WD Raptor... Where are its competitors?

[phaxmohdem]

So I was over at Tom's Hardware reading up on the new WD4000 400GB HDD, and started thinking about the Raptor line of HDD's. These drives have been out for a LONG time (in computer terms) and have yet to see any direct competitor... You can argue that the performance gap is closing with higher density platters and larger caches and such, but the bottom line is there are no other consumer level 10K Hard drives. Why is this? Aren't the Raptor series a hot commodity among us nerds?

Also stated in the Tom's article is that faster larger Raptors are just around the corner Yay!

Back to the subject at hand... Why wouldn't a company like Seagate challend the Raptors supremacy in the high end consumer segment? Seagate has in my opinion the best SCSI drives, and they manufacture those at 10K/15K all day long. Isn't the Raptor basically a SATA converted SCSI drive?

 

[Mik3y]

the raptors dont perform much better then top of the line 7200rpm hdd's. because of this, more people would rather have larger hard drives than hard drives that are noisier and output little performance increase. still, the raptor is popular nonetheless.

 

[evilharp]

The raptor is an Odd-ball in the consumer market. Because of its low capacity (36gb or 75gb) most users won't consider it (80gb to 120gb is the new entry-level for desktops). If you look at the benchmarks, the Raptor (revision 2) does well until real world apps are used. Once real-world apps are considered cache, platter density and read/write performance take priority over RPMs.

Originally, the raptor was suppossed to be an entry level server part (SATA was designed for cheap servers). However, most CTOs insist on SCSI for servers, so SATA went to the desktop.

Seagate could probably build a faster drive (maybe a 15k SATA), but there really isn't a market for it. Most Nerds and Geeks are looking at capacity and cache now. 400gb+ is the current fantasy.

 

[phaxmohdem]

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but wouldn't a SATA variation of a 300GB 15K drive kick some SERIOUS ass??? (Assuming it doesn't cost more than the rest of the PC combined)

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: phaxmohdem
Correct me if I'm wrong here, but wouldn't a SATA variation of a 300GB 15K drive kick some SERIOUS ass??? (Assuming it doesn't cost more than the rest of the PC combined)

the hdds companies won't do that because they want to make the serious $$$ off of the scsi market, where they could charge $2000 for a 15k, 300GB u320 hdd.

 

[Markbnj]

I have to say I am not that thrilled with the 74g Raptor. It's not size, as I don't often need hundreds of gigs, but it is noisy as hell. I agree with the other poster who said that RPM quickly gets swamped in realworld access patterns too.

 

[First]

It's the fastest desktop-level consumer HDD on the market, short of U320 15K SCSI drives that are significantly higher priced, especially when you include the cost of a controller card ($150 for a good SCSI controller, though the cost of entry is coming down).

 

[Pariah]

Back to the subject at hand... Why wouldn't a company like Seagate challend the Raptors supremacy in the high end consumer segment?

This has been covered a million times here. The Raptor is not targetted at the high end consumer. There is practically no money to be made in that segment. It's designed as a lower cost alternative to SCSI. Which makes it quite obvious why the other hard drive manufacturers who have SCSI divisions have no interest in releasing a competing product.

Isn't the Raptor basically a SATA converted SCSI drive?

No, it's a parallel ATA drive converted to SATA.

 

[Bona Fide]

The Raptor, for all intensive purposes, sucks. Buy a Seagate.

 

[Makaveli]

The Raptor is the fastest SATA drive at the moment and has been for the last 2 years. Alot of people that talk haven't even owned a raptor or just complain that the price isn't worth it. Of course everyone has their own opinon. but most of the people are just haters and brand loyal. I suggest u try one out, or try someone computer that has one, then try a regular 7200 drive and see if it matter to u. I know for me the difference was noticable. and I wouldn't trade my 74gb raptor for a newer drive as my boot drive. just stick in a second drive for storage if need be.

