Are SATA Hard drives 30$ better than ATA?

[PrayForDeath]

I wanna buy a new hard drive, and I am undecided between a SATA or an ATA HD.
What advantage do I get from SATA? Are there any real improvements besides better airflow (smaller cables)?
edit: just wanted to add that ATA hard drives are ~30$ cheaper than SATA, and there usually are better offers on ATA drives.

 

[Tarrant64]

Besides airflow not really. Between ATA and SATA, there isn't that much of a difference. They are a lil' bit faster though IMO. However, if you were to say get SATA2(did I see SATA3 somewhere with 300mb/s throughput or whatever???), and maybe a HD that supports NCQ, you'll be rockin'.

Just go with SATA and be happy that your cables aren't huge. ^^;

 

[PrayForDeath]

Are there any SATA2 drives out?
What's NCQ?
Thanks

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: PrayForDeath
Are there any SATA2 drives out?

Several (including the Seagate 7200.8s). Note that the 300MB/sec. bandwidth of SATA2 does nothing for hard drives, since they're nowhere near the 150MB/sec. limit of regular SATA.

What's NCQ?

Native Command Queuing (search?). If you are running multiple I/Os in parallel, and the controller and drive support it, it lets the drive reorder them so it can process them more efficiently. I don't know if it will really help for desktop tasks, since usually they do one I/O at a time.

Basically, there is no performance difference between 7200RPM ATA and SATA drives. NCQ might provide some benefit, but you need a controller that supports it (right now, basically just the NForce4 onbard, and some add-on RAID cards).

 

[Tarrant64]

There are currently a few SATA drives out. I'm not a pro on NCQ or anything, but i guess I might describe it as a 'smart drive'? instead of just executing instructions in the order it's given, it will choose what's best to improve overall performance and speed. Again, i'm not expert on it but that's how I think of it. A smart drive that decides how to get the data faster.

Maybe someone else can better explain it.

Also, although there is SATA2 out, I'm not sure what their prices are compared to SATA or even ATA(IDE). So if you are trying to save money, stick with the SATA or IDE. I just suggested the SATA2 because that's where the performance difference is.


Thanks for clearing that up Matthias99

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: PrayForDeath
Are there any real improvements besides better airflow (smaller cables)?

No. SATA (currently) has worse compatibility, worse noise-immunity (compared to proper-length 80-conductor cables), more power usage (on the interface at least, since it's "always on"), and costs more. Wait for the second gen of SATA, that's what I'm doing. (NCQ should be an advantage.. but OTOH, if there is only one drive/channel, why bother?)

 

[Zepper]

Some SATA drives may be a newer generation than their ATA equivalents. Only way to tell is by poring over the spec sheets, etc. IAC, not likely to be a noticeable diff in perf until you talk Raptor.
.bh.

 

[gggplaya]

i switched out an 80gb maxtor ata133 for a sata 120gb drive i got for free. There is a noticeable difference when games load up. That might be due to the larger 8mb cache on the drive but it definitly loads ~20 secs faster in battlefield vietnam when loading a level. I just like how the cable is much easier to hook up. You can hook up external sata drives at the same speed as your internal. Less cable clutter inside is actually a huge advantage for me. It's great.

 

[crimson117]

Originally posted by: gggplaya
That might be due to the larger 8mb cache on the drive but it definitly loads ~20 secs faster in battlefield vietnam when loading a level.

:thumbsup:

And was your old drive 5400rpm, and your new one 7200? That makes a bigger difference than anything.

 

[PrayForDeath]

Originally posted by: gggplaya
i switched out an 80gb maxtor ata133 for a sata 120gb drive i got for free. There is a noticeable difference when games load up. That might be due to the larger 8mb cache on the drive but it definitly loads ~20 secs faster in battlefield vietnam when loading a level. I just like how the cable is much easier to hook up. You can hook up external sata drives at the same speed as your internal. Less cable clutter inside is actually a huge advantage for me. It's great.

Actually, newer games don't rely that much on HD speed when loading, since they are CPU limited because of the huge data extraction. I read that in Maximum PC. But Vietnam might be different.
Anyway, thank you very much for the answers. I probably won't go RAID 0, so I don't think I'll use NCQ, but I have an nForce4 mobo, though.
According to your answers, I suppose I'll get a cheap IDE HD.

 

[SunSamurai]

Would people ignore the interface already? Look at the HARD DRIVE. Trust that no company is going to limit their drive due to a limited interface. Sheesh.

 

[Gamingphreek]

Originally posted by: aeternitas
Would people ignore the interface already? Look at the HARD DRIVE. Trust that no company is going to limit their drive due to a limited interface. Sheesh.

