Serial IDE, USB 2.0, and 64-biit OH MY!

[Stiganator]

Should I wait to upgrade my harddrives until serial IDE comes out? The same question for USB 2.0 and 64 bit processors?

 

[HansXP]

you might be waiting a while

 

[Rand]

If you what Serial ATA then buy an adpater when it debutes, why should you care about USB 2.0 if your concerned about a HDD?
Unless of course your thinking about an external USB compatible HDD.

64bit processing is an absolute and total waste with no benefits whatsoever for 99% of home users. Which is not to say there are no benefits, simply that those benefits are not any that would be of even the slightest concern to most home users and even the vast majority of enthusiasts.

 

[Nothinman]

My general thinking is that waiting for any certain tech is pointless, as soon as it's released you'll want to wait for something else. Get the best of what you can now, or atleast what you can afford, and get ready to do it again in a few months or a year.

Especially for SATA, jumping on the bandwagon as soon as it's released will just make you a guinea pig for the first chipsets. And I believe SATA is supposed to have backwards compatibilty so you could use the old drives on the new controller until you get cash to get new drives. I'm also of the thinking that you should just go with SCSI, ATA is a bad design with many bandages to cover it up, they need to replace it instead of adding more kludges.

If you want a 64-bit processor get an Alpha for a UltraSparc, you can get whole systems of either for round a grand and you'll get a real, proven 64-bit OS too ( Tru64, Solaris or Linux). I wouldn't run XP 64 for anything critical for quite a long time, the 16->32 bit transition was bad for MS and I doubt the 32->64 bit one will be any easier. But in general you won't see any benefits from a 64-bit chip, unless you work with extremely large data sets.

 

[thorin]

Actually it's SerialATA not Serial IDE.

For further information and links see my (slightly out of date, updates coming soon) HD Interface and Standards FAQ

Thorin

 

[thorin]

"And I believe SATA is supposed to have backwards compatibilty so you could use the old drives on the new controller until you get cash to get new drives."

Yes SATA is backwards compatible using a dongle or genderbender, and is fully compatible at the driver/software level.

Thorin