Firewire versu UltraATA 100

[trikster2]

I got an external firewire/usb 2.0 enclosure for one of those $120 AR 250GB hard drive deals that keep on popping up.

Hooked it up to my PCI fire wire card and am please with how spiffy it feels. It's a lot faster than my old 7200rpm/2mb system drive.

I originally only intened to use the drive for offsite backups, but given the speed may just use it to run some of my applications.

How much (if any) of a performance hit am I taking by using fire wire?

 

[Zepper]

It does't make a lot of difference as either is faster than any single 7200 rpm drive that exists... But the UATA100 spec is faster by a factor of approx. 2...
.bh.

:moon:

 

[trikster2]

Was more concerned that the IDE --> Firewire --> PCI conversion would loose something versus plugging directly into my intel motherboards IDE connector.

 

[Mday]

Yes, you do lose something. Those converters castrate the throughput. Besides, considering that ATA100 is up to 100 MBps, and firewire is 400Mbps = 50MBps, which do you think is faster. Those converters will probably limit you to 30MBps max (burst).

 

[LED]

In realtime performance the Firewire will go faster than the USB Hi-speed but there is no performance loss between Firewire700 and IDE...see?

 

[zephyrprime]

In realtime performance the Firewire will go faster than the USB Hi-speed but there is no performance loss between Firewire700 and IDE...see?

Without knowing the model of drive used, it's not valid to really draw any conclusions from the charts. Over at storagereview, there's a 40GB ide drive pulling in 60MB/s in outer STR.

 

[LED]

Originally posted by: zephyrprime

In realtime performance the Firewire will go faster than the USB Hi-speed but there is no performance loss between Firewire700 and IDE...see?

Without knowing the model of drive used, it's not valid to really draw any conclusions from the charts. Over at storagereview, there's a 40GB ide drive pulling in 60MB/s in outer STR.

Actually it's Firewire 800 which I thought might be corrected but it's a WD SE 80 gig Drive and the same drive I have tested via

Standard Firewire, vs USB Hi-Speed vs Firewire800 and IDE...Firewire800 and IDE feel and test the same while USB Hi-Speed seems the slowest with Firwire400 comming next to last...