OOOPs, just got a "new" CRAPPY HD??

[Thunderdog]

I read (here) that if you get a HD, you should get an 8MB buffer?- I got a NEW Western digital at office max, after REBATES- $20.00 or so.

STATS:
8.9 MS average seek time
2MB buffer
up to 100 MB/s data transfer rate using ultra ATA/100

Im trying to build a super fast decent high end (possible P/4 /ASUS ) gamer system. Will this slow my baby down? Uh oh-

[Igloo]

it might slow it down, during loading and so on, but not too noticible on performance.

thats whati found anyway,

Igloo

[Rick G]

for graphics intensive games on hdd, yes it will slow system down but large price difference. Remember the slowest part of your system is the determining factor on total speed.  Think weakest link.

[Wade777]

I'm using 2 WD HDDs (7200RPM) w/ 2 MB buffer and I'm completely happy.

[query]

No, it won't.  There are plenty of drives from all the major manufacturers (Seagate, WD, Hitachi, Samsung, Maxtor) that have 8 MByte caches and parallel ATA interfaces.

The 8 MByte cache does improve performance, but it's an incremental improvement, not a drastic one.

[Thunderdog]

Roger- Ill use what I got, and when I get a 10,000 RPMN raptor, ill have the screamer.
THanks!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Mark H]

For $20, I would definitely keep it even if you got another drive. You can't beat the price. Sometimes economics overrides performance. In this case, the performance drop is not very noticable if you are doing a lot of random access.

Mark H

[the sheeep]

pshhhh buffers... i dont got none on mine and im happy as **** :)

[Carskick]

For $20, I would definitely keep it even if you got another drive. You can't beat the price. Sometimes economics overrides performance. In this case, the performance drop is not very noticable if you are doing a lot of random access.

Mark H

Isn't that why most of us buy AMD processors?  ;)

But seriously, for $20, it's a great HDD. I have a Western Digital 80GB 7200RPM 2MB Buffer in my HP, and it does just fine. Unless you have unlimited funds, that should be plenty fast. If you really want high speed, go for RAID 1, or better yet, RAID 0+1, which would require 4 hard drives.