive noise is bothering me. Thus I'm motivated to use IDE drives in my next system if I can do so without too much compromise. What about performance? If I run two or or three disk-intensive applications under Windows, will there be much practical difference between a pair of fast Ultra320 drives and a pair of fast IDE drives? I will have at least three IDE devices: two hard disks and a CD/RW or DVD drive. I'm assuming that each device should go on a dedicated channel. If so, should I get a mainboard with four IDE channels built in, or will an add-on adapter work equally well? What about reliability? Are modern IDE drives reliable enough for all practical purposes? (I define this to mean a negligible chance of failure over a system life of three years, with the drives running almost constantly.) Are there any popular brands or models which have particularly good or bad reputations? My mail address is jsachs177 at earthlink dot net. I suggest neither SCSI nor IDE (meaning PATA) HDs, but SATA. Well, that certainly solves the seperate channels problem. SATA is the successor to PATA, with better performance Potentially better performance. Currently there is only one drive that act- ually makes use of it. Others are just PATA drives with a SATA interface. and better cabling. I think that a good current choice would be SATA for HDs and PATA for DVD/CD stuff. Modern HDs have MTBFs, regardless of bus, on the order of 10 years. What you get in practice depends a lot on the environment; pay real attention to cooling (air flow) and make sure that your power supply choice is based on attributes other than price. -- Cheers, Bob |
#5
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"Papa" wrote in message k.net... Hi Johnathan: Although SCSI has always been considered superior, IDE performance has improved drastically in recent years, So has SCSI's. is becoming the standard, Nope. is very reliable, is widely available, and has a significant cost advantage. I have used both, but now (for my stated reasons) I only use IDE, and my brand preference is Western Digital - which have never given me a failure.. Regards. "Jonathan Sachs" wrote in message ... I'm assembling a new system in a couple of months, and am facing the old dilemma: SCSI or IDE disks? I have traditionally insisted on SCSI disks because they're faster and more reliable. Lately I've been having some hearing problems, though, and the drive noise is bothering me. Thus I'm motivated to use IDE drives in my next system if I can do so without too much compromise. What about performance? If I run two or or three disk-intensive applications under Windows, will there be much practical difference between a pair of fast Ultra320 drives and a pair of fast IDE drives? I will have at least three IDE devices: two hard disks and a CD/RW or DVD drive. I'm assuming that each device should go on a dedicated channel. If so, should I get a mainboard with four IDE channels built in, or will an add-on adapter work equally well? What about reliability? Are modern IDE drives reliable enough for all practical purposes? (I define this to mean a negligible chance of failure over a system life of three years, with the drives running almost constantly.) Are there any popular brands or models which have particularly good or bad reputations? My mail address is jsachs177 at earthlink dot net. |
#6
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"Jonathan Sachs" wrote in message ... I'm assembling a new system in a couple of months, and am facing the old dilemma: SCSI or IDE disks? I have traditionally insisted on SCSI disks because they're faster and more reliable. Lately I've been having some hearing problems, though, and the drive noise is bothering me. Thus I'm motivated to use IDE drives in my next system if I can do so without too much compromise. What about performance? If I run two or or three disk-intensive applications under Windows, will there be much practical difference between a pair of fast Ultra320 drives and a pair of fast IDE drives? Should be, given that SCSI still has the beter access time and IO/s. I will have at least three IDE devices: two hard disks and a CD/RW or DVD drive. I'm assuming that each device should go on a dedicated channel. If so, should I get a mainboard with four IDE channels built in, or will an add-on adapter work equally well? There probably ain't a difference unless the extra channels are on the MoBo chipset. Still, with 2 harddrives you probably won't spring the PCI bus 132MB/s limit anyway. What about reliability? Are modern IDE drives reliable enough for all practical purposes? (I define this to mean a negligible chance of failure over a system life of three years, with the drives running almost constantly.) Are there any popular brands or models which have particularly good or bad reputations? My mail address is jsachs177 at earthlink dot net. |
#7
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"Tod" wrote:
