[H] 1 TB drives?
Looking to replace the 250 GB drives in my RAID 5 HTPC array with 1 TB ones. The Seagates in there now have been champs and really hoping I can get the same performance out of the new drives. I was going to go with the WD GreenPower line as they seem to be out the longest and hopefully have had all the kinks worked out. But going through the reviews on Newegg, I saw the WD RE2 which is supposed to be an enterprise-class drive (and is $240 as opposed to $180) and also the WD Caviar Black which had twice the cache of the other 2 at 32MB for a price between them. Seagate, HItachi, and Samung also now have 1 TB drives out with the Samsung Spinpoint supposedly being reviewed the best and the Hitachi being really new with not a lot of reports yet. Anyone on the list have thoughts/opinions/experiences? I know at this point it seems like the quality of a manufacturer can shift every few years and collectively from what I've read anecdotally there are higher than normal reports of DOAs and early deaths with all of these 1 TB drives than what we have seen in the past. Brian
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
Avoid the WD GP (and RE2-GP) series of drives. They're decent in terms of STR, excellent in power/heat/noise, but they're 5400rpm drives. Ignore the marketing nonsense saying that they're 5400-7200rpm drives. WD has been intentionally vague. Contrary to popular opinion, they do NOT change RPM dynamically; WD specifies the RPM for the entire series of drive, leaving the possibility of a 7200rpm variant in the future. There are none now. It looks like the WD Black WD1001FALS is becoming available now, but if you're looking for something that's been out for a while and proven--this isn't it. It's WD's first 3-platter 333GB 7200rpm design, their first 32MB buffer design, etc...it's likely a very solid drive, but it isn't proven. Samsung's drives are held in pretty high regard right now. What controller card are you using? Supposedly the Samsung F1 has some issues with Intel's ICHxR in RAID modes. It does have 334/GB platter technology, meaning that it's a current-generation drive and has only 3 platters. This is a good thing. Hitachi's 1TB drive is actually one of the oldest 1TB designs. It's a 5-platter design, using 200GB/platter tech. I'd avoid it. It's basically 1.5-2 generations old, and 5 platter designs are very uncommon in the industry due to the complexity of such an arrangement. Remember the 75GXP? Seagate's 1TB drive is also one of the older designs. It uses 250GB/platter tech, hence has 4 platters. Probably okay, but it's a generation old technology. Ultimately, not a lot of choices IMO if you're wanting the latest generation technology. I think I'd go in this order: WD Black 1TB WD1001FALS Samsung F1 Seagate 7200.11 Hitachi 7K1000 WD GP-RE2 WD-GP Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden Sent: Sunday, July 06, 2008 6:54 AM To: hwg Subject: [H] 1 TB drives? Looking to replace the 250 GB drives in my RAID 5 HTPC array with 1 TB ones. The Seagates in there now have been champs and really hoping I can get the same performance out of the new drives. I was going to go with the WD GreenPower line as they seem to be out the longest and hopefully have had all the kinks worked out. But going through the reviews on Newegg, I saw the WD RE2 which is supposed to be an enterprise-class drive (and is $240 as opposed to $180) and also the WD Caviar Black which had twice the cache of the other 2 at 32MB for a price between them. Seagate, HItachi, and Samung also now have 1 TB drives out with the Samsung Spinpoint supposedly being reviewed the best and the Hitachi being really new with not a lot of reports yet. Anyone on the list have thoughts/opinions/experiences? I know at this point it seems like the quality of a manufacturer can shift every few years and collectively from what I've read anecdotally there are higher than normal reports of DOAs and early deaths with all of these 1 TB drives than what we have seen in the past. Brian
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
I have two 1TB spinpoints and no issues so far. They universally test out to be the quietest, fastest, and almost as low powerdraw as the 5400rpm WD. One less platter than the competition is a huge advantage. The majority of the negative reviews on newegg stem from the partition/disk utility bundled with the sammy and it apparently is antiquated and messes up the drive. My response is huh? people still use disk utilities? Date: Sun, 6 Jul 2008 07:53:32 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] 1 TB drives? Looking to replace the 250 GB drives in my RAID 5 HTPC array with 1 TB ones. The Seagates in there now have been champs and really hoping I can get the same performance out of the new drives. I was going to go with the WD GreenPower line as they seem to be out the longest and hopefully have had all the kinks worked out. But going through the reviews on Newegg, I saw the WD RE2 which is supposed to be an enterprise-class drive (and is $240 as opposed to $180) and also the WD Caviar Black which had twice the cache of the other 2 at 32MB for a price between them. Seagate, HItachi, and Samung also now have 1 TB drives out with the Samsung Spinpoint supposedly being reviewed the best and the Hitachi being really new with not a lot of reports yet. Anyone on the list have thoughts/opinions/experiences? I know at this point it seems like the quality of a manufacturer can shift every few years and collectively from what I've read anecdotally there are higher than normal reports of DOAs and early deaths with all of these 1 TB drives than what we have seen in the past. Brian _ Need to know now? Get instant answers with Windows Live Messenger. http://www.windowslive.com/messenger/connect_your_way.html?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_messenger_072008
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
