Maxtor Atlas 15K

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Vegitto

Diamond Member
May 3, 2005
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I'm thinking of buying a SCSI (68-pin wide) Maxtor Atlas15K 18GB harddisk. Also, I'd need to buy a SCSI expansion slot, because my MOBO doesn't natively support SCSI. I have 2 questions:

1.) Is buying one of these HD's even worth it?
2.) Is there a noticable difference between a SCSI drive that is natively supported and a SCSI drive that is on an expansion slot?

Thanks in advance.
 
V

Vegitto

Diamond Member
May 3, 2005
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Uhm.. 1 thing: I do NOT care how loud it is. And actually, this drive was cheaper than a similair Raptor at my local e-tailer.
 
kitkat22

kitkat22

Golden Member
Feb 10, 2005
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In today's computer world 18GB isn't a whole lot. I can only suspect what you're using the drive for, but if it's anything to do with video editing, etc that space is going to be eaten up super fast. As the others have said if you have the pocket book for it get a raptor. I just wandered over to pricegrabber and it looks like the 36GB raptor is roughly twice as expensive as the Atlas, plus if your mobo supports SATA you won't have to get a SCSI card either.
 
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imported_michaelpatrick33

Platinum Member
Jun 19, 2004
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Ahhh, forget the Raptor and gets the screamer. Use it as the OS(s) drive and enjoy. The newest SCSI disks have increased the single user performance levels greater and that drive will blow away a Raptor. If you are using for Video Editing or huge photoshop projects it will disappear fast LOL.

As long as you have a newer motherboard that has a larger link between the PCI slots and South(North)bridge you shouldn't have a problem

That Atlas probably gives you 65-75mgbps sustained
If you have a regular 32bit PCI slot SCSI card you can get 133mgbps max transfer rate so you should be fine. If you try to connect two or more drives on it, though, a bottleneck could form with a lot of concurrent access. A native SCSI port goes right to the South(North)bridge and elminates that potential.

Be careful and make sure you get a straight PCI 32bit 33Mghrz SCSI card. Many of them are 32bit 66Mghrtz or 64bit PCI-X cards.

Edit: It has been a while but I think many of the higher end SCSI PCI cards are backward compatible with the standard PCI 32bit slot.
 
6

6000SUX

Golden Member
May 8, 2005
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Obviously he's thinking of using it for a system drive. Here's the best advice you're going to get, OP: neither a Raptor or Atlas will give you anything you need unless you're doing disk-intensive work that needs fast random access. (Gaming doesn't count.) If you're doing fast random-access work, a Raptor is not the best choice. If you need high throughput (say, if you're capturing video), late-model single drives at 7200RPM will work wonderfully well, and anything more would be wasted. If you need super-high throughput, buy multiple SCSI drives and a good hardware RAID controller.

If you're looking to be an uber-l33t gamer, you're out to waste your money to start with, and you're probably not going to heed my words-- but both drives will be wasted.
 
V

Vegitto

Diamond Member
May 3, 2005
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I am going to use it for OS (Windows, Linux and possibly OS/2) and Photoshopping, so I won't need it for storage, just for speed. For storage, I have 2 400 GB 7200 RPM drives planned :).
 
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6000SUX

Golden Member
May 8, 2005
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Originally posted by: Vegitto
I am going to use it for OS (Windows, Linux and possibly OS/2) and Photoshopping, so I won't need it for storage, just for speed. For storage, I have 2 400 GB 7200 RPM drives planned :).
Click to expand...

It is probably worth it, especially because you can always take the drive to a new system (although you should consider that if you do that, you may need to buy another controller card). I don't expect any operating system to require 18GB of storage for quite a while, which should let you install at least a lot of your programs on the drive.
 
V

Vegitto

Diamond Member
May 3, 2005
5,234
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Originally posted by: Kensai
Hell, get 4 of them and stick them in RAID 5. You will see a pretty nice performance increase.
Click to expand...

That's a fvcking good idea. Maybe I'll do that. Thanks, Kensai.
 
6

6000SUX

Golden Member
May 8, 2005
1,504
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Originally posted by: Vegitto
Originally posted by: Kensai
Hell, get 4 of them and stick them in RAID 5. You will see a pretty nice performance increase.
Click to expand...

That's a fvcking good idea. Maybe I'll do that. Thanks, Kensai.
Click to expand...