 

[Genx87]

Who cares if it only has 74GB? Honestly any self respecting builder will be using a slower larger disk for storage of MP3s, Movies, misc files. 74GB is the boot partition and application disk.

Nobody needs 10K spindle speed for listening to MP3s.

 

[BigCoolJesus]

Originally posted by: Makaveli
The Raptor is the fastest SATA drive at the moment and has been for the last 2 years. Alot of people that talk haven't even owned a raptor or just complain that the price isn't worth it. Of course everyone has their own opinon. but most of the people are just haters and brand loyal. I suggest u try one out, or try someone computer that has one, then try a regular 7200 drive and see if it matter to u. I know for me the difference was noticable. and I wouldn't trade my 74gb raptor for a newer drive as my boot drive. just stick in a second drive for storage if need be.

Im not a brand hater or a fanboi of anysort.

I used to own a Raptor, but only for a year.......theres a simple reason i choose to chuck my Raptor and get a Hitachi 160GB drive, the Raptor was worthless.

Not only did i run out of space, but comparing windows load times and game load times to my Hitachi, the Hitachi is actually 1-3 seconds faster then my Raptor was





the Raptors RPM's just got pwned by a Hitachi







O, and have fun with your boot drive..... while my raptor was getting 7 bars to load windows, my Hitachi only gets 4 and a half

 

[Genx87]

O, and have fun with your boot drive..... while my raptor was getting 7 bars to load windows, my Hitachi only gets 4 and a half

lmao 7 bars?

I usually count my boot times in seconds.
Personally I dont excited about sticking storage on my boot device but that is just me. I dont go cheap and instead grab large disks for storage. Recently I decided to move to storing all of my non-essential files on my server and run MP3s ect over my Gbit network.

Soon Ill be upgrading it to 8x250GB drives so space wont be a problem.

 

[BigCoolJesus]

Originally posted by: Genx87

O, and have fun with your boot drive..... while my raptor was getting 7 bars to load windows, my Hitachi only gets 4 and a half

lmao 7 bars?

I usually count my boot times in seconds.
Personally I dont excited about sticking storage on my boot device but that is just me. I dont go cheap and instead grab large disks for storage. Recently I decided to move to storing all of my non-essential files on my server and run MP3s ect over my Gbit network.

Soon Ill be upgrading it to 8x250GB drives so space wont be a problem.

im to lazy to count seconds (even though my phone is right next to me), so i would just count bars

no bullsh!t, 7 bars
(and just incase theres a counterpoint, the only app that ran as soon as windows loaded was my nvidia desktop manager 😉 )

 

[Genx87]

Originally posted by: BigCoolJesus

Originally posted by: Genx87

O, and have fun with your boot drive..... while my raptor was getting 7 bars to load windows, my Hitachi only gets 4 and a half

lmao 7 bars?

I usually count my boot times in seconds.
Personally I dont excited about sticking storage on my boot device but that is just me. I dont go cheap and instead grab large disks for storage. Recently I decided to move to storing all of my non-essential files on my server and run MP3s ect over my Gbit network.

Soon Ill be upgrading it to 8x250GB drives so space wont be a problem.

im to lazy to count seconds (even though my phone is right next to me), so i would just count bars

no bullsh!t, 7 bars
(and just incase theres a counterpoint, the only app that ran as soon as windows loaded was my nvidia desktop manager 😉 )

I guess you will have to refresh my memory on what bars are.
You talking about the animation within WinXP?

 

[BigCoolJesus]

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: BigCoolJesus

Originally posted by: Genx87

O, and have fun with your boot drive..... while my raptor was getting 7 bars to load windows, my Hitachi only gets 4 and a half

lmao 7 bars?

I usually count my boot times in seconds.
Personally I dont excited about sticking storage on my boot device but that is just me. I dont go cheap and instead grab large disks for storage. Recently I decided to move to storing all of my non-essential files on my server and run MP3s ect over my Gbit network.

