73.0GB WD Raptor SATA, worth the money?

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kelvin1704

Senior member
Mar 21, 2001
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If i am not mistaken, in terms of Price per megabytes, the 73.0GB WD Raptor SATA are much more expensive... and higher... (correct me if i am wrong),

my question is, is it really worth that money spent?
 
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DaveSimmons

Elite Member
Aug 12, 2001
40,730
670
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Yes or no.

It depends of course on your budget and your intended uses of it, same as with a high end CPU, video card, case, etc.
 
StrangerGuy

StrangerGuy

Diamond Member
May 9, 2004
8,443
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Its not worth the money if the other components of your PC are currently lacking, e.g too little RAM, slow CPU or graphics. The money is much better spent elsewhere such as a faster video card or CPU or more RAM since these affects overall performance much more than just a mere Raptor.
 
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XxSuNSoOxX

Member
Mar 31, 2002
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i bought it and its fast jsut like the reviews have implied.. it is something you would definetly want to invest in
 
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Algere

Platinum Member
Feb 29, 2004
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Around 2.5 times the cost of a regular SATA drive of almost the same storage capacity(73 vs. 80 GB) & maybe +25% or even less(guesstimate) increase in performance over a regular SATA drive.

Think it's worth it?


NewEgg (borrowed)

Raptor $165 After Rebate
Regular $66
 
Soulkeeper

Soulkeeper

Diamond Member
Nov 23, 2001
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i bet the price will prob drop to the 120-150 range in the next 6 to 8 months
or more if everyone jumps on the 10k rpm wagon quick
 
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JBT

Lifer
Nov 28, 2001
12,094
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81
I have it I love it. But if you don't have the money to spare then alot of the others drives performance is similar and you could put that extra $80 or so into getting a gig of RAM rather than 512 or jumping from a vanilla 6800 to a GT. It may be worth it depending on what you need. I noticed the performance quite bit compared to my old drive and wouldn't trade it for anything.
 
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LED

Diamond Member
Oct 12, 1999
6,127
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Look @ it as a long term investment because not only is it the fastest PATA/SATA drive out there but you also get the 5 yr warranty compared to 1 and some 3ers that the others give.
 
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Double Trouble

Elite Member
Oct 9, 1999
9,270
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It has a longer warranty and is definitely the fastest drive you can put in your desktop. Is it worth it? For me it is, it noticably increases the overall response of my system, but for someone that has too little memory or too slow of a processor it might not be worth it.

Very expensive, but definitely worth it for me.....
 
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Algere

Platinum Member
Feb 29, 2004
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Originally posted by: Soulkeeper
i bet the price will prob drop to the 120-150 range in the next 6 to 8 months
or more if everyone jumps on the 10k rpm wagon quick
Click to expand...

Definitely

Wasn't long ago (few or so months ago) that it was @ around $200 AR.
 
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Slid

Member
Jul 5, 2004
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I just finished putting together my new system with the 36gb version and I think it is definately worth it. I went with 36gb since I don't store much for mp3's and video anymore and I always try to step down from the "latest and greatest".

I was coming from a 2mb buffered, 5k rpm drive among other things and it is a huge increase in performance.
 
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Algere

Platinum Member
Feb 29, 2004
2,157
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Originally posted by: LED
Look @ it as a long term investment because not only is it the fastest PATA/SATA drive out there but you also get the 5 yr warranty compared to 1 and some 3ers that the others give.
Click to expand...

3 years is long enough when you compare and put into consideration the Raptors pricing @ over twice the price of a 7200 RPM SATA hard drive. There's 2 ways I see it scenario-wise, with the same amount of funds in mind.

1) Keep the Raptor for 5 years (warranty in mind).

Raptor Hard Drive $150


2) Buy a 7200 RPM SATA hard drive and @ the end of 3 years(warranty in mind) retire the drive and buy another hard drive to replace the former and assuming a hard drive 3 years into the future will outpace today's Raptor in both performance and storage capacity while supporting newer hard drive technologies(i.e. NCQ II?) & also in turn combining the warranty length of both drives into 6 years, assuming the future drive will also carry a 3 year warranty.

1st Hard Drive $60
2nd Hard Drive $90(+$30 over $60 based on storage and market value)



With games like Half-Life 2 said to take about 3.5 GBs of hard drive space & assuming games will only get larger in size not to mention other types of media and what not, I doubt 73 GBs will cut it down the road unless you RAID it, if you don't mind the slight increase in failure rate.

Obvious advantage today to buying a Raptor is top performance right here, right now. As for long term it's not worth it IMO esp. if you compare the Raptor w/ Maxtor's new MaXLine III (borrowed from AT's article) which assumingly will come out later this year and performs close/little slower to the Raptor in some situations and outperforms it in others.
 
n7

n7

Elite Member
Jan 4, 2004
21,281
4
81
It all depends if you need size or speed.

I do not regret getting mine at all, even though it cost more than a 250 GB drive does.

I wouldn't want to give up the speed i have seen.


For me, there is a huge difference in UT2k4's loading times that makes the $306 Cdn i spent well worth it to me.
 
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Boogak

Diamond Member
Feb 2, 2000
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Bought one a month ago and I don't think it's worth it. There is a slight noticable increase in speed, but not enough to justify the price IMHO. Unless you already have top of the line stuff, I think the money would be better spent on a faster CPU/GPU.
 
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dheffer

Senior member
May 26, 2004
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Originally posted by: Boogak
Bought one a month ago and I don't think it's worth it. There is a slight noticable increase in speed, but not enough to justify the price IMHO. Unless you already have top of the line stuff, I think the money would be better spent on a faster CPU/GPU.
Click to expand...
 
Muadib

Muadib

Lifer
May 30, 2000
18,113
909
126
Originally posted by: Boogak
Bought one a month ago and I don't think it's worth it. There is a slight noticable increase in speed, but not enough to justify the price IMHO. Unless you already have top of the line stuff, I think the money would be better spent on a faster CPU/GPU.
Click to expand...
I agree 100% I expected to notice a large change in boot time vs. my 80 gig 7200 drive. There is a difference, but boy is it small. If I had to do it again, I would have gotten faster memory.
 
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dbdynsty25

Member
Jun 22, 2004
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Originally posted by: Muadib I agree 100% I expected to notice a large change in boot time vs. my 80 gig 7200 drive. There is a difference, but boy is it small. If I had to do it again, I would have gotten faster memory.
Click to expand...

But the fact that you can install Windows in under 10 min. sealed the deal for me. Going from 20-25 min. to 10 min. is a thing of beauty.
 
Muadib

Muadib

Lifer
May 30, 2000
18,113
909
126
I just did a install of windows after I upgraded my cpu. I didn't time it, but I know it took longer than 10 minutes. Where did you see that?
 
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kelvin1704

Senior member
Mar 21, 2001
869
0
0
Lets change the topic a bit.

We know that Maxtor NCQ support is coming this way.

I have no idea how it would effect the performance...

if we put it like the Raptor vs NCQ..

what are the performance difference now?
 
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obeseotron

Golden Member
Oct 9, 1999
1,910
0
0
Originally posted by: kelvin1704
Lets change the topic a bit.

We know that Maxtor NCQ support is coming this way.

I have no idea how it would effect the performance...

if we put it like the Raptor vs NCQ..

what are the performance difference now?
Click to expand...


Both the raptor 74 gig and the new maxtor's have NCQ so I would imagine they would both scale similarly. Storage review and anand both have articles show the benefits (5% at the most) of the technology
 
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