coo-coo-clocker
Limp Gawd
- Joined
- Sep 6, 2007
- Messages
- 183
I am planning a build for the wife's new PC. She does a lot of video editing work, and demands good performance and high reliability. For these reasons, I've always used SCSI in her machines I've built over the years.
One thing she needs in the new build is larger capacity drives. I currently have several U160 cheetah's and a few U320 cheetah's. They are the older 10k 73GB drives, but using the existing drives in the new build would be desirable, since they have plenty of life left in them. I have an old adaptec U320 controller, but it's PCI-X and so it isnt fully exploited (mobo doesn't support PCI-X).
I have done a lot of research the last couple of days on 'latest/greatest' to see if I can switch to SATA for the new build. Honestly, I can't seem to zero in on conclusive data to help with my decision:
U320 Roundup
Seagate's 15K.5 Cheetah or 15K.6 Cheetah
Good discussion here about SAS vs VRaptor
SCSI vs. SATA
To switch over to SAS seems a bit like overkill. A decent SAS/SATA controller is going to run me about $300 (or way up from there!). I would then be mixing SAS and SCSI drives and don't know if I want to mess with that. SAS drives are still insanely overpriced.
SATA 3.0 performance is certainly closing in on SCSI, but the reliability and performance for demanding I/O like video editing isn't quite there yet. The VRaptors are pricey. I could get 300 GB cheetah 15k.5 for $100 less than the VRaptor.
If I stay with U320, I will most likely spring for a 320 PCI-e controller, and then look at picking up a couple of the newer 300GB U320 drives... and that means about $600. But I will be able to use the existing cheetahs (they're a nice size for O/S boot drive and maybe swap file).
On the decision of "to raid or not to raid", I currently do not use any raid for her system. The SCSI drives are so dependable (never had one fail in over 15 years), I have never really thought about using Raid for the fault-tolerance. Perhaps I could look into Raid 0 for improved performance...I would need to research to see if it makes a noticeable difference for this application.
What do you guys think about my research and options here? Am I missing any key points? Any recommendations?
One thing she needs in the new build is larger capacity drives. I currently have several U160 cheetah's and a few U320 cheetah's. They are the older 10k 73GB drives, but using the existing drives in the new build would be desirable, since they have plenty of life left in them. I have an old adaptec U320 controller, but it's PCI-X and so it isnt fully exploited (mobo doesn't support PCI-X).
I have done a lot of research the last couple of days on 'latest/greatest' to see if I can switch to SATA for the new build. Honestly, I can't seem to zero in on conclusive data to help with my decision:
U320 Roundup
Seagate's 15K.5 Cheetah or 15K.6 Cheetah
Good discussion here about SAS vs VRaptor
SCSI vs. SATA
To switch over to SAS seems a bit like overkill. A decent SAS/SATA controller is going to run me about $300 (or way up from there!). I would then be mixing SAS and SCSI drives and don't know if I want to mess with that. SAS drives are still insanely overpriced.
SATA 3.0 performance is certainly closing in on SCSI, but the reliability and performance for demanding I/O like video editing isn't quite there yet. The VRaptors are pricey. I could get 300 GB cheetah 15k.5 for $100 less than the VRaptor.
If I stay with U320, I will most likely spring for a 320 PCI-e controller, and then look at picking up a couple of the newer 300GB U320 drives... and that means about $600. But I will be able to use the existing cheetahs (they're a nice size for O/S boot drive and maybe swap file).
On the decision of "to raid or not to raid", I currently do not use any raid for her system. The SCSI drives are so dependable (never had one fail in over 15 years), I have never really thought about using Raid for the fault-tolerance. Perhaps I could look into Raid 0 for improved performance...I would need to research to see if it makes a noticeable difference for this application.
What do you guys think about my research and options here? Am I missing any key points? Any recommendations?