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Whats more important: SEEKTIME or HD CACHE ?

S

slinkeepie

Member
Ive been looking over seagates line of drives, mainly because they are quiet. But cant decide between their older model which has a slower seektime but higher cache within my price range. Their newer model (7200.7) has 2mb cache but is generally a bit faster. What does the extra cache do for me basically?

Seagate Cuda V
Model Number:ST3120024A
Capacity:120 GB
Cache: 8 MB
Speed:7200 rpm
Seek time:9.4 ms avg
Interface:Ultra ATA/100
appx $135

VS!

Barracuda 7200.7
Model Number:ST3160023A
Cache: 2mb
Capacity:160 GB
Speed:7200 rpm
Seek time:8.5 ms avg
Interface:Ultra ATA/100
appx $170





 
I'm no genius, but I would say seek time because then you know you can access the data faster *shrug*

What is the harddrive going to be used for?
 
Depends on app. In general, seek time is more important, but if you're looking at a big contiguous file reading operation, I think cache is more important.
 
Originally posted by: Slammy1
Depends on app. In general, seek time is more important, but if you're looking at a big contiguous file reading operation, I think cache is more important.
Click to expand...

Yes
 
Just to let you know that the 7200.7 is reported to not be quiet like the V and IV.

The 7200.7 has a better transfer rate, but actually has a longer seek time than the V. (As reported from independent reviews.) The 7200.7 definately doesn't have an 8.5 seek time.

 
Originally posted by: Slammy1
...if you're looking at a big contiguous file reading operation, I think cache is more important.
Click to expand...
This is incorrect. Disk caching improves performance for small files in high-locality access patterns. If you pull a 50KB file, the drive's firmware will grab other nearby small files and put them in the cache, since those other files have a good chance to be requested next. If those files are requested, you win - the cache serves them up without a new seek. If, on the other hand, you're reading a 50MB file, the cache will be bottlenecked by the speed with which the drive can fill it.

 
the drive will be used for audio recording mainly. multi-tracking software/audio production. so there will be reading/writing at the same time (playing back tracks while recording new ones).

thanks for the input so far!
 
If the drive will only contain AV data (big contiguous files), neither seek time nor cache will be of great importance to you. Just find something quiet with a good transfer rate, preferably cheap.
 
both are important. cache is important if you access the same information over and over. seektime is important if you randomly access stuff in which case cache wont help you. obviously the cache isnt going to be huge, that's why seektime is so important. and there will be times when both wont help you at all (as noted by cleverhandle).
 
the drive will be used for audio recording mainly. multi-tracking software/audio production. so there will be reading/writing at the same time (playing back tracks while recording new ones).

Take the drive with the lower times. Click around this link for some guidance. http://www.digidesign.com/compato/mainhdwin.cfm


If the drive will only contain AV data (big contiguous files), neither seek time nor cache will be of great importance to you. Just find something quiet with a good transfer rate, preferably cheap.

This is true for solo playback like on a desktop with the new Hulk trailer. Multi-track recording can be fairly I/O intensive.
 
In general............... the 8MB cache drive is going to give you better performance.

It's kind of like the same old automobile question. "What's more important, Torque or Horsepower?"

The answer of couse is always... "It depends?"
 
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