Caviar: SE or RE?

[robodude666]

Hey guys,

I bought a new (X2 3800+ @ 2.6-2.8, 2GB DDR-800, x1950pro) rig two months ago and I was low on money so I decided to stick with my ancient Maxtor IDE drives. I have a 120GB (main), 80GB (my old main), and a second 120GB (file/anime storage). At the moment I only have my main 120GB in because my case (Raidmax Smilodon) can't fit 2 IDE drives without it being very painful on the fingers. My IDE cables are rounded, long, and THICK.

I will be getting a Seagate Barracuda (7200.x, dont know which one) 320GB SATAII drive for free tonight or this week, which I will use as my file drive. I originally planned on getting a RAID 0 of Raptors for my main C drive since I am sick and tired of the long load times (Sh!T man, it took me 3 hours to install Steam, 5 hours to install Rainbow 6: Vegas!). I shortly realized that I won't be able to pull together $400 or $300 for a RAID 0 of Raptors.

Then, in a Raptor X review thread at 3GM, a member (Kingdom934) showed his HD Tach results for a RAID 0 of 250GB Barracudas and he was getting like 90MB/s. Right in between the 75MB/s of a single Raptor X and 130MB/s of a RAID 0 of Raptor X drives.

During a talk with Blake on AIM about Raptor HDDs, he showed me an article from Tom's: Cheap RAID Ravages WD Raptor and I realized that I could get a RAID 0 of two cheaper drives.. Get great speeds, not burn a hole in my wallet, and have more HDD capacity! So, I finally decided on getting two small WD Caviar drives and RAIDing them in a 0 array.

Now, my question for you guys!

I seen WD has a Caviar SE and a Caviar RE. The RE is Raid Edition and gets about 5-10MB/s higher when in RAID 0. But, the lowest the RE goes is 160GB... Do you guys think the extra speed is worth the price for the higher capacity? I originally wanted to get like 2x 80GB Caviar SEs since I won't need much space on the main drive except for windows, and my games (and I don't have many. I will be getting the Orange Box in october though :) Might get Dark Messiah too... Really enjoying the demo ^^). Anyways... there is a guy about an hour or so away from me who is selling a few 80GB Caviar Ses for $20-25 each ($25 ones have Vista w/ office 2007 preinstalled, but I will be formating anyway).

Also, another thing. How does Cache affect the speed of a single drive and RAID 0? I noticed WD has a 2MB, 8MB and 16MB Caviar drive.

What do you guys think?

Oh, side questions... If one of my drives in the RAID 0 array fails, am I basically screwed? Or is there a way to restore it? If one of the SATA/power cables comes off while its on, am I also screwed? >_< If I make a backup image of my drives (using the windows XP backup thing-a-ma-bob) could I use those images to restore the drives/my XP installation?

Cheers,
-robodude666

[Panda Man]

Originally Posted by robodude666

Oh, side questions... If one of my drives in the RAID 0 array fails, am I basically screwed? Or is there a way to restore it? If one of the SATA/power cables comes off while its on, am I also screwed? >_< If I make a backup image of my drives (using the windows XP backup thing-a-ma-bob) could I use those images to restore the drives/my XP installation?

Cheers,
-robodude666

Yes, you're screwed :P If you make a backup image though, you can restore it to a single drive. What do you mean by windows XP backup thing-a-ma-bob though? The only windows backup thing I can think of is system restore, and that does not image your drives. Just grab a copy of acronis and make an image of C: for backing up.

It all depends on what you want. I would go with the SE's, but if you MUST have that much more speed, then go for the RE's. As for myself, this 300GB Maxtor is fast enough for me. :D

[robodude666]

Originally Posted by Panda Man

Yes, you're screwed :P If you make a backup image though, you can restore it to a single drive. What do you mean by windows XP backup thing-a-ma-bob though, the only windows backup thing I can think of is system restore, and that does not image your drives

It all depends on what you want. I would go with the SE's, but if you MUST have that much more speed, then go for the RE's. As for myself, this 300GB Maxtor is fast enough for me. :D

I am screwed, huh? Guy on eBay is selling 3x 320gb barracudas for cheap. Think I should get those and setup a RAID 0+1 (with the barracuda I will get)?

I am not *all that* crazy about speed.. My maxtor gets about 25-30MB/s... What does your Maxtor get? :P An upgrade from 25-30MB/s to like 70-80MB/s would be great enough! I was just wondering if you guys think that its worth the extra $$ for 10MB/s. If not, which Caviar SE is best bang for the $ or GB/$.

Uhhh, last time I checked you can make a backup image with windows xp. Theres like the two types.. Forgot what they are called. One backups all files since last backup, and one backups all files since last full backup... It creates an image file which you can burn to a CD/DVD or put onto an external HDD.. (I am planning on getting a 2 drive RAID 1 NAS later on).

Wait, so if I do make a backup image (Of the windows RAID 0 HDD)... I can only restore it to one drive? I can't restore it to the entire RAID 0 array?

Hmmm,
-robodude666

[gvblake22]

The image of the fresh Windows install can be "ghosted" or installed back onto a newly rebuilt RAID 0 setup.

[robodude666]

Originally Posted by gvblake22

The image of the fresh Windows install can be "ghosted" or installed back onto a newly rebuilt RAID 0 setup.

Well, that I know. But can an image of a non-fresh installation be put onto a rebuilt RAID 0 array? Like, an image with my registry, desktop, settings, etc.

[TWBalls]

I vote RE.

I've had arrays with both SE and RE. RE gives me less of a headache.

Supposedly, the firmware they have is more suited for RAID arrays than their SE line. They're also considered to be their 'enterprise' class of drives, so I would hope that they're made with higher quality components.

***edit***
I see you're also thinking about Barracudas. I'd go with those over either of these two... but then I'm a huge Seagate whore. ;)

[gvblake22]

Originally Posted by robodude666

Well, that I know. But can an image of a non-fresh installation be put onto a rebuilt RAID 0 array? Like, an image with my registry, desktop, settings, etc.

Yes, an image is an image no matter how you slice it (the hard drives don't care). An image with a Windows installation, songs, pictures, documents, favorites, etc should still work just fine.

[Panda Man]

Originally Posted by robodude666

Wait, so if I do make a backup image (Of the windows RAID 0 HDD)... I can only restore it to one drive? I can't restore it to the entire RAID 0 array?

Hmmm,
-robodude666

Oh no, you can restore it to the RAID if you want, I just figured that if one drive failed you wouldn't want to try and restore it to to both drives :P

Also, I wouldn't trust winxp's imaging (if it does have it, I've never seen it, nor wouldn't trust it), I'd think you would be much better off plunking down $30 and getting acronis

EDIT - My maxtor gives me about 66 MB/s last time I tested it. I need to test it again.

[onebxr]

Robo,
I know you asked about the caviar line but I would like to tell you about a little startup company called samsung. I currently have 4 of the spinpoint series drives with another in the mail. These drives are reliable, cheap and are pretty fast. Just a little more info to screw your buying descision up.
-1

[TWBalls]

Originally Posted by onebxr

These drives are reliable, cheap and are pretty fast.

They're pretty quiet drives too.