I assumed you were on a budget because of the drive you picked. If I were to spend so much, I'd probably just get three of these and a decent controller and call it a day.
 
bob4432

bob4432

Lifer
Sep 6, 2003
11,727
46
91
Originally posted by: 6000SUX
Originally posted by: Vegitto
Originally posted by: Kensai
Hell, get 4 of them and stick them in RAID 5. You will see a pretty nice performance increase.
Click to expand...

That's a fvcking good idea. Maybe I'll do that. Thanks, Kensai.
Click to expand...

I assumed you were on a budget because of the drive you picked. If I were to spend so much, I'd probably just get three of these and a decent controller and call it a day.
Click to expand...

if you get the scsi setup, just get a u160 card since a 32bit pci slot can only move at 133MB/s. look for a used adaptec 19160, 29160 or 39160 or the lsiu160, you should be able to pick up the card for ~$40-$50, then you need a u320 cable with a terminator. depending on which hdd it is, some of the 15krpm drives have a str of ~90MB/s and the seek time is awesome. also, imo, one you go scsi you never go back

i really like these, it will be my next scsi drive :)
 
C

Chode Messiah

Golden Member
Apr 25, 2005
1,634
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That sounds like a killer rig, especially if you go for raid 5. I always have wanted a scsi or 2. Enjoy the speed!:thumbsup:
 
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imported_Kensai

Lifer
Nov 11, 2004
10,855
0
0
Originally posted by: bob4432
Originally posted by: Kensai
Actually, you'll want four drives for RAID 5. 3 drives is underperforming in RAID 5.
Click to expand...

he just has a 32bit pci slot...
Click to expand...


It won't matter. RAID 5 with 3 drives will only fork up about 55-70MB/s, yet a 4 drive RAID 5 on the same controller with give up 80-90+MB/s.
 
6

6000SUX

Golden Member
May 8, 2005
1,504
0
0
Originally posted by: Kensai
Actually, you'll want four drives for RAID 5. 3 drives is underperforming in RAID 5.
Click to expand...

Actually, RAID 5 is always "underperforming" compared with something like RAID 0. People use it specifically for its combination of data redundancy and decent performance, plus the fact that it doesn't waste as much space as RAID 1. The drive I recommended has a 3 ms seek time and throughput of 98 Mbps, so I assume you're recommending RAID 5 mostly for fault tolerance-- or because you don't know??? The guy started by saying he wanted a fast system drive, and you're recommending he buy eight hundred dollars' worth of hardware (including a decent controller card).
 
F

fstime

Diamond Member
Jan 18, 2004
4,382
5
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Originally posted by: hippotautamus
A Seagate Cheetah would be a better investment. No fire causing potential + 5yr warranty
Click to expand...


Maxtor is ahead of Seagate in the SCSI department.

I could agree with you on the 5 yr though.

Not sure what maxtor offers.
 
I

imported_Kensai

Lifer
Nov 11, 2004
10,855
0
0
Originally posted by: 6000SUX
Originally posted by: Kensai
Actually, you'll want four drives for RAID 5. 3 drives is underperforming in RAID 5.
Click to expand...

Actually, RAID 5 is always "underperforming" compared with something like RAID 0. People use it specifically for its combination of data redundancy and decent performance, plus the fact that it doesn't waste as much space as RAID 1. The drive I recommended has a 3 ms seek time and throughput of 98 Mbps, so I assume you're recommending RAID 5 mostly for fault tolerance-- or because you don't know???
Click to expand...


Those are theoretical scores and design scores. What are the real performance scores for a single user desktop?
 
bob4432

bob4432

Lifer
Sep 6, 2003
11,727
46
91
Originally posted by: Kensai
Originally posted by: 6000SUX
Originally posted by: Kensai
Actually, you'll want four drives for RAID 5. 3 drives is underperforming in RAID 5.
Click to expand...

Actually, RAID 5 is always "underperforming" compared with something like RAID 0. People use it specifically for its combination of data redundancy and decent performance, plus the fact that it doesn't waste as much space as RAID 1. The drive I recommended has a 3 ms seek time and throughput of 98 Mbps, so I assume you're recommending RAID 5 mostly for fault tolerance-- or because you don't know???
Click to expand...


Those are theoretical scores and design scores. What are the real performance scores for a single user desktop?
Click to expand...

i know the new gen 15krpm drives have a real world str of ~90MB/s on hdtach
 
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