A "Quality" high end SCSI hard drive will last longer under long term disk-intenive (24 hour a day) work. But you are paying a lot more money. The drives will be spinning all the time, but since this is a workstation, they will not be seeking all the time. When I mentioned "disk-intensive applications," I was thinking of my need for performance during short periods of high activity, not the effects of disk activity on the drives. It never occurred to me that pounding the disk would actually wear it out. I'm accustomed to thinking that drive life is dependent on power-up time and the operating environment, and on power-up/down cycles. Am I being too simplistic? I would get a motherboard with the built-in Raid controller (only about $20 more). Put the ATA/EIDE Boot hard drive on the Raid controller. An interesting possibility, which I hadn't considered. It brings a couple of questions to mind. First, will I pay a performance penalty? I investigated RAID several years ago, and learned that there was a substantial performance penalty. Even with RAID 0 there was a penalty if the drives were not synchronized (and IDE drives did not have the hardware necessary to do that). Second, what about noise, heat, and space requirements? This would increase the number of drives in my system from 2 to 4, presumably doubling all of those factors. Might I not find four IDE drives to be nearly as noisy as two SCSI drives, or even noisier? My mail address is jsachs177 at earthlink dot net. |
#8
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"Jonathan Sachs" wrote in message ... "Tod" wrote: A "Quality" high end SCSI hard drive will last longer under long term disk-intenive (24 hour a day) work. But you are paying a lot more money. The drives will be spinning all the time, but since this is a workstation, they will not be seeking all the time. When I mentioned "disk-intensive applications," I was thinking of my need for performance during short periods of high activity, not the effects of disk activity on the drives. It never occurred to me that pounding the disk would actually wear it out. I'm accustomed to thinking that drive life is dependent on power-up time and the operating environment, and on power-up/down cycles. Am I being too simplistic? So you are just doing normal disk activity. I think most people would agree that heat is the drive killer. I would get a motherboard with the built-in Raid controller (only about $20 more). Put the ATA/EIDE Boot hard drive on the Raid controller. An interesting possibility, which I hadn't considered. It brings a couple of questions to mind. First, will I pay a performance penalty? I investigated RAID several years ago, and learned that there was a substantial performance penalty. Even with RAID 0 there was a penalty if the drives were not synchronized (and IDE drives did not have the hardware necessary to do that). A 7200RPM ATA/EIDE will have close to the same performance as a SCSI 7200 drive Invest in a fast processor and lots of memory. Second, what about noise, heat, and space requirements? This would increase the number of drives in my system from 2 to 4, presumably doubling all of those factors. Might I not find four IDE drives to be nearly as noisy as two SCSI drives, or even noisier? My mail address is jsachs177 at earthlink dot net. |
#9
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Jonathan Sachs wrote in message ... Rod Speed wrote I will have at least three IDE devices: two hard disks and a CD/RW or DVD drive. I'm assuming that each device should go on a dedicated channel. No need. That seems to require some explanation. The short story is that its only simultaneous ops on a pair of drives that benefits from having that pair on a separate channel. Thats pretty uncommon in practice. The most common real world situation where thats seen is when ghosting one drive to an image file on another drive and even then, the speed of that operation is dominated by the compression time if compression is used. Even when say burning a CD from a hard drive, the speed of the entire operation is mostly determined by the speed of the burner which is much less than the speed of a hard drive. I said "I'm assuming" because I know that an IDE channel can perform only one operation at a time. Yes, but the modern reality is that you dont often use two drives literally simultaneously. And you never use 4 drives simultaneously, so there isnt any need for them all to have their own channel. Even SCSI doesnt allow the use of all 4 drives simultaneously anyway. Thus if two devices share a channel, any operation on one device will lock out the other. Only if both are being used at once. Thus if a DVD drive is seeking, for example, a read or write request on the hard disk will jolly well have to wait until it's done. Is this no longer true? Its still true. But you dont normally want to use them simultaneously and when you do, say with an install from the drive to a hard drive, the fact that the hard drive has to pause occassionally while the DVD drive head seeks isnt normally a real problem. |
#10
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Rod Speed wrote:
Even SCSI doesnt allow the use of all 4 drives simultaneously anyway. Sure it does. SCSI allows all drives to be used simultaneously; up to 7 HDs on a narrow bus and up to 15 HDs on a wide bus. E.g., SCSI allows the initiator (the Host Adapter) to issue a read command to each target (HD) and then disconnect from the SCSI bus; each HD may then, concurrently, do the seek, then read data from the platter into its buffer, and reconnect only when it is ready to copy data into host RAM. This capability is one reason why it makes sense to use a 320 MB/s (U320) version of SCSI to attach HDs which have STRs of less than a quarter of the bus data rate. Moreover, with command queuing, a bunch of read commands can be issued to each HD, and each HD can execute them out-of-order and briefly re-occupy the SCSI bus to do the actual data transfer. And yes, it works the same way for writes and for mixtures of reads and writes. I am not claiming that WinWhatever takes full advantage of the capabilities of SCSI, but there are grown-up OSs which do. -- Cheers, Bob |
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