Empty Harddrive Bay & Too Many Options

Hello all,

I am going to have some christmas $ to spend here soon and was planning on putting something in this empty bay in the ol' 6860. At first I thought just put a 500GB WD scorpio for storage. Then I thought a 320GB and raid 0 for performance. Then I thought why not 2 x 320 GB 7200rpm scopios in Raid 0 config. Now I'm wondering about a 64-128 GB SSD for windows and the stock HD for storage.... AAAHHHHH someone make up my mind... please & thanks!

oh and btw don't really want to go much over $200 (someone on here mentioned a OCZ SSD for $195 but idk where cause they seem to be over 300 at least).

-The SSD sound kinda sketchy and unassuring but sometimes like the best thing ever?
-How about the 10,000rpm drives instead of the SSD's?

Again thanks all

 

it really depends on what you want, you gave a lot of options and each has its advantage and disadvantage, in the end you have to decide...

here's a few tips:

-ssd will be fastest but will be most pricey and least capacity

-raid 0 is a second alternative and will be very fast, but you should buy a hdd with a capacity matching the stock one (raid 0 capacity is twice the storage capacity of your smallest drive), but the downside to raid 0 is one drive fails the whole array fails

-I generally don't see the point of using an internal hard drive for storage (unless we're talking an internal hdd in a external enclosure). if you're going to have a drive for storage, why not just utilize an external hard drive instead of taking up an internal spot, but thats just my opinion

 

thanks for your feedback. Nice rig btw. Well i was mostly dwelling on the performance aspect, sounds like raid 0 is comparable to the SSD (roughly; for low budget). So would it be worth it for the 10,000 rpm fujitsu vs 2 WD scorpios in raid 0?

Sorry just tough to decide...

I'm sorta leaning toward doing 2 WD scorpios @ 7200rpm in a raid 0 config (i'll backup relevant data...no worries there... just 4 school not business)

but i'm really intrigued by what I hear about the SSD's being wicked fast in general operation, then again I've heard bad things too so maybe safest bet is with the WD's i guess....

again sorry to jabber on but I want to make a good decision here. Choices are good but def a bittersweet in this case

 

you can pm iata he uses an ssd + 500gb hdd in his rig.
might be able to answer some of your questions.

 

I would hold off for the SSDs for now. If people say they are pricey, they are not kidding, I'm telling ya.

I would go for dual 7200 RPM on a RAID 0 Configuration. You can probably get a deal for two of them on a local listing for ~$150-$170 or cheaper.

 

hmm i never saw a 10000rpm 2.5" drive...

And if you want raid0 you will want to buy two drives with the same specs. it will make both operate at slowest rpm and smallest size. Worst case scenario you get a 500gb 5400rpm drive and a 60gb 7200rpm. raid0 will give you a 120gb 5400rpm drive...

 

I got my OCZ Core v1 128GB from Directron for $294 + $99 mail in rebate. They are doing a similar deal at the moment but the 64GB looks to be a better deal @ $99 after MIR:

http://www.directron.com/oczssd21c128g.html
http://www.directron.com/oczssd21c64g.html

If you install it as a non-member disk of the onboard RAID it should run perfectly. It is honestly the best $195 I have ever spent on a PC upgrade. Applications load instantly and I get no stutter what so ever. I had two WD 500GB in RAID 0 before I purchased the OCZ and it absolutely smashes the RAID setup performance wise. You just can't beat 0.3ms access times

Benchies: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=4286797&postcount=1890

 

I was pretty much asking the same question in my post.... but this question is more directed to animal..... $200 is about my limit too so I was thinkin I would get a 32gb drive (patriot probably) and only install Vista x64 Home Prem and maybe a few programs, keep the 320gb drive that came with the 6860fx and place the pagefile and program files on it, and get a cheap external drive for backup.....based upon everything I have looked into it seems that just doing that with install the OS on an SSD everything should improve all around?

Thanks

 

If you have a 6831/6860/171 FX I would just get the Core v1 and save some dosh. As I said before it runs perfectly.

 

Alright... that sounds good but as I asked before would it be feasible to install vista on the 30gb version and maybe only another few essentials while putting the rest on the other drive for the program directory/etc.... and are there any main differences between the core v1 and v2 or would they be negligible?

 

Core v2 is only very slightly faster and not worth the extra $. Core v2 is also firmware upgradable but they have yet to release a firmware upgrade and from reading the OCZ forums and with Vertex on the horizon I doubt they ever will.

I would go for at least the 64GB version especially if you play games. The more you can fit on the SSD the better. One good thing is Windows 7 has a much smaller install footprint than Vista so you will be able to fit more programs on your SSD soon. It also helps the SSD if you have more free space so that the wear levelling can be more effective. If you have a very full SSD there is only a small amount of free cells for the wear levelling to utilise for day to day erase-writes.

 

Okay iata, you have convinced me to get an SSD. I will watch and wait for a great deal on the OCZ ones. Hopefully the prices will fall in the not too distant future or I can get a good deal. I see some on ebay for around 300 so maybe I'll keep saving... You make it sound like the ultimate setup n now I want one
thanks for the advice everyone!

 

Wait for a great deal? What do you call this:

http://www.directron.com/oczssd21c64g.html

 

I call it a $150 that you'll never see =) i heard OCZ was really bad with rebates... you get yours back yet iata? and i'm hunting an ssd down soon i'll be checking back with ya for ur fix if you don't mind

 

i recieved my rebate check last week from ocz after sending it in in november...

 

I have yet to receive my cheque but i have every faith

As long as you stick to the rebate form rules by the letter you should be fine.

 

Sweet!!!!!

 

That rebate expires 12/31... asumming you bought it today you have 8 days for them to process and ship, receive your package, send the rebate in, and have them process the rebate. any one of those could take 3-4 days by itself

 

That date is referring to the purchase date on the sales invoice so as long as you buy it by 31/12 you're fine. You then have 14 days to post the rebate.

 

i stand corrected, good deal then