SCSI Drive compatiblity...

[alimoalem]

I'm planning on making a second build after nearly 3 years. I'm thinking of getting either a SATA II hard drive or SCSI (i found some - listed below - that are about 60 cents per gb) but i'm not sure the SCSI drives i have in mind are compatible with regular desktops. i would much appreciate if someone could tell me if these hard drives are compatible:

Seagate Barracuda 181.6GB 7200rpm (it's $119)
SKU: ST1181677LCV
http://www.hypermicro.com/product.asp?pf_id=HDSE124

Seagate Cheetah 73.4GB Hard Drive 10,000rpm (it's $46)
SKU: ST173404LCV
http://www.spartantech.com/product.asp?PID=ST173404LCV&m1=pg

aslo, i was wondering if there is any significant different between Ultra 160 SCSI and Ultra 320? lastly, i see so much controversy over which is better: SCSI or SATA II? so i just wanted to see what you guys think. Any help is much appreciated

 

[RichUK]

if you going to get a 10k drive just get a 74gig raptor, other wise get the 15k version of the cheetah

 

[alimoalem]

yea but those cost like $100 for a 36gb. the 74gb SCSI drive listed is $46 and the 181gb is like $119. my budget is $100 but i want at least 150gb.

do you know where i can get any cheap raptors?

 

[alimoalem]

hey what's a "bump"?

 

[interchange]

A bump is a reply intended to bring a topic back to the top of the list...

And about your question: SCSI is compatible with desktop computers, but you will need a SCSI controller card along with it. Some motherboards have controllers built in, but that's mostly for server boards.

*Edit* If you're not going to go all-out 15k RPM Cheeta, there's really no point in going SCSI for you. Just get the SATA Raptor if you want the speed.

 

[feelingshorter]

"but i'm not sure the SCSI drives i have in mind are compatible with regular desktops." - SCSI hard drives are server class hard drives. You cannot use them in regular motherboards and motherboards that do have intergrated SCSI will cost you an arm and a leg. Another option is to get a regular mobo and buy an adapter. With the fact that those hard drives are server class, anything you buy will be expensive for them, including the connector cables, which arent included in those OEM hard drives. I dont even see how you can even have any such option of using SCSI at all with your budget, If you do buy SCSI, between the U160 or U320...its going to be U160 for sure as U320 adapter cards are more expensive.

Ok...If you do decide to spend a little more, why not just buy two of:
Seagate Cheetah 73.4GB Hard Drive 10,000rpm

and then run them in a raid array?
Only draw back is the "Sound Emission 43 dB" is really loud. Im not sure how they measured that though, wether its real world terms or sound comming directly from it at a close distance. Chances are its real world terms and thats REALLY loud. 5+ dB after 25 means its twice as loud. Or was it anything after 30 dB?

newegg.com for 74 giger raptors. THey arent cheap but will work with regular mobos.

 

[Googer]

I thought they quit making 7200 RPM SCSI Drives 9 or 10 years ago. I am surprised to see a 7200 RPM SCSI larger than 40GB. Anyways As long as you have a Dual Channel U320 Controller to isolate the older SCSI devices from the newer ones then all should be ok. As for the Differances between U320 and U160: Faster bus and Some protocol changes to the way data is handled or transferred.

Those disks would be a great way to make a cheap raid array. TONS IF I/O's!



EDIT: And yes these hard drives are fine for desktop useage, just look for them in the 68pin version becasue you will need an adapter for the 80pin.
Acording to StorageReview these drives are super fast.
http://www.storagereview.com/articles/200104/20010426ST1181677LWV_2.html

 

[ribbon13]

Originally posted by: feelingshorter
Only draw back is the "Sound Emission 43 dB" is really loud. Im not sure how they measured that though, wether its real world terms or sound comming directly from it at a close distance. Chances are its real world terms and thats REALLY loud. 5+ dB after 25 means its twice as loud. Or was it anything after 30 dB?

decibels are a logarithmic form of measure. +3db is a noticable increase and takes roughly twice the power to generate. +10db sounds twice as loud to the human ear but takes 10x the power to generate.

