Best HDD configuration?

[gL001]

Hi

I have a question regarding the optimal configuration of my hard drives. I currently use two separate Seagate 7200.7 SATA drives as my main drives. The drives are each partitioned into two drives, and I spread different data across the partitions (the main partition on drive 1 is used as the system drive). I also have an 80GB Seagate Barracuda IV 7200RPM IDE drive which I use as an external drive.

I want to simplify and speed things up again, so this is what I was thinking:

1. Connect the 80GB IDE drive internally as the system drive, load it up with apps etc. (possibly partition the drive and use the partition for swap and temp files)

2. Connect the two S-ATA drives in a RAID 0 array and use them for data. I mainly work on photo/video editing applications.

3. Get another 80GB drive (external) to mirror important data and store an image of the system drive.

Would using an IDE drive as the system drive slow things down significantly? It's still a relatively fast drive, and all the data (photos, videos etc.) would be stored on the RAID array.

Would getting a standalone 80GB S-ATA/7200RPM drive make much of a difference in performance over the IDE/7200RPM drive? (for the system files only)

Should I perhaps use the RAID array (or a partition on the RAID array) for the system/backup files and keep the IDE drive as an external backup?

System config:

2GB DDR2 RAM
Pentium 4 640 CPU
Nvidia 6600 GPU
Intel 915 chipset

Many thanks in advance for opinions/suggestions.

Regards,
gL

 

[amdskip]

2. Connect the two S-ATA drives in a RAID 0 array and use them for data. I mainly work on photo/video editing applications.

If anything, I would only use a raid 0 array for an operating system drive, etc. if you are dealing with video editing etc. I would not store any files on the raid array because if one drive dies everything is gone instantly.

You could look into setting up a raid 1 array for file storage purposes. This will back up your data files. I would not worry about backing up your system drive though containing windows.

 

[dnuggett]

What would be the purpose of looking at RAID 0 gLOO1? If you are just using them as storage drives with minimal access there is no point really. Theoretically there will be a speen gain, but you won't notice it and as said above you risk that if one drive of the 2 go all the data will need to be recovered.

 

[gL001]

Hi - the point of the RAID 0 would be to keep the files I'm working on (photos, videos etc.) for quick access. If you don't reckon this will give me much of a performance boost, then I'll scrap the idea and stick with the two S-ATA drives as system and storage drives respectively, with the 80GB drive as an external backup for critical files.

Thanks -- gL

 

[dnuggett]

Originally posted by: gL001
Hi - the point of the RAID 0 would be to keep the files I'm working on (photos, videos etc.) for quick access. If you don't reckon this will give me much of a performance boost, then I'll scrap the idea and stick with the two S-ATA drives as system and storage drives respectively, with the 80GB drive as an external backup for critical files.

Thanks -- gL

Yeah, scrap the idea.