HDD Question

[wellmad]

Hi,

I'm thinking about buying a 36GB Raptor, primarily to increase my windows boot time...

Just checking out the ebuyer site and comparing the 36GB raptor with my current drive (maxtor SATA II 50Gb 7200RPM) and I notice that the maxtor drive has a data transfer rate of 300MBS whereas the faster spinning Raptor only has 150MPS. Is this because the raptor has SATA I interface? Will this make real difference to the actual read/write times of the drive?

Will the raptor help windows boot quicker?

[peterb]

You mean DECREASE windows boot time? It probably won't make any difference especially if the Raptor is SATA 1 and your existing drive is SATA 2 (assuming your mobo is SATA 2).

Best way to speed up the boot time is to ensure that you are not loading un-needed services and drivers at boot time.

[pauldarkside]

The current hard drives are nowhere near maxing out the throughput allowed by SATA I left alone SATA II. Those Raptor's have a much higher spin rate (10,000 RPM as opposed to 7,200 RPM) giving lower access times, etc, so I'd say it probably would make a difference, especially used with a managed boot (needed services etc).

And yes, you'd be aiming for decreased boot times really

[arthurleung]

I doubt you will see any noticible differences with only a 36GB Raptor. A 150GB Raptor or a 750/1TB 7200rpm drives would be much faster for booting windows.

[wellmad]

lol yes I meant decrease. Doh!

why would a bigger drive lower boot times, is it something about files being placed on the edge of the disc surface? What about using a raid with two 36Gb drives, would that help?

[dave87]

In bigger discs you will have multiple platters that can be read independently, combined with a higher density on the platter, meaning that the data can be read more quickly from the platter than on smaller drives at the same RPM.

[cotswoldcs]

No - forget the 36Gb Raptor, even in RAID 0. Go for the newer 150Gb Raptor or a Samsung or WD 500Gb drive. Larger capacity drives generally perform better than lower capacity drives. A 500Gb Samsung or WD will easily outperform a 250Gb model so you'd be advised to spend your money on a bigger drive if budget will stretch. The Raptor is unusual and still stands out as the best performing SATA desktop hard drive money can buy.

A larger drive will lower your boot times, although if you really want that extra second go with the Raptor. If you need the capacity I'd recommend a Samsung 500Gb drive.

[TooNice]

The best way to decrease boot time (at least under XP) is to go RAID-0 - doesn't matter all that much which drive to be honest as long as it's roughly in the same generation. I would expect 2x36GB to boot after than 1x 150GB.

That said, I am not one who advocate RAID-0 normally, but I would not buy a 36GB Raptor. At least go 74GB IMO.

[Lourdes]

If you want high performance get a Samsung F1. A Raptor will have lower access times but slower transfer rates and would only be faster in situations you won't encounter. Back when the Raptors first came out they were fast drives, not anymore - even the newer ones - in comparison to 7200rpm drives. You might get quicker boot times but only by a few seconds, even SSD drives aren't that much quicker unless considered as a %.

[wellmad]

Ok, thanks for the advice, but what am I to do about my boot times? I've searched this topic on google loads of times and done everything advised from emptying the prefetch folder (didn't help at all) to stopping unneeded services and startup apps (no noticable difference). I've defragged the hdd and boot files and used bootvis and nothing has helped in the least.

my boot times are currently 1.5 - 2 minutes and I have what I consider to be a newish fairly quick/good machine:

Q6600 CPU
4 (3.25) GB Ram
pretty new 80Gb SATA II HDD
ASUS P5K deluxe wifi AP
antec 500W smart power PSU
Geforce 8500 GTS

I remember reading that win xp should take 30 seconds to boot and my boot time just seems excesive. Would OC'ing the CPU help? A better power supply?

I thought a faster spinning HDD would definatly improve things but I guess not. Would a 500Gb drive make that much difference?

Could I partition a 500GB drive into 2 logical drives and RAID the partitions to get the benefits of RAID & a big HDD?