Soon Ill be upgrading it to 8x250GB drives so space wont be a problem.

im to lazy to count seconds (even though my phone is right next to me), so i would just count bars

no bullsh!t, 7 bars
(and just incase theres a counterpoint, the only app that ran as soon as windows loaded was my nvidia desktop manager 😉 )

I guess you will have to refresh my memory on what bars are.
You talking about the animation within WinXP?

Yea, when you turn on your computer and the Windows screen comes up (with the big logo and everything) there is a bar near the bottom that scrolls across until windows loads....

1 scroll is equivalant (just rounding and guessing) to about 1.5 seconds


so my raptor loaded in about 10 seconds and my hitachi loaded in about 7 seconds

 

[Pr0d1gy]

My Windows XP Pro boots up in 3 "bars" with my Raptor, so it wounds like you were doing something wrong. I wouldn't trade my Raptor for anything. I am almost always the first guy on a map in BF2, although I only use 1gb of RAM. The case fans are definitely louder than the Raptor ever is and I just use a slow Hitachi drive for storage.

If you just want the fastest drive you can get & storage isn't an issue, I would definitely recommend the 74gb Raptor from my personal experience with it.

 

[Genx87]

Originally posted by: BigCoolJesus

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: BigCoolJesus

Originally posted by: Genx87

O, and have fun with your boot drive..... while my raptor was getting 7 bars to load windows, my Hitachi only gets 4 and a half

lmao 7 bars?

I usually count my boot times in seconds.
Personally I dont excited about sticking storage on my boot device but that is just me. I dont go cheap and instead grab large disks for storage. Recently I decided to move to storing all of my non-essential files on my server and run MP3s ect over my Gbit network.

Soon Ill be upgrading it to 8x250GB drives so space wont be a problem.

im to lazy to count seconds (even though my phone is right next to me), so i would just count bars

no bullsh!t, 7 bars
(and just incase theres a counterpoint, the only app that ran as soon as windows loaded was my nvidia desktop manager 😉 )

I guess you will have to refresh my memory on what bars are.
You talking about the animation within WinXP?

Yea, when you turn on your computer and the Windows screen comes up (with the big logo and everything) there is a bar near the bottom that scrolls across until windows loads....

1 scroll is equivalant (just rounding and guessing) to about 1.5 seconds


so my raptor loaded in about 10 seconds and my hitachi loaded in about 7 seconds

Ok I usually get it done in about 2.5 bars but who knows what else you are loading to slow it down.

 

[BigCoolJesus]

Originally posted by: Pr0d1gy
My Windows XP Pro boots up in 3 "bars" with my Raptor, so it wounds like you were doing something wrong. I wouldn't trade my Raptor for anything. I am almost always the first guy on a map in BF2, although I only use 1gb of RAM. The case fans are definitely louder than the Raptor ever is and I just use a slow Hitachi drive for storage.

If you just want the fastest drive you can get & storage isn't an issue, I would definitely recommend the 74gb Raptor from my personal experience with it.

Just to ask, how the hell would i be at fault for my sh!tty ass raptor not being "super ultra mega ub0r" fast?


and i love your statement

I am almost always the first guy on a map in BF2

because it almost means something............almost




After my personal experience, and after gaining good knowledge as to whats better in a computer, id reccomend an extra Gig of RAM or a step up in a GPU or a step up in a CPU over a Raptor

 

[BigCoolJesus]

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: BigCoolJesus

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: BigCoolJesus

Originally posted by: Genx87

O, and have fun with your boot drive..... while my raptor was getting 7 bars to load windows, my Hitachi only gets 4 and a half

lmao 7 bars?

I usually count my boot times in seconds.
Personally I dont excited about sticking storage on my boot device but that is just me. I dont go cheap and instead grab large disks for storage. Recently I decided to move to storing all of my non-essential files on my server and run MP3s ect over my Gbit network.

