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About to buy a new hard drive need advice.

N

nx02nx02

Senior member
I am about to get a new hard drive and I was wondering how much of a difference Serial ATA is.
How much faster is it compared to Parallel ATA?
Is it worth the extra money?
The motherboard I ordered is this one.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131571

The 2 hard drives im considering.

80GB WD JB - 7200 RPM - ATA100 W/ 8MB Cache - 3yrs WD Warranty $53.00

80GB Seagate Serial ATA, 7200 RPM's w/ 8MB Cache - 5yrs Seagate Warranty $58.00

Which of these 2 hard drives is better?

Is Serial ATA that much faster or should I just stick to the WDJB?


 
One more question about that motherboard. Does that come with the Serial ATA cables that i need or do I need to buy them seperate?
 
Originally posted by: nx02nx02
I am about to get a new hard drive and I was wondering how much of a difference Serial ATA is.
How much faster is it compared to Parallel ATA?
Is it worth the extra money?
The motherboard I ordered is this one.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131571

The 2 hard drives im considering.

80GB WD JB - 7200 RPM - ATA100 W/ 8MB Cache - 3yrs WD Warranty $53.00

80GB Seagate Serial ATA, 7200 RPM's w/ 8MB Cache - 5yrs Seagate Warranty $58.00

Which of these 2 hard drives is better?

Is Serial ATA that much faster or should I just stick to the WDJB?
Click to expand...

Extra money? They are so close - go with SATA, it is a bit faster.

Of the two drives - Either is fine. In my experience (comp hardware distribution), I've seen a tad more Seagates go bad lately, but not enough to really make a huge difference.

WD has an excellent RMA program though.

And yes, the motherboard comes with 1x SATA cables, as pictured on Newegg's site.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ShowImage...0+Micro+ATX+AMD+Motherboard+%2D+Retail

 
well, I bought 2 hard drives from newegg, one was the 80gig WD sata and the other was an 80gig IDE WD.....I tested them both in identical setups...same MB, ram, opticals etc.... the sata was no faster than the IDE....and I absolutely hate SATA cables! the damn things fit loose and give me the feeling they are going to fall off....the SATA power connector is no better....I have used seagate sata and WD sata and i am not impressed....my results in benchmarks were virtually identical, I could see no real world perfromance increase, load times, my flight sim games, nothing i did seemed to be any faster than the IDE setup..and for the issue of really loose fitting cables alone, i dont recommend sata, when they make cables that arent so cheap fitting, maybe it will change my mind....but i am not going sata yet...
 
All my SATA cables fit very tightly as well, just the cables that came with the motherboard. All my drives are Seagates, 1 160GB, 2 300GB, and 1 500GB.

Something for the OP to consider though, all the new NF5 based mobos only have onboard support for 2 PATA devices. Thats not enough drives for me. You'd have to get a PCI controller card to add more PATA devices. Because of this, the odds that you could take that SATA drive with you to the next system are higher than the PATA drive.

SATA drives also tend to be more reliable than their PATA counterparts, but thats sketchy information.

A lot of people seem to forget that the point of SATA wasn't to increase bandwidth, although that was part of it. The point of SATA was to reduce the cable size to allow more airflow through out the case as other devices started consuming more and more and more power.

Lastly, to the OP, those drives you linked to are rather pricey. For 30 dollars more, you could get a much larger drive, as Howard pointed out.
 
80GB Seagate Serial ATA, 7200 RPM's w/ 8MB Cache - 5yrs Seagate Warranty $58.00
No choice problem choosing the better hdd. The Seagate is the one.
 
Thanks for the advice. 🙂

Ya these drives are at a local computer store, if I ordered one off the net I could get a bigger one for a bit more money but $60 is about max I could go for the hard drive, I am already way over my budget. 🙂

Thanks again everyone.

I ended up getting the seagate.
 
well i must just be getting the crappy cables or I am just too damn picky! I used the cables that came with the motherboards as well....there were 2 different sets between the two motherboards, one was red, one was orange....thats about all i can tell ya...reckon i am just too damn particular....lol! and SATA was about the transfer rates, the thinner cable was a bonus....no one in their right mind would design a whole new hard drive standard just to reduce cable clutter....it seemed to be the next step in hard drive evolution for faster hard drive transfer rates...but it simply hasnt matured enough to get all of the benefit, bus speeds are still limiting the SATA abilities if i recall the articles i read correctly...
 
Originally posted by: allanon1965
.it seemed to be the next step in hard drive evolution for faster hard drive transfer rates...but it simply hasnt matured enough to get all of the benefit, bus speeds are still limiting the SATA abilities if i recall the articles i read correctly...
Click to expand...

Its the internal speeds of HDDs thats the limit, not the bus speed.
 
A lot of people seem to forget that the point of SATA wasn't to increase bandwidth, although that was part of it. The point of SATA was to reduce the cable size to allow more airflow through out the case as other devices started consuming more and more and more power.


well I reckon i am gonna have to google it again, because i am pretty sure there is more to it than that....i will post my findings ....this is what i was talking about..

PATA has been the standard and has served well, but it has also had drawbacks. Cables limited to 18 inches (46 cm) in length often made connections difficult and also clogged cases blocking airflow, while cooling has become crucial. Though rounded cables became available, the most advanced PATA drives (Ultra ATA/133) hit the maximum parallel transfer rate of 133 MB/ps. With the speed of CPUs, RAM and system buses improving, designers saw PATA would soon be bottlenecking advanced drive efficiency in system architecture.
Enter SATA.

Serial ATA has distinct key advantages over its predecessor. Cables are very thin with small 7-pin connectors. They can be up to 3 feet (1 meter) in length, and are easily routed to stay out of the way allowing maximum airflow inside the case. SATA also has a far lower power requirement of just 250 mV compared to PATA's 5-volt requirement, and with chip core voltages declining, this speaks well of SATA's future. Serial ATA does away with Master/Slave configurations and drive jumpers. Setup is greatly simplified, and the technology even allows hot-swapping, meaning drives can be removed or added while the computer is running.

However, the most promising feature of Serial ATA is that it eliminates the transfer limit hit by PATA. First generation has a maximum transfer rate of 150 MB/ps, and SATA II delivers 300 MB/ps. A version set for 2008 will deliver 600 MB/ps.

With introductory transfer speed so close to existing Ultra ATA/133 speeds, the increase in real-world performance is negligible for first generation SATA, though prices of the drives are comparable to PATA drives, making the switch to the new technology a good choice when upgrading, building or buying a new system. Motherboards with integrated SATA and PATA interfaces are widely available to accommodate both types of drives, and there are no restrictions to using both types in the same system. Serial ATA is also a good choice for RAID and is earmarked to eventually replace PATA.

For older systems, third party SATA controllers can be placed in any PCI slot, should you purchase a SATA drive. (A parallel Ultra ATA drive can also be used via a PATA-to-SATA adapter, though drive performance will take a hit, as the adapter must translate the data stream from parallel to serial.)

If upgrading your motherboard, buying SATA-enabled will allow ease of use for future SATA drives even if your current drives are standard ATA.

 
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