HDD recommendations

[gman314]

This thread is related to my other one in which I explained that my HDD refuses to boot at this point (I am currently working on it).

I was wondering if anyone has any HDD recommendations.  My "currently non-working" drive is a 1TB Seagate.

I picked up this Western Digital drive from my local Best Buy (not much of a selection), but am having second thoughts about taking it out of the box: http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digital-3-5-Inch-Internal-Desktop/dp/B0047QSUB4/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1348509952&sr=8-2&keywords=Western+Digital+Caviar+Green+WDBAAY5000ENC-NRSN+500+GB

500 gb is all that I need, but I am worried about the fact that it is only 5400 rpm.  I will be using it primarily to run Mame and various console emulators (the most powerful of which probably are Zinc, Project64, and Visual Pinball).  For what I will be using it for, will the rpms have that much of an impact?  Thanks.

[dekar24k]

HDD only matters in terms of boot time and loading time. When the game is loaded, it is loaded into RAM, so it won't be needing to access the HDD (because of its rather small size, compared to later PC games that are 4-10+ GB) and it therefore won't cause any slowdowns if your drive is slow. I'd still grab a 7200RPM drive, but you won't really suffer with the 5400RPM drive either.

[mytymaus007]

I would get a 60 or 128 gig SD HD its amazing the boot time is so fast and your up and running in no time.  Load the OS on the SD drive and the frontend and leave roms on the 5400rpm drive you'll be happy!

[lilshawn]

the WD green drive run at 5400 and spin up to 7200 when access is needed IIRC. They call it intellipower.

the larger 32mb cache of the green will help with access times.

i stick mainly with the WD blue cause they are cheaper...but the green is more likely to last longer due to the spinup/spindown power saving features etc.

the green and blue drives have a 2 year warranty

AV and RED drives have a 3 year

the blacks velociraptors come with a 5 year warranty.

[Unstupid]

get one that doesn't spin! 

[mgb]

I would get a 60 or 128 gig SD HD its amazing the boot time is so fast and your up and running in no time.  Load the OS on the SD drive and the frontend and leave roms on the 5400rpm drive you'll be happy!

Newegg has 128GB Samsung SSDs for  $99.
Thats the route I'm going with my current pc. OS on that and the emulation all on a 500 gig hdd

[gman314]

I am not too familiar  with SSDs.  Do they generally work the same way that an HDD would?  Do they plug directly into the motherboard with a SATA cable?

[nipsmg]

Yeah.  SSD's work just like a regular hard drive would.  SATA interface, same form factor.  Will mount right in your hard drive cage.

** edit ** :

I think an SSD for this is overkill.  If you're worried more about having a drive fail again, maybe it's worth it as there are no moving parts, but it's very rare for a HDD to completely fail like yours did before.  I've found that drives (Especially name brand ones) are pretty reliable. 

[lilshawn]

if an SSD is frequently read/written to it will fail prematurely. The chips used for storage have a limited amount of times they can be written to. (it's in the millions upon millions of cycles but in the scope of data, it can add up fast.)

try this...

get a smaller drive for your OS (maybe a 250 or 500gb)then install all your data to a 2nd drive. (2 or 3 TB)...if your OS packs it in, it's not a big deal to format it and install...or replace.

also: i agree with the aforementioned diagnosis... your drive is probably fine...you just have an OS issue...your data will still be there.

[gkarnik]

I used this SSD as I caught it on sale for $90:

SAMSUNG 830 Series MZ-7PC128B/WW 2.5" 128GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820147163

Then I use a second larger hard drive for backups and CHDs

[gman314]

try this...

get a smaller drive for your OS (maybe a 250 or 500gb)then install all your data to a 2nd drive. (2 or 3 TB)...if your OS packs it in, it's not a big deal to format it and install...or replace.

also: i agree with the aforementioned diagnosis... your drive is probably fine...you just have an OS issue...your data will still be there.

So, if my actual data (roms etc.) is saved on a secondary HDD, does that mean that the data will be safer than if it is stored on the primary HDD that boots the OS?

Also, if I plan to use two separate drives (or even just copying data from the non-working one the a new one), I have an additional concern.  I have my non-working HDD installed with Windows XP service pack 2.  I am not sure where my SP 2 CD is, but I found an XP disk with SP 1.  Will this have any effect, or should I track down another SP 2 disk.