Soon Ill be upgrading it to 8x250GB drives so space wont be a problem.

im to lazy to count seconds (even though my phone is right next to me), so i would just count bars

no bullsh!t, 7 bars
(and just incase theres a counterpoint, the only app that ran as soon as windows loaded was my nvidia desktop manager 😉 )

I guess you will have to refresh my memory on what bars are.
You talking about the animation within WinXP?

Yea, when you turn on your computer and the Windows screen comes up (with the big logo and everything) there is a bar near the bottom that scrolls across until windows loads....

1 scroll is equivalant (just rounding and guessing) to about 1.5 seconds


so my raptor loaded in about 10 seconds and my hitachi loaded in about 7 seconds

Ok I usually get it done in about 2.5 bars but who knows what else you are loading to slow it down.

like i said, the only other thing that loaded with windows was nvidia desktop manager, which is standard pretty much.
Every other app i had was set to only run when i started it

 

[t3h l337 n3wb]

The cost-to-performance ratio of a Raptor sucks. They're only for people that have aw huge, but not sky-high budget (~$3000-$4000). There are much better things you can do with the money. Anyone with a budget higher than that should be getting 15k SCSI. So really, Raptors are pretty useless.

 

[Pix3lDezigner]

Originally posted by: Makaveli
The Raptor is the fastest SATA drive at the moment and has been for the last 2 years. Alot of people that talk haven't even owned a raptor or just complain that the price isn't worth it. Of course everyone has their own opinon. but most of the people are just haters and brand loyal. I suggest u try one out, or try someone computer that has one, then try a regular 7200 drive and see if it matter to u. I know for me the difference was noticable. and I wouldn't trade my 74gb raptor for a newer drive as my boot drive. just stick in a second drive for storage if need be.

I agree with you. I went from an 80 gb Western Digital 8 mb cache, to 2 x 74 gb Raptors in Raid 0, and I noticed a very considerable difference. I got both 74 gb Raptors for a total of $300, so I figured it wasn't that bad. Everything I do is a bit snappier, and Windows loads up much quicker. Windows loads up in 2 bars (in the Windows XP animation). I haven't counted seconds yet, but it's much faster than before I had them. I also tossed a 200 gb "extra storage" Seagate to the mix, so I'm set.

 

[BigCoolJesus]

Originally posted by: t3h l337 n3wb
The cost-to-performance ratio of a Raptor sucks. They're only for people that have aw huge, but not sky-high budget (~$3000-$4000). There are much better things you can do with the money. Anyone with a budget higher than that should be getting 15k SCSI. So really, Raptors are pretty useless.

:thumbsup:

 

[Pix3lDezigner]

Originally posted by: t3h l337 n3wb
The cost-to-performance ratio of a Raptor sucks. They're only for people that have aw huge, but not sky-high budget (~$3000-$4000). There are much better things you can do with the money. Anyone with a budget higher than that should be getting 15k SCSI. So really, Raptors are pretty useless.

I disagree as I got 2 74gb Raptors for $300. I run those puppies in Raid 0. Yes, it's more than a 7200 rpm 160gb drive, but I thought the minor difference was worth it. I don't regret it at all and am very happy with them.

 

[Genx87]

Originally posted by: t3h l337 n3wb
The cost-to-performance ratio of a Raptor sucks. They're only for people that have aw huge, but not sky-high budget (~$3000-$4000). There are much better things you can do with the money. Anyone with a budget higher than that should be getting 15k SCSI. So really, Raptors are pretty useless.

Built my machine last year with a 6800GT, A63 3000+, 1GB PC3200, DVD-RW, new case, fans, and ASUS K8N-E MB for 1200 bucks with the 74GB Raptor.

I find it funny people calling them useless considering the use I have got out of it for the past 13 months. Now useless? I had a couple of 6.5GB fujitsu drives that had seek times near 20 ms. Those things were useless, Raptors are silky nice from my exprience.