Who's got a raptor 150gb drive here?

[eUphoria]

Thinking about getting one of these to put a nice shiny copy of vista on - worth the cash for these drives? Just how noisy are they compared to a 'standard' SATA drive?

[saltynay]

I don't own one but I have used two in raid0 the performance boost was marginal compared to my Seagate cudas not worth the money might as well use a scsi drive if you want performance

[adam1701]

i wish i had one

[Harkin]

Its still pretty quick imo, fastest single Hdd by far unless u go scsi. So if u got the cash to splash I'd do it. Heres a review I read awhile back about them http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...1926852,00.asp

[dave87]

For once, I agree with saltynay - RAID 0 Seagate 7200.10s will be just as quick in most cases, and you get heaps more storage for the same price.

[SiM]

I would disagree that its just as quick... The raptor has a much lower access time, and doesnt raid 0 increase the access time?

Maybe if you copy a lot of files everyday you will find it just as quick for that...

(I moved from raid 0 to no raid - i was seeing barely no performance difference. I havent tryed the raptor either because im poor)

[TooNice]

From what I've heard, the latest Raptors, while not quiet, are not too noisy either. I am only using a 2nd gen Raptor, and to be honest, it is quieter than my Seagate 7200.10.

If cost was no concern, I probably would get the latest Raptor as an OS drive. I've played with SCSI before (but not SAS), and I don't think I can stand those types of cable anymore. But personally, I don't think I will go Raptor anymore - for the same reason I don't go SCSI: though it is less painful than SCSI drive in that sense, it's really not very good value. Yes it provides a better rounded performance than you could with RAID-0 of slower drives (*), but it will eventually be surpassed (especially in non-server applications). And when that happens, the drive is completely obsolete. Whereas the same price can get you 2x 4-500GB drives. While drives of those capacities will also eventually become obsolete, I do think that they will remain 'useful' for longer period of time. It comes down to how much you value the performance gains - like all things in the upper range, you do pay a significant premium for the 'fastest'. Of course, it may well be that you have £150 burning in your pocket, and absolutely do not forsee the need for 1TB of storage - in which case the Raptor would make a fine purchase I am sure.

*RAID-0 of slower drives can provide significantly better sequential read/write performance than a single Raptor. But those scenarios are not as common applicable all the time, and dare I say, most of the time - hence the 'better rounded' comment.

[markymicro]

I have one, I can't really tell you if it faster than a normal harddrive or maybe I have ajusted to it?? But what I can tell you it's louder than a normal drive, you can hear it clicking away............................

[Clunk]

I have a 74gb raptor and for general stuff, there is a noticable bump in speed over a normal sata drive, especially for things like defragging, virus scan etc. As mentioned, if you have a quiet system, it will get on your nerves, mine does.

[chuckskull]

I have a 74gig raptor, used to have 2 36's in RAID0. The noise is a lot more than a normal drive when seeking, but theres loads of ways to reduce the noise, like drive enclosures etc.

Also if you really want a speed boost, get two of the smaller drives and RAID0 them.

[eUphoria]

Thanks guys - i've already got a couple of large SATA II drives for storage so my interest was just for using the raptor as an OS drive really, does sound like experiences are mixed and that the overall message is that they arent worth the extra money then? I'd be wanting to actually notice a difference in OS loading time, as well as game levels loading to justify one i think.

[TooNice]

OS loading, or at least Windows XP tend to benefit a chunk from RAID-0 (one of those cases) than a single fast drive. For many thing else, the faster drive wins.

Whether it is worth it.. you can take a look at the latest HD article on the 7K1000 in RAID-0 (with Raptor benchmarks).

http://www.anandtech.com/storage/sho...spx?i=2974&p=5

[GSte]

I have a 74gb raptor and for general stuff, there is a noticable bump in speed over a normal sata drive, especially for things like defragging, virus scan etc.

And battlefield 2 load times.....

[ExceededGoku]

I hate to say it but its the biggest waste of ~£150 i have spent in a while...

[supermonkey]

I have a raptor X, must say its a very fast drive, noticeable when booting up ur PC. On the noise side, its not too noisey when idle, but when read & write, it make this loud clicking cause the read/write head moves so fast. Its worth the money if you are looking at speed, but for a slience drive, no. I would say buy a samsung spinpoint instead, it fast as a 7200rpm drive and quiet.

[Thorsson]

There's been some interesting comparisons of Raptor and Deathstar 1Tb (plus Raid 0) on AT. I don't think most of you would get much benefit from either Raptors or Raid 0.

OTOH I have a multi-Gb database that I use constantly, and am seriously thinking about both for the first time.