Simple question about vista and hd cache

If you have a single sata drive that has a 16mb cache buffer on it... will it use this cache by default in vista? Or is this an internal cache in the drive that you can't shut on or off?

for example... here is a picture of the setting i'm talking about. if you have this disabled will your drive not be using it's "16mb cache buffer" or are these two seperate things i'm talking about here?

 

I have those same boxes enabled. I did not change them, its just what XP defaulted.

As far as harddrive cache, I dont think that will help much in Vista. The difference in performance betwen a harddrive with an 8mb buffer, and one with a 16mb buffer is minimal.
Your best bet, is to upgrade your memory, if it is not already at least 2Gb.

K-TRON

 

i have 4gb so i'm not worried about that. thanks for the answer but that still doesn't really explain if this option is directly releated to the "16mb cache buffer" and from what i've read it will help in vista

 

What are you asking again? I thought you already answered your original question in the 2nd post...

 

Ok.. I ordered a sager np5792. it comes with a 200gb sata drive with 16mb cache buffer. In Vista....Does the HD use this buffer no matter what or do you have to have the setting turned on in that screenshot in my first post??? Really I don't know how more simple to make the question.

 

Thanks in advance to anyone willing to answer this question.

 

Just dont change the setting and everything will be fine. A single Hitachi 7k200 has enough pucnch and speed to take whatever vista has to throw at it. I have two in Raid0 in my laptop, I guess that makes the buffer 32mb, and it is fast. Not fast enough, as my desktop outpaces it with its 2 SAS 15K rpm ultrastar harddrives in Raid0.

Dont worry too much about caching.
If it really bothers you, when you get your laptop, enable caching run some tests, and then try it when its disabled and see if any speed difference occurs.

I guess a lot of people just dont know if it does anything, thats why you are not getting the defined answer you are looking for.

K-TRON