16mb Cache Sata HDD

[wallrunnerm15]

i am looking to get a new hard drive to replace my old 2mb cache WD. i am looking to get the new 250gb 16mb cache from maxtor. Has anyone had any experience with this drive in particular or maxtor drives in general?

 

[hclarkjr]

i have had the 250 GIG IDE model for a little over a month now and have had no problems at all and it performs like a champ. very quiet and fast. this is my second maxtor drive i have owned with a 80 GIG 8 MEG cache being the one i replaced with this one. no problems with the other one either and it is still running in a relatives system right now.

 

[andy nowotny]

16mb? do you need so large cache? normally 8mb is ok

 

[Brian48]

I have the PATA version. Fastest drive I've used to date. It's also fairly quiet, although not completely silent. No complaints. Would have gotten the SATA version, but this was on sale for substantially less.

 

[tallman45]

I have one as well and it is clearly faster than the 80gb 8mb cache drive it replaced. System restart is done in an instant, with so much data still in the cache.

But aside from the 16mb cache it is also speedy due to the high density platters.

My OS partition is on the 12gb Outer edge which takes advantage of the higher density than the 80gb drive

 

[wallrunnerm15]

i just purchased one yesterday, it is amazingly fast, better than my 160gb caviar se. the only othr thing i noticed is that it is louder than my other hdd and i can hear it sometimes over my fans blowing? is this a problem? someitmes it sounds like something is scratching.

 

[InfiniteLurker]

Originally posted by: tallman45
My OS partition is on the 12gb Outer edge which takes advantage of the higher density than the 80gb drive

How did you do this? Was it just the last partition you created or by some other tool/method?

I've got a new system on the way, and would be interested in trying this...

Thanks...

 

[Auric]

Two diff'rent drive generations (primarily densities) cannot be compared to determine the effect of cache capacity.

The fastest accessed parts are the inner rings. An OS or whatever else is first written will naturally inhabit that space at the beginning of the first platter.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: Auric
Two diff'rent drive generations (primarily densities) cannot be compared to determine the effect of cache capacity.

The fastest accessed parts are the inner rings. An OS or whatever else is first written will naturally inhabit that space at the beginning of the first platter.

The "outer" tracks (the ones furthest from the center of the drive) are fastest, not the innermost ones. Hard drives are CAV; the outer edge travels under the heads more rapidly, increasing STR and decreasing seek time (fractionally). On a hard drive using LBA, the 'first' blocks (the ones with the lowest numbers) are near the outer edge, with higher-numbered ones going inwards. Note that on CDs and DVDs, the data is written from the inside out, so the 'fastest' access is on files written at the "end" of the disk rather than the "beginning".

To minimize seek time, files that are accessed together should be placed on 'nearby' tracks (some optimizing defrag programs will try to do this to some extent). If files are always accessed in a specific order, you can really speed things up by placing them in sequential disk blocks, but automating that kind of fine-tuning is not usually possible.

 

[Auric]

Oddly I knew that but momentarily succumbed to the vapors. Still, the first data will be written to the beginning, even when that starts at the outside, so that InfiniteLurker needn't do anything special except perhaps partition the OS and bulk storage seperately as I am wont to recommend.

 

[BigHurt]

ive been talking to seagate about a 16mb sata drive as i am a little hesitant to purchase a maxtor drive given their recent reputation.

however, no 16mb drives are planned in the near future from seagate so i was thinking of picking up a 7200.8 instead.

just doesnt seem like maxtor is a reliable company.

 

[smackbomb1216]

My SATA 250 16MB (or is it 300?) works like a dream. I have yet to see any benefits from this so called NCQ breakthrough, but the drive itself makes me warm and fuzzy. Well worth it in my professionally novice opinion

 

[jdogg707]

I have the 300GB version as a storage drive, and it seems every bit as fast as the 74GB Raptor that is my boot drive.

 

[DaveyTN]

The 16MB cache is nice, but I have heard that Maxtor may not be as reliable long term as opposed to the Seagate brand.

I was in the same situation trying to decide between the 16MB cache Maxtor and another drive and went with the 8MB cache SATA Seagate because of their reputation for quality.

 

[PhoenixOrion]

relevant question to this maxtor thread:

is it true that 300GB 16MB uses 5 platters versus 250GB 16MB only uses 3 very dense platters?

 

[imported_ceefka]

When did you hear that Maxtor is unreliable? Maxtor being unreliable is a little old if you ask me. A lot of brands have gone through that phase. Our home computer (Dell XPS 700T) killed 1 WD and 1 Seagate so far. Both had very short lifespans.

NCQ, from whatever brand, will be nice when you're multitasking. At least that's what Anand says in his first dualcore test with the Pentium D. The big buffer is nice for streaming. There's actually a test of this very drive her on AT: http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2094