[gman314]

Update:
So I decided to purchase a single WD scorpio black 500gb HDD: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136856

The problem is that, in my haste, I mistakenly ordered a notebook drive.  Here's my question: Since I am using an SATA cable, then this shouldn't be an issue, right?  Also, I noticed that there is one main difference between the notebook drive and the one that I intended to buy: the cache.  The cache on the notebook is 16MB, while the cache on the other one is 64MB.  Will this make any significant difference in what I am using it for?  Here is the drive that I intended to order: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822236345

Is it worth returning the notebook drive for this one?

[mgb]

The sata connection will all be the same.
  definitely the 64MB cache would have been better but I'm not sure how much of a difference you would notice with just keeping files on it.

if its going in a regular PC, you may also need an adaptor for putting a 2.5" drive in a 3.5" bay.
there are a bunch of plastic adpators for this on ebay, they're like 3 bucks.

[DeLuSioNal29]

Have you considered this?
http://onepcbsolution.com/



Maybe the hard drive is salvageable.

D

[lilshawn]

Have you considered this?
http://onepcbsolution.com/



Maybe the hard drive is salvageable.

D

unless you work at seagate or western digital...under NO circumstances should you EVER open a harddrive.

[DeLuSioNal29]

No need to open it. The platter portion remains sealed. You need to simply swap the exposed circuit board on the back of the HDD.

[Haze]

the slower spinning drives are absolutely fine for MAME, and will run significantly cooler.  lower temperatures = longer life too.

The 1-1.5TB Seagates were easily the worst of the bunch for running hot, I've had several and eventually gave up getting them replaced, even with cooling they'd run dangerously hot and were incredibly unreliable, I'm not surprised yours failed even under relatively light use.

These days I run a mix of Samsung and WD 'Green' drives, all of which run cool and are perfectly adequate for MAME, although I've stopped buying Samsung now because the current ones are just rebranded low-end Seagates instead (Seagate bought up Samsungs HDD business and promptly started using the brand to flog their junk)

[JoeB]

Spinning drives is so 1990s. You should move to SSD, it's the future. Cell phones use solid state memory and so do digital cameras, why not pcs??

And don't worry about burning them out, any modern SSD drive has a smart controller that not only contains a garbage collector/trim for optimal performance, but also makes sure that writes to drive are spread across all sectors.  If you constantly write to the drive (eg swap file) it would take 20+ years to kill it!

[Haze]

Spinning drives is so 1990s. You should move to SSD, it's the future. Cell phones use solid state memory and so do digital cameras, why not pcs??

And don't worry about burning them out, any modern SSD drive has a smart controller that not only contains a garbage collector/trim for optimal performance, but also makes sure that writes to drive are spread across all sectors.  If you constantly write to the drive (eg swap file) it would take 20+ years to kill it!

Stop drinking the kool aid dude, theoretical is great, but real use, especially if you put the swapfile / temp folder on it doesn't really give any longer life than spinning disks, and when they die they die hard, without warning.

You absolutely don't need an SSD for a MAME machine, the main advantages are they're faster access, which doesn't matter for MAME, you're probably spending more time on the unzip function than the HDD access and they're more tolerant to being dropped (rather unlikely to happen to an arcade cabinet)

Spending your money on a top end CPU is far, far more important for an emulation box than any kind of SSD.

[gman314]

I decided on a WD Caviar black 7200 rpm 500 gb 64 mb cache for my primary drive. As for the secondary backup drive, I have 2 in my possession, 1 of which I will return. Which do you think is better: a WD caviar green 5400 rpm 500 gb 32 mb cache or a WD scorpio notebook drive 7200 rpm 500 gb 16 mb cache? I ordered the notebook drive by mistake. What is more important, the rpm speed of the scorpio or the larger cache of the green? Keep in mind that I have a bartop, so neither drive will be mounted inside of a tower.
The third option is that I may just return them both and go with another WD caviar black.

[Dervacumen]

I decided on a WD Caviar black 7200 rpm 500 gb 64 mb cache for my primary drive. As for the secondary backup drive, I have 2 in my possession, 1 of which I will return. Which do you think is better: a WD caviar green 5400 rpm 500 gb 32 mb cache or a WD scorpio notebook drive 7200 rpm 500 gb 16 mb cache? I ordered the notebook drive by mistake. What is more important, the rpm speed of the scorpio or the larger cache of the green? Keep in mind that I have a bartop, so neither drive will be mounted inside of a tower.
The third option is that I may just return them both and go with another WD caviar black.

