HDD Speeds - Does SetFSB harm your HDD?

Ok.. I haven't spent the time to do ANY research, I figure I'll just ask first. I hate being that guy but thought this may be useful to others, so I am asking publicly. Using SetFSB, and pumping that baby up pretty high..does it harm the HDDs? Or, somehow does it cause more fragmentation? I haven't defraged in a while, but I did purchase a new 320GB WD Scorpio BJKT 7200 RPM drive last week.. I just imaged my primary drive to it(primary was only 160GB), and this thing seems MUCH faster. Not sure if it's the size, but doubt that's it. I doubt it's virtual page space. But, it seems more peppy. Everything seems more peppy.

So, the thought crossed my mind when overclocking, did I just hurt my HDD? And now it crosses my mind again.. can I harm my HDD by using SetFSB? I'm about to defrag both drives.. I'm sure that will take some time, but back to my original point.. Any comments?

Side note: my 160GB is also a WD 7200 RPM so aside from size, all is the same.

 

Well no. the 320gb hdd is faster because it has another platter and has more density.

this is the same when the 200gb @7200rpm were beaten by the 320gb @5400rpm.

 

Really? Hmm.. Good to know - but seriously..my system was getting "slow" compared to what it was new. Guess defrag is a necessity.

 

Well yeah it is. everything starts from your hdd. even if everything else is fast as anything. your hdd is spending more time finding the right files to load because it isnt organized(defraged) then to distribute it to the rest of the computer.

dont forget as you install stuff the registry expands. you also have back up files. windows update, system restore and alot more things. so mantenance is very important. (like ccleaner can clean you tempory files and your registry.)

 

I've been a JKDefrag fan for quite some time, it also optimizes and cleans registry, temp folders, etc... I haven't defragged in, ohhhhh... 2 months. Doing so now.

 

I'll give that a try. i nevered used it before.

oh one more piece of info. what slows down your computer hdd isnt how much stuff is on there ex: music, videos, etc. (unless it is more than 80% full) but how much stuff is installed on it.

i noticed this when i use to install my os(both xp and vista) and didnt format.(meaning that all my stuff is still on it.) and my computer was brand new(speed). but when i started to install a whole bunch of stuff i notice it started to take a little longer to boot up, shut down, etc.

really and truly because of this, i reinstall my os every 2 months. ( not exactlly but an estimate.)

one big performance increasement is to slipstream vista sp1( or xp sp2(i find sp3 slower so i dont use it.)) and burn it into a cd. because if you ever notice, when oyu install. you see it says"prepering backup, creating restore point, installing, saving" and a bunch of other stuff. where as if you slipstream it just installs. not all the extra restore point and stuff.

 

Nice.. fortunately, SP1 was already on my Vista DVD And, I try to make sure I don't have a ton of installed programs that cause background processes. That gets annoying. Sucks up all your resources.

JKDefrag man, it's the bomb.

EDIT: Oh, and the fact I had 100GB used of 120GB total on that partition, that likely wasn't helping my performance.

 

Well, if you OC the FSB too high, there is a risk of data corruption to your HD.

 

Lol no i think for 120gb if you past about 90gb you should start seeing a decrease.

dont forget that if you partition. the first partition should be your os that you mostly use. because the needle(cant think of the name) doesnt have to much as much as if were on the opposite side were it can take longer to do.

@ichime. what are the chances? and how much would you think is the limit towards doing that?

 

ichime, that was my concern. You're pumping the FSB of the entire system, not just the CPU. So, if the FSB is pumped, then the whole board is running faster than it should, and data may not transfer properly..hence fragmenting at the least, and physical damage a possibility.

 

Well, as long as you're not OCing the FSB to some insane number like 1333 (333 x 4), then you would be fine. Also, it would be worse with an SSD drive over a conventional HD due to the fact that defragmenting an SSD makes it slower.

Edit: Also, I remember reading some article regarding overclocking that any FSB overclock that is 25% above what the chipset can support would guarantee data corruption.

 

Well.. I don't think I've made it that far. But, I have had BSODs when FSB pumping saying "Windows shutdown to prevent Data Corruption....." So, that was the first time it crossed my mind, but that may just be a random BSOD message. You feeling better ich?

 

A little bit, I still feel a little pain, but not as much as yesterday. The pain has died down enough for me to enjoy/tamper with my QX9300.

 

Yep, OCing the FSB too high can cause damage to the hdd, but I supose you know your limits.

Also, hdd`s are not so slow, I mean, with a RAID 0 setup I get around 115-120MB average speed in HDTune...

 

I think Im gonna go RAId tonight.. I have a 3d HDD now, so it should be easy.

 

RAID 0 makes a world of a difference.
Just backup every 2-3 months or so..just in case

 

i hate when I get these urges, but I have way too much bloat on this computer..just crap I'll never use again- - Time to format and go RAID

 

done backing up..time to fresh install.