I'm currently using an LSI MegaRAID 150-6 and it has served me well but has a max volume size of 2TB, is PCI-X (and I'm using a mobo without one of those), and has limited cache. So I'm looking to upgrade. Requirements are PCI Express, on the fly capacity expansion, and SATA-II with at least 6 ports. Right now I am leaning towards the Areca 1220 which uses the Intel IOP333 engine: http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16816131004 I agree about the 3 platter thing which is one of the reasons why I was looking at the WD Black (along with the cache) but also share your suspicions about its polish. I'm going with 3 1 TB drives in a RAID 5 array to start, and will be adding additional drives over the rest of the year as capacity is needed. I do have one WD GP drive that I will be using to hold my data while I build the new array and it will probably serve as a hot spare afterwards. Also just saw this benchmark comparison between them on Storage Review: http://www.storagereview.com/php/benchmark/suite_v4.php?typeID=10testbedID=4osID=6raidconfigID=1numDrives=1devID_0=361devID_1=348devID_2=352devID_3=354devCnt=4 Don't like the power usage of the Hitachi (esp since it doesn't seem to have any performance advantage). Leaning towards the Samsung Spinpoint. --- Brian On Sun, Jul 6, 2008 at 12:05 PM, Greg Sevart [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Avoid the WD GP (and RE2-GP) series of drives. They're decent in terms of STR, excellent in power/heat/noise, but they're 5400rpm drives. Ignore the marketing nonsense saying that they're 5400-7200rpm drives. WD has been intentionally vague. Contrary to popular opinion, they do NOT change RPM dynamically; WD specifies the RPM for the entire series of drive, leaving the possibility of a 7200rpm variant in the future. There are none now. It looks like the WD Black WD1001FALS is becoming available now, but if you're looking for something that's been out for a while and proven--this isn't it. It's WD's first 3-platter 333GB 7200rpm design, their first 32MB buffer design, etc...it's likely a very solid drive, but it isn't proven. Samsung's drives are held in pretty high regard right now. What controller card are you using? Supposedly the Samsung F1 has some issues with Intel's ICHxR in RAID modes. It does have 334/GB platter technology, meaning that it's a current-generation drive and has only 3 platters. This is a good thing. Hitachi's 1TB drive is actually one of the oldest 1TB designs. It's a 5-platter design, using 200GB/platter tech. I'd avoid it. It's basically 1.5-2 generations old, and 5 platter designs are very uncommon in the industry due to the complexity of such an arrangement. Remember the 75GXP? Seagate's 1TB drive is also one of the older designs. It uses 250GB/platter tech, hence has 4 platters. Probably okay, but it's a generation old technology. Ultimately, not a lot of choices IMO if you're wanting the latest generation technology. I think I'd go in this order: WD Black 1TB WD1001FALS Samsung F1 Seagate 7200.11 Hitachi 7K1000 WD GP-RE2 WD-GP Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden Sent: Sunday, July 06, 2008 6:54 AM To: hwg Subject: [H] 1 TB drives? Looking to replace the 250 GB drives in my RAID 5 HTPC array with 1 TB ones. The Seagates in there now have been champs and really hoping I can get the same performance out of the new drives. I was going to go with the WD GreenPower line as they seem to be out the longest and hopefully have had all the kinks worked out. But going through the reviews on Newegg, I saw the WD RE2 which is supposed to be an enterprise-class drive (and is $240 as opposed to $180) and also the WD Caviar Black which had twice the cache of the other 2 at 32MB for a price between them. Seagate, HItachi, and Samung also now have 1 TB drives out with the Samsung Spinpoint supposedly being reviewed the best and the Hitachi being really new with not a lot of reports yet. Anyone on the list have thoughts/opinions/experiences? I know at this point it seems like the quality of a manufacturer can shift every few years and collectively from what I've read anecdotally there are higher than normal reports of DOAs and early deaths with all of these 1 TB drives than what we have seen in the past. Brian
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
Question - when a RAID card says 2 internal ports what are those used for? Chaining multiple cards together? This one is an example: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816103086 but at the bottom it says it has 8 SATA connectors. --- Brian
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
That card itself doesn't have 8 standard SATA connectors on it; it has two SFF-8087 connectors. This is a 4x multi-lane SAS interface that you can then use fan-out cables (looks like it comes with some) to connect to 8 individual drives. Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden Sent: Sunday, July 06, 2008 11:30 AM To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] 1 TB drives? Question - when a RAID card says 2 internal ports what are those used for? Chaining multiple cards together? This one is an example: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816103086 but at the bottom it says it has 8 SATA connectors. --- Brian
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
Ah. That makes sense. The RAID cards I've used in the past have all had individual connectors (either IDE or SATA) for each of the drive ports. I haven't worked with SAS before but from what I've gathered it's just SCSI moving in the serial age. Don't plan on using SAS in my application but I guess it would be an okay option to have for future proofing. Brian On Sun, Jul 6, 2008 at 2:13 PM, Greg Sevart [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That card itself doesn't have 8 standard SATA connectors on it; it has two SFF-8087 connectors. This is a 4x multi-lane SAS interface that you can then use fan-out cables (looks like it comes with some) to connect to 8 individual drives. Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden Sent: Sunday, July 06, 2008 11:30 AM To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] 1 TB drives? Question - when a RAID card says 2 internal ports what are those used for? Chaining multiple cards together? This one is an example: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816103086 but at the bottom it says it has 8 SATA connectors. --- Brian