I was just going to suggest this.  The WD Black has a 5 year warranty and I got so sick of drives failing after 3 years I spent a few extra bucks.  It's been my main drive for a few yeas now.
I don't really understand what the fuss is about a hard drive for MAME though.  I've never used anything but old salvaged 40-60 GB drives for mine.

RPM speed will outweigh the larger cache unless you plan on transferring a ton of small files frequently.

[JoeB]

Wow, lots of hate for SSD in this thread. 

While its true that if SSD die, they die hard, same is true for modern spinning drives.  Modern Sata drives have such high ariel density that they rely on Crc checks to work! Use something like spinrite and you'll see it in action.

SSD drives are smaller and more expensive but they allow mame users to create the illusion of using real pcb drives rather than a PC (almost instant boot and instant game launch) you can also turn off your PC without shutdown and not fear data loss.

In addition, with 4+ gb of ram in a dedicated mame PC why would anyone even have swap enabled in windows???

It's your $$$ do as you please. From a pure technology point of view SSD is here and here to stay. I'll be shocked if anyone will be able to purchase a spinning drive a decade from now.

[gman314]

Wow, lots of hate for SSD in this thread. 

While its true that if SSD die, they die hard, same is true for modern spinning drives.  Modern Sata drives have such high ariel density that they rely on Crc checks to work! Use something like spinrite and you'll see it in action.

SSD drives are smaller and more expensive but they allow mame users to create the illusion of using real pcb drives rather than a PC (almost instant boot and instant game launch) you can also turn off your PC without shutdown and not fear data loss.

In addition, with 4+ gb of ram in a dedicated mame PC why would anyone even have swap enabled in windows???

It's your $$$ do as you please. From a pure technology point of view SSD is here and here to stay. I'll be shocked if anyone will be able to purchase a spinning drive a decade from now.

Hmmm...You kind of have me thinking about SSDs now.  Is it really "instant" stratup time?  I guess up until now I never gave conscious thought to the fact that a typical PC boot time is somewhat "non-arcade like".   That always kind of bothered me and I didn't think that they was any way around it.  The problem is that those SSDs are so expensive.  If I was starting my cab from scratch, I would almost definitely invest in one.  Is it possible to find a decent one of about 300gb for under $200? 

[Dervacumen]

You can get SSD'd for about $1/GB.  I think the cheapest I've seen recently was 256GB for about $200.  So yes, sort of within your range.  As with everything tech if you're not super hot to get it now and you keep your feelers out there will be something on special somewhere, sometime.

[gman314]

I just ordered a Samsung 256gb SSD for $200 (the reviews on newegg were great). I will use the WD black 500gb as my backup.  Is it really true that you can just shut the pc down at any time without risking losing data? How can that be? Is it because of the lack of moving parts?

[Haze]

I just ordered a Samsung 256gb SSD for $200 (the reviews on newegg were great). I will use the WD black 500gb as my backup.  Is it really true that you can just shut the pc down at any time without risking losing data? How can that be? Is it because of the lack of moving parts?

It's not true on any of the ones I've used, cutting the power while it's in the middle of a write operation is as dangerous as ever and if the OS hasn't flushed to disk you'll still lose data.

You still need caching logic to address the 'problem' of frequent small writes (something which flash isn't really suitable for, because you have to erase an entire block at a time)

Boot times are faster, not instant, but tbh if you're running a dedicated box stripped of services without the usual Windows install/uninstall churn problem your PC will probably be spending more time on the bios screen than booting Windows anyway.

I'll say it again, a top end CPU is far more important for emulation if you're budgeting things up (I can't believe people here are saying AMD is good, but you really need an SSD, that's pretty much the opposite of good advice)

[JoeB]

It always amazes me what happened to the price of disk drives.  In the 90's the sweet point for disk drives was 250-300$ (best bang for the buck) year after year the drives got bigger but price stayed the same.

A decade later, it seems to have moved to 100-150$

SSD just resets the reality for people.  Yes, drives are cheaper than ever today but they're also a lot less reliable! As with anything in life, you get what you pay for.