Hard Drive Upgrade Questions

[mathwizard314]

Hey guys - I've been using my old Dell 40 GB hard drive for quite some time now, but while I'm typing this message with only about 200 megs of free space on it, I figure it's time for me to get a new one. I have a few questions for you guys about a hard drive I have my eye on.

First off, I believe the hard drive I have now is a standard Maxtor (from Dell) 40 GB 2 MB Cache hard drive. I currently have my eye on a Western Digital 80 GB 8 MB Cache hard drive that OfficeMax is selling for around $50 dollars or so.

Questions -
1.) I've heard before that if you store your Windows on another partition from your main files, it'll run faster. How would you guys suggest I setup my partitions?

2.) Would it be possible to setup a raid between the two of them? And if so, would I notice that much improvement?

3.) If I format them into one big partition, I assume it'll only be running at the slower cache size? (2 MB)

Thanks in advance for all your help!

 

[jazzhound]

Well firstly I'm not too versed in RAID setups, but there are a few configurations you have to choose from. Some require you to have 2 or more identicle capacity drives or if you have two different capacity drives like an 80 and a 40, you will lose 40GBs off the 80... performance is probably debatible, but for common usage, I don't think you'll gain enough to justify the setups.

When you say Windows files; I take it you meant to say Program Files like applications? If so, you won't notice a great deal of difference, but obviously if you install the programs on a different partition, seek/load time may increase unless the partition is on a SCSI hdd or something faster than your OS partition.

If you do get the WD SE drive with 8MB cache, install your operating system on that. You will see the difference particuarly because of the dated design of the Maxtor drive.

And just to be safe you cannot join the two physical drive into one logical partition without RAID of some kind.

 

[mathwizard314]

Ok, thank you for your help!

 

[StraightPipe]

if you are just now filling the 40 GB hdd you got a few years back you porbly dont need raid, although RAID 0 is faster for moving large files.

I think the key is to get a fast drive (7200 with 8mb)
that new drive is great (i've got one)

I would recomend you put windows on the new drive and use the old drive for storage.

if you have your heart set on raid see if you can find a 40gb maxtor to match your original. and you'll still have to get a controller card, and btw you'll have to erase the whole drive to start raid 0.