 

[Googer]

Here are some technical specifications:

68pin version: http://www.seagate.com/cda/products/discsales/enterprise/tech/0,1084,330,00.html
80pin version: http://www.seagate.com/cda/products/discsales/enterprise/tech/0,1084,331,00.html

More Technical Specifications and Reviews of this drive:
http://www.scsi-planet.com/scsi-hard-drives/drive/seagate/barracuda-180/

 

[alimoalem]

wow thanks for the quick replies. i just have a couple questions:

Originally posted by: feelingshorter
"Ok...If you do decide to spend a little more, why not just buy two of:
Seagate Cheetah 73.4GB Hard Drive 10,000rpm

so you mean buy two of the ones i listed right?

Originally posted by: Googer
EDIT: And yes these hard drives are fine for desktop useage, just look for them in the 68pin version becasue you will need an adapter for the 80pin.
Acording to StorageReview these drives are super fast.
http://www.storagereview.com/articles/200104/20010426ST1181677LWV_2.html

just wondering, how do i find out if the MB comes with the 68pin thing so that i wouldn't need an adapter? and when you say say that according to storage review these drives are fast, are you talking about the ones i stated?

 

[imported_Phil]

Originally posted by: alimoalem

Originally posted by: Googer
EDIT: And yes these hard drives are fine for desktop useage, just look for them in the 68pin version becasue you will need an adapter for the 80pin.
Acording to StorageReview these drives are super fast.
http://www.storagereview.com/articles/200104/20010426ST1181677LWV_2.html

just wondering, how do i find out if the MB comes with the 68pin thing so that i wouldn't need an adapter? and when you say say that according to storage review these drives are fast, are you talking about the ones i stated?

99.999% of desktop motherboard do not come with a SCSI controller. A good proportion of workstation and server boards do, however.

I have a 36GB 10krpm Fujitsu drive on an LSI U160 controller, and goddamn this thing is fast. Even though I'm on an Athlon 2600+ and 1GB RAM, I'm still the first person into CS:S servers every single time, and bootup is insanely quick.

SCSI is fantastic; if you can afford it, get it. It's so much more responsive under heavy load.

 

[imported_Phil]

I'm going to post the response to the PM from the OP here so others can read a bit more about it:

Hmm, they're "okay".

The larger drive, the 7200rpm one; avoid it. The reason is that they haven't made 7200rpm SCSI drives in quite some time, and any stocks that are still around will be slow, noisy and hot-running.

The Cheetah you linked to is quite a good drive, but at $46, I'd also avoid it like the plague. There has to be a reason that it's so cheap.

What you're after is a decent, current-generation drive, and that's going to cost quite a bit more.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi...ry=0&minPrice=&maxPrice=&Go.x=0&Go.y=0
Should give you a list of Fujitsu drives on Newegg (Fujitsu IDE drives suck big time, but their SCSI drives are fantastic, and are widely used in the corporate/enterprise markets).

I have the first one - MAP3367NP (although mine's the 80-pin version, which you don't want).

SCSI's a great idea and performs exceptionally under high loads; for instance, copying files while doing something else (like a defrag), where a SATA/IDE drive will really slow down.

You get NCQ (Native Command Queueing) on SCSI drives by default, and a 6ms seek time is not unrealistic. Most IDE drives will be in the 10-15ms range. I'm not sure about the Raptors, but a similar SCSI drive will still beat a Raptor 95% of the time because of the SCSI interface and the way it works. SCSI is geared towards high queue depths (i.e. multiple requests from multiple programs/users at the same time), and excels in pretty much everything.

If you can afford it, splash for a 36Gb 15,000rpm U320 drive, or 74Gb 10,000rpm U320 drive. You'll also need a controller card (I have an LSI 53C1010 U160), and there's no point in buying an U320 card as you're limited by the PCI bus, which is 133MB/sec theoretical maximum speed.

Definitely get the 68-pin drives (80-pin is hot-swap, single connector, and you'll need an adaptor for those, which I have, but had to rip out of a caddy), and make sure you get an LVD SCSI cable with a terminator (you must have a terminator on the cable).

