Hard drive options

[Chris_PC]

Im looking at the possibilities for hard drives and was looking at the Raptors. I need around 150GB Minimum. With having 2 hard drives does it class them as 2 seperate ones or can you "link" them to make one.
Also what is RAID, and what are your opinions on the raptors.
My budget would be around £200

Ive also seen some Bundles like the one here:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/westerndigital_sata.html

What options do I have?

PS: My case will hold 5 HD's so that isnt an issue

 

[NathanM]

RAID uses multiple hard drives for sharing or replicating data among the drives. Basically, it forms all hard drives into one like you asked in your 3rd sentence. Technically, it's not all one hard drive, but you will only see one.

The raptors are 10,000 RPM hard drives. They're more of a high performance hard drive. In order to determine if this will be a worthwhile investment for you, what are your main uses for your PC?

 

[Chris_PC]

The reason i was looking into raptor is because ill be doing quite a bit of gaming and using many programs at the same time.

So will RAID allow you to make a 150GB hard drive out of 2 74/75 GBs or will it still only hold 74/75GB but duplicate it.

 

[NathanM]

It can do either. RAID 0 is what splits data evenly across the drives, which basically makes it 1 larger drive. RAID 1 mirrors the data across the drives. So, I assume what you want is RAID 0.

 

[Chris_PC]

Would i just be better off going for a single 150GB raptor?. My current PC has a 120GB HD and is only using 51.4GB, however I will have a lot more games and programs on my new PC. 150GB may be enough.
If i had the money in the future could i just buy another HD and set them up in RAID0 if i needed the extra space.(do they have to be identical, eg speed)

 

[Crusader]

Im pretty sure they have to be the same, so its best to by two identical hds. Do you really need another hd, cos if ur happy with your current hd then you could save the money or upgrade something else. Cos if its just games and programs 120gb is plents and you can always unistall games and programes. But if you do dl a lot and store lots of music etc then i guess you could look at other options.

 

[Chris_PC]

This HD will be for my new gaming PC. 4400+ X2, 7800GT/GTX etc.
Im not just upgrading my current pc, forgot to mention that, sorry :O.

Also i store a lot of music in mp3 format, will probarbly be around 50+ albums. I have around 40 albums on my current PC

 

[filocardhustler]

well it depends on what kind of performance you want, you can get higher performance at a price if you get the two raptos, RAID 0 will give you roughly 30% more performance than having a single 150gb drive yet on the other hand a double chance of losing all data because if one fails then the other is erased as well. The single Raptor performs greater than those HDD's of the average user and should more than do you well but either way, the choice you make will be good.

 

[Chris_PC]

I think ill stick with a single 150 and if i have the money/need the space in the future ill buy another and run them in raid 0.

Does raid1 increase performance at all of is it just a "backup"

 

[NathanM]

I took the liberty of Wiki'ing this for you. This should answer any RAID question you have.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

Happy reading .