What in the world are you talking about.

gggplaya i HIGHLY doubt that statement is true unless your old HDD, was 5400RPM, could only run in PIO mode, and had 2mb cache.

-Kevin

 

[gggplaya]

I bought the new motherboard and drive together. I took the cpu athlon xp 3000+ and ram and video card out and put them back into the same case as the new parts. I bought the new parts specifically cause i edit my home movies and need the external drive to take with me sometimes and plug them in at my friends house. The main drive is the same drive and i keep that in my case. I have 2 SATA drives. Anyways, i did notice that the levels load up faster. Same video settings. I didn't measure them but they do load faster. It's enough that is noticeable. I play bf vietnam all the time at least 1 hour per day since it came out and it is definitly noticeable. Might have been from the new motherboard or higher cache in the harddrive(old one had a 2mb cache as opposed to 8mb).

It is a more expensive motherboard compared to that cheap ecs i had before but it's the same cpu and ram.
As for what they said about noise earlier, i don't think that would have an effect up until the point where it starts to corrupt data passing through. Real world, i have seen any problems especially from my external.

On a personal level, i have a clear plastic side on my case, SATA makes it look way better then it did before. Even with rounded ide cables, it was still cluttered.

 

[gggplaya]

i went to google and foud the only test on sata i could find. There findings agree with mine.

http://www.varbusiness.com/sections/technology/tech.jhtml?articleId=56800132

Also as they mentioned my windows xp boots up faster too. In fact i'll turn my computer off right now and test how long it takes. from the time it starts reading the hard drive to the time i can see my wall paper. You can compare results with your computer and buy a sata drive if you want to or not.

 

[gggplaya]

i couldn't find my stopwatch but it took about 20 mississipi from the time it exited bios and my had drive light came on till i saw my windows xp splash screen.

 

[Gamingphreek]

NO that review is WAY off. Ill garauntee you there is almost no difference between IDE and SATA.

-Kevin

 

[natto fire]

Bah, I switched for the cables alone. That, and there was only a $15 price difference. Really though, the cables are a lot better.

*Disclaimer for the 'SATA cables are too loose' peeps*
What the hell are you doing poking around in your case while the HDD is powered up.

 

[stevty2889]

Most hard drives still can barely max out ata66 let alone ata 100/133 or ata150 for sata, so the only differance is the smaller cable. Just be careful with the connector on the drive it's a bit fragile, I broke one on one of my raptors. Still works though so it's all good.

 

[BigPete]

Actually, the only difference isnt smaller cables. Wouldnt you see a small performance increase as well for moving the hard drives off the IDE controller and thus lowering overall CPU usage? This would also be a big plus for anyone who does a lot of multi tasking (with disk intensive activities anyway).

 

[Oyeve]

Originally posted by: BigPete
Actually, the only difference isnt smaller cables. Wouldnt you see a small performance increase as well for moving the hard drives off the IDE controller and thus lowering overall CPU usage? This would also be a big plus for anyone who does a lot of multi tasking (with disk intensive activities anyway).

very true. Other than the cable being better for airflow (duh) each SATA connection is on its own chain, sorta like SCSI, so if you have more than one SATA device it wont bog down like PATA when you use more than one SATA device. Ever play an mp3 and burn a cd if the HD and Burner are on the same IDE cable?

 

[LED]

Originally posted by: Oyeve

Originally posted by: BigPete
Actually, the only difference isnt smaller cables. Wouldnt you see a small performance increase as well for moving the hard drives off the IDE controller and thus lowering overall CPU usage? This would also be a big plus for anyone who does a lot of multi tasking (with disk intensive activities anyway).

very true. Other than the cable being better for airflow (duh) each SATA connection is on its own chain, sorta like SCSI, so if you have more than one SATA device it wont bog down like PATA when you use more than one SATA device. Ever play an mp3 and burn a cd if the HD and Burner are on the same IDE cable?

Exactly plus where else can one get a Raptor or an NCQ compatable HD other than SATA?

 

[Arcanedeath]

If you really want the lowdown on hard drives check out Storagereview.com it will tell you basicly anything you ever wanted to know about HDD's. The bottom line is that interphase is not important at this point and you get no performance advantage from SATA over PATA AS LONG AS ITS THE SAME DRIVE MECHANICS. So unless the Sata drive has more cache or denser platters or higher capasity there is no reason to pay $30 more for it.

 

[PrayForDeath]

Thanks again for the answers. I think I changed my mind.
Today I'll go to Fry's see if they have any offers on HDs since it's friday, I might get a SATA after all.

 

[dashiki]

Personally I just like the cables and the increased airflow in my case dropped temp 4c

 

[imported_aten]

do you think the type of processor will afect the hard disk speed