If you want any more help, just shout

However, if you're budget's $100, you're not going to get much, sorry
I'm lucky in that I obtained this card, drive and cable/adaptor for free.

 

[Oyeve]

Originally posted by: Phil
I'm going to post the response to the PM from the OP here so others can read a bit more about it:

Hmm, they're "okay".

The larger drive, the 7200rpm one; avoid it. The reason is that they haven't made 7200rpm SCSI drives in quite some time, and any stocks that are still around will be slow, noisy and hot-running.

The Cheetah you linked to is quite a good drive, but at $46, I'd also avoid it like the plague. There has to be a reason that it's so cheap.

What you're after is a decent, current-generation drive, and that's going to cost quite a bit more.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi...ry=0&minPrice=&maxPrice=&Go.x=0&Go.y=0
Should give you a list of Fujitsu drives on Newegg (Fujitsu IDE drives suck big time, but their SCSI drives are fantastic, and are widely used in the corporate/enterprise markets).

I have the first one - MAP3367NP (although mine's the 80-pin version, which you don't want).

SCSI's a great idea and performs exceptionally under high loads; for instance, copying files while doing something else (like a defrag), where a SATA/IDE drive will really slow down.

You get NCQ (Native Command Queueing) on SCSI drives by default, and a 6ms seek time is not unrealistic. Most IDE drives will be in the 10-15ms range. I'm not sure about the Raptors, but a similar SCSI drive will still beat a Raptor 95% of the time because of the SCSI interface and the way it works. SCSI is geared towards high queue depths (i.e. multiple requests from multiple programs/users at the same time), and excels in pretty much everything.

If you can afford it, splash for a 36Gb 15,000rpm U320 drive, or 74Gb 10,000rpm U320 drive. You'll also need a controller card (I have an LSI 53C1010 U160), and there's no point in buying an U320 card as you're limited by the PCI bus, which is 133MB/sec theoretical maximum speed.

Definitely get the 68-pin drives (80-pin is hot-swap, single connector, and you'll need an adaptor for those, which I have, but had to rip out of a caddy), and make sure you get an LVD SCSI cable with a terminator (you must have a terminator on the cable).

If you want any more help, just shout

However, if you're budget's $100, you're not going to get much, sorry
I'm lucky in that I obtained this card, drive and cable/adaptor for free.

Yup, scsi aint cheap. I used to run 18 33.1gb drives. 14 of them in raid 5 in scsi3 chassis and 4 inside my computer. All were U160 at the time and 10krpm. I got the chassis free from work and the drives were free but if I were to buy them all it would have easily cost well over 15,000 (at the time ) also, the noise was unbearable! Each chassis has 9 fans (18 fans total) and the drives were very noisy for a home environment. But DAMN that system rocked! Still have all of it hooked up to my old PC and every now and then I boot it up for nastolgia. Still faster than my current system's sata setup but the 18 33.1 drives all raided together are still only 1/3 of my main systems capacity which has only 6 SATA and PATA drive. *sniff* I miss scsi.

 

[alimoalem]

wow if that's the case i think SCSI's out of the picture. my budget (not including monitor and ram) is $700. i have $260 set aside for the amd 3700 SD, 160ish for a mobo (still deciding), $100ish for a hard drive, $40 for a dvd burner, $80 for case and fan, and the rest for graphic card(s).

this goes to my next option: SATA II. i want to take this path because it goes up to 300Mb/s compared to SATA's 150Mb/s. the price difference isn't too great either. just wondering, which drive is the best for overall performance? i'm gonna use it for the regular applications like Office and some games, but all the reviews show some drives are really good in most things but are WAAAY behind in other things. do the drives really matter that much?

 

[imported_Phil]

Originally posted by: alimoalem
wow if that's the case i think SCSI's out of the picture. my budget (not including monitor and ram) is $700. i have $260 set aside for the amd 3700 SD, 160ish for a mobo (still deciding), $100ish for a hard drive, $40 for a dvd burner, $80 for case and fan, and the rest for graphic card(s).

In your case, you may well be better off going SATA. You may want to check eBay listings from reputable dealers, for drives that have five-year warranties. At least then you have some recourse should it die.

this goes to my next option: SATA II. i want to take this path because it goes up to 300Mb/s compared to SATA's 150Mb/s.