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
I'm currently using an LSI MegaRAID 150-6 and it has served me well but has a max volume size of 2TB, is PCI-X (and I'm using a mobo without one of those), and has limited cache. So I'm looking to upgrade. Requirements are PCI Express, on the fly capacity expansion, and SATA-II with at least 6 ports. Right now I am leaning towards the Areca 1220 which uses the Intel IOP333 engine: http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16816131004 I love the Areca cards. I have one model higher than that, the ARC-1230, with 12x 500GB WD drives in RAID6. I get about 350MB/s reads, and about 270MB/s writes. The 1230 has an expandable cache, too, which I upgraded to 1GB. I would NEVER, EVER run with write-back cache enabled on ANY controller without a BBU though--which I bought. Otherwise, up to the cache size could be lost should you lose power, have a PSU failure, etc. A battery backed cache keeps the data in the cache refreshed--most for up to 3 days. Some Areca models have the IOP34x series processor. In contrast to the IOP33x series, they use DDR2 memory and can go up to 2GB of cache, and are good for several hundred MB/s more of i/o--if your drives support it. I agree about the 3 platter thing which is one of the reasons why I was looking at the WD Black (along with the cache) but also share your suspicions about its polish. I'm going with 3 1 TB drives in a RAID 5 array to start, and will be adding additional drives over the rest of the year as capacity is needed. I do have one WD GP drive that I will be using to hold my data while I build the new array and it will probably serve as a hot spare afterwards. The Black series also has a 5-year warranty--something else that might be worth considering, though warranty has never been a make-or-break decision for me. The Samsung is a nice drive to be sure, but I've had such good luck with WD that they are my manufacturer of choice, at least until I get burned. It'll happen eventually, but until then... Greg
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
t looks like the WD Black WD1001FALS is becoming available now, but if you're looking for something that's been out for a while and proven--this isn't it. Yeah, when you are talking 1TB of your data this becomes the most important issue. A drive of this size is difficult to keep backed up properly so reliability is crucial. I have been thinking of getting a 1TB drive and I think I am going with the Seagate. Fast enough for my media files it has proven to be safe, and reliable.
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
t looks like the WD Black WD1001FALS is becoming available now, but if you're looking for something that's been out for a while and proven-- this isn't it. Yeah, when you are talking 1TB of your data this becomes the most important issue. A drive of this size is difficult to keep backed up properly so reliability is crucial. I have been thinking of getting a 1TB drive and I think I am going with the Seagate. Fast enough for my media files it has proven to be safe, and reliable. Well, to be completely fair, it isn't like it's a whole new from-scratch design. WD's been doing 3-platter 7200rpm drives for a long long time. 334GB/platter tech isn't new either...the B3-revision WD3200AAKS and all WD6400AAKS drives use the same tech, with 1 and 2 platters, respectively. All the new Black edition does is add a platter and double the buffer, and likely some firmware optimizations to take advantage of the bigger buffer. I wouldn't discount it completely just because it's new; it is likely a very solid drive.
Re: [H] 1 TB drives?
I would tend to agree. The WD 640 has proven to be a really nice, quiet, cool running, and reliable drive, so adding a 3rd platter to make a 1 TB drive model makes sense. :) I was gonna get 2 of the 640's for a NAS box running Raid 1, but I might get 2 of the 1 terabyte models instead. :) Well, to be completely fair, it isn't like it's a whole new from- scratch design. WD's been doing 3-platter 7200rpm drives for a long long time. 334GB/platter tech isn't new either...the B3-revision WD3200AAKS and all WD6400AAKS drives use the same tech, with 1 and 2 platters, respectively. All the new Black edition does is add a platter and double the buffer, and likely some firmware optimizations to take advantage of the bigger buffer. I wouldn't discount it completely just because it's new; it is likely a very solid drive. -- JRS [EMAIL PROTECTED] Please remove **X** to reply... Facts do not cease to exist just because they are ignored.
Re: [H] Win2K Server OS?
The number that you enter is for the number of CAL's (Client Access Licenses) you own. A Windows license comes with 5 CAL's. I always did per seat licensing, so that you'd only have to worry about a CAL for each computer accessing the server. DHSinclair wrote: I am rebuilding my win2KServer OS. I just rcvd the magic 25-digit key. I entered it and now I am at a screen asking about Licensing Modes. IIRC, the original server install was for 5 Clients and 25 concurrent connection. Should I change the [ 5 ] to [25]?? The window is default with ATM: o Per Server. Number of concurrent connections [ 5 ] Each connection must have its own Client Access License (?CAL?) Per Seat. Each computer must have its own Client Access License (?CAL?) To avoid violation of the License Agreement, use Licensing (which is located in Administrative Tools) to record the number of Client Access Licenses purchased. Thanks much. Yes, I am digging in my W2K Server book also... Best, Duncan