You don't need to worry about the interface bandwidth. The drive cannot transfer more than 60-70MB/sec anyway, so the 300MB/sec advertising junk is just that; junk.
You can compare it to having a speedometer in your car that goes all the way to 300mph, but your car can only hit 110mph. Why have the speedo going to 300mph?

the price difference isn't too great either. just wondering, which drive is the best for overall performance? i'm gonna use it for the regular applications like Office and some games, but all the reviews show some drives are really good in most things but are WAAAY behind in other things. do the drives really matter that much?

The main drives to consider are:

1. Seagate - quiet, cool, five-year-warranty. Highly recommended :thumbsup:
2. Hitachi - quiet, cool, slightly faster than the Seagates. However, I won't trust them until they've been around for a few years, give the Deathstar/IBM fiasco.
3. Samsung - personally, I don't like them. Many people do however, and they are reported to be the quietest drives on the market. I'm not sure how they do on speed.

I would plump for a nice 200-300GB Seagate 7200.8 myself. If you want roughly the same drive but with a little more performance, get the Hitachi.
Lastly, if absolute silence is your goal, then the Samsung will fit the bill.

Hope this helps

 

[alimoalem]

sounds not really an issue for me. i'm more into performance of day-to-day use and lasting of the hard drive.

what about Western Digital? how's their SATA II hard drive? from what AT shows on the charts, it excels in many things but in those it isn't top 2 or 3 in, it's usually dead last. so i was just wondering how that adds up compared to the other drives?

 

[foodfightr]

So what would be better?

This -VS- Raptor?

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: foodfightr
So what would be better?

This -VS- Raptor?

if you already have the scsi card and 80->68pin adapter, the scsi knowledge and cooling the scsi would be. it will be probably pretty close in speed to the raptor but much hotter and louder. the older scsi stuff was that way, hot and loud. but for $50, you can't beat it if you already have other scsi stuff. makes me want to buy one and replace my 80GB PATA with it...

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: alimoalem
sounds not really an issue for me. i'm more into performance of day-to-day use and lasting of the hard drive.

what about Western Digital? how's their SATA II hard drive? from what AT shows on the charts, it excels in many things but in those it isn't top 2 or 3 in, it's usually dead last. so i was just wondering how that adds up compared to the other drives?

you are getting too stuck up on "SATAII", don't, read this article and learn.

also, you may want to just go with a 7200rpm 160GB sata that you an probably pick up ~$40AR, cut back on the 3700 to a 3000venice and o/c it and then get a better video card, since it seems like you are building a machine for gaming.

and you shouldn't get 2 of the 74GB ones and raid them becuase you will be using raid0(striping) which i would be recommending against and also windows raid, because a true scsi u160 raid card is going to push you over the $$$ you have allocated.

as far as being "compatible" with desktops machines, like others have state you have a 99% chance of needing a pci scsi card as i highly doubt your m/b has built in scsi. the only ones that have builtin scsi are workstation/server boards and they are ~$200+ for the m/b easy.

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: alimoalem
sounds not really an issue for me. i'm more into performance of day-to-day use and lasting of the hard drive.

what about Western Digital? how's their SATA II hard drive? from what AT shows on the charts, it excels in many things but in those it isn't top 2 or 3 in, it's usually dead last. so i was just wondering how that adds up compared to the other drives?

just get a sata with a 5yr warranty like seagate and don't get too hung up on benchmarks since they are ususally all within 5% of each other, something you will never notice because you don't have others to compare it to.

 

[alimoalem]

thanks a lot bob, you're a lot of help.

Originally posted by: bob4432
[just get a sata with a 5yr warranty like seagate and don't get too hung up on benchmarks since they are ususally all within 5% of each other, something you will never notice because you don't have others to compare it to.

my final choices for SATA were the Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 (i believe it was this model) and the Western Digital Caviar SE, either 16mb cache or 8mb (is there really a difference??). so you think i should go Seagate?

Originally posted by: bob4432
also, you may want to just go with a 7200rpm 160GB sata that you an probably pick up ~$40AR, cut back on the 3700 to a 3000venice and o/c it and then get a better video card, since it seems like you are building a machine for gaming.

i know the 3000venice is nearly as good as the 3700 and a lot cheaper, but eversince a couple years ago when i first saw the 754-pin 3700 clawhammer, i've always wanted a 3700 and since the San Diego is out, i might as well take the newer core. plus, i'm keeping this build for a while. i'm keeping it all through college (i start next year) so i want to make sure there's a lot of room for upgrading/overclocking.

lastly, what about getting a SCSI boot drive and SATA secondary drive? i doubt i'm gonna do this but if it's not a bad idea, i may decide to do it in a year.

thanks for all your quick responses

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: alimoalem
thanks a lot bob, you're a lot of help.

Originally posted by: bob4432
[just get a sata with a 5yr warranty like seagate and don't get too hung up on benchmarks since they are ususally all within 5% of each other, something you will never notice because you don't have others to compare it to.

my final choices for SATA were the Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 (i believe it was this model) and the Western Digital Caviar SE, either 16mb cache or 8mb (is there really a difference??). so you think i should go Seagate?

Originally posted by: bob4432
also, you may want to just go with a 7200rpm 160GB sata that you an probably pick up ~$40AR, cut back on the 3700 to a 3000venice and o/c it and then get a better video card, since it seems like you are building a machine for gaming.

i know the 3000venice is nearly as good as the 3700 and a lot cheaper, but eversince a couple years ago when i first saw the 754-pin 3700 clawhammer, i've always wanted a 3700 and since the San Diego is out, i might as well take the newer core. plus, i'm keeping this build for a while. i'm keeping it all through college (i start next year) so i want to make sure there's a lot of room for upgrading/overclocking.

lastly, what about getting a SCSI boot drive and SATA secondary drive? i doubt i'm gonna do this but if it's not a bad idea, i may decide to do it in a year.

thanks for all your quick responses

i understand about the new core of cpu, and if it is worth nearly twice the price that is up to you. the 3000venice will work just as well and they usually have a lot of headroom with nice xp90 hsf combo.

as far as the scsi/sata combo, that is a good choice but i would recommend getting a newer gen scsi hdd because of the heat issue with the older ones. i personally run a 36GB 10krpm u320 system hdd and a 80GB pata storage hdd, but if you are going to run it like this, look for a good deal on a 15krpm 36GB system hdd, that is what i am looking for.

as far as i am concerned, with these fast hdds for system/app/game setups it is not the str you are looking for but the amazing seek times, so a 1gen old 15krpm u320 hdd would be your best bet since the seek time will be ~3.5ms with a latency of ~2ms where a 10krpm has a seek time of ~6ms and the 7200rpm is ~9ms all with a latency of 2-3ms. it doesn't sound like much but you can definately feel it. again people tell me i am crazy for spending so much for a 36GB hdd, but it is my personal preference.

in the mean time look in the fs/ft section for a scsi card, like a lsiu160 or adaptec 19160 along with a 5 connector u320 cable with terminator (i have found the flat ribbon ones on ebay for ~$10).

 

[alimoalem]

k i'll look for that. just wondering, to have certain programs run faster, would they need to be on the SCSI drive or i just need the SCSI to be my boot drive? also, any specific drives you know that i should get? because i know there's the Cheetah, but there's an old version and new one i believe. do you know any Serial #'s for the "new" ones? again thanks a lot for your help

 

[0roo0roo]

scsi used to be more of an option for pc's when many higher quality optical drives were scsi, and when ide was lousy and external drive interfaces like usb and firewire did not exist. now you have raptors and sata the gap is not that big, and the cost cannot be justified for most people. i guess for sh*ts and giggles if you have an unlimited budget, or if you require the highest quality drives for your data for some reason. raid raptors would be good enough for most again i used to have a few scsi things, useful for external cdrw drives when they were like 300+ dollars a drive!! 2x? lol scsi was a noticable boost back then when ide really blew and any disc access would totally degrade system responsiveness.

 

[alimoalem]

well actually i am on a budget and i'm looking for a cheap SCSI solution...which kinda doesn't go together but one can hope