Current raptors, Crap.

[sutahz]

I bought 2 RaptorX's, benchmarked them (in RAID0, using real world benchmarks) and found them to be about 7% faster then my RAID0 w/ 2x250GB 7200RPM 8MB hdds (if you ask SATA-I or SATA-II, you really shouldn't even reply to this thread). So for the price premium, it was completely a rip off for myself. I'm sure the next generation of raptors will be perpendicular technology and that should prove sorta interesting, depending on its real world benefits. Maybe WD should release said raptor to the consumer/enthusiast market (as the server market would shun said hdd).
If your not using your raptors for long sequential reads.. you ripped yourself off. I too, thought, my raptors were "hella fast" and "pWnzor all". But numbers dont lie, and they were only 7% faster for a 400%+ price increase. Hey, if you've got money to burn, why the hell not.
One theory is that people, rightfuly so, upon purchase of said raptor, do a fresh install of (OS, XP 99% of all cases) and they think they have an awesome drive, when its really they havent defrag'd for about 5yrs so yeah, ANY FRESH INSTALL WOULD BE A WELCOMED SPEED INCREASE. But they attribute said peformance boost to the raptor, and not to their fresh install.
Go ahead, tell me your raptors changed your computing world. I'll tell you my 42" 1080p changed my gaming world...

 

[Blain]

Are you selling your Raptors?

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

Is this a rant or e-pee-pee thread? So the Raptors are crap for your situation... That tells me you didn't research your purchase, not that the products are bad. I spent a decent amount on a RAID controller and it does what I want it to do, so who cares what the benchmarks say. Enjoy the 7% or get cheaper drives...

 

[Roguestar]

Originally posted by: sutahz
I bought 2 RaptorX's, benchmarked them (in RAID0, using real world benchmarks) and found them to be about 7% faster then my RAID0 w/ 2x250GB 7200RPM 8MB hdds (if you ask SATA-I or SATA-II, you really shouldn't even reply to this thread). So for the price premium, it was completely a rip off for myself. I'm sure the next generation of raptors will be perpendicular technology and that should prove sorta interesting, depending on its real world benefits. Maybe WD should release said raptor to the consumer/enthusiast market (as the server market would shun said hdd).
If your not using your raptors for long sequential reads.. you ripped yourself off. I too, thought, my raptors were "hella fast" and "pWnzor all". But numbers dont lie, and they were only 7% faster for a 400%+ price increase. Hey, if you've got money to burn, why the hell not.
One theory is that people, rightfuly so, upon purchase of said raptor, do a fresh install of (OS, XP 99% of all cases) and they think they have an awesome drive, when its really they havent defrag'd for about 5yrs so yeah, ANY FRESH INSTALL WOULD BE A WELCOMED SPEED INCREASE. But they attribute said peformance boost to the raptor, and not to their fresh install.
Go ahead, tell me your raptors changed your computing world. I'll tell you my 42" 1080p changed my gaming world...

Betcha RAID-0 didn't change your gaming world either.

I don't think I've ever purchased an item of technology and said "pWnzor all". In fact, I don't think I've ever said it at all.

 

[nerp]

I don't run benchmarks. I just use my computer. And side by side, the Raptor kills my normal 7200 rpm SATA drives in every task.

 

[thorin]

Originally posted by: nerp
I don't run benchmarks. I just use my computer. And side by side, the Raptor kills my normal 7200 rpm SATA drives in every task.

I'm with nerp on this one. Personally I believe there are two rules.
1) Decide what you want and ignore the price/performance argument(s).
2) Buyer beware, do your research before making the purchase (in this case storagereview.com [or similar] and some postings here would have saved you time/money).

 

[JackMDS]

"Current raptors, Crap".

A roll of Charmain would solve the problem.

On a serious Mote.

It is not a Rip off, it is people that have wishful thinking and listen to advice that is more of a pie in the sky rather than technologically sound.

In the real world there are many businesses that 7% increase worth their while to pay more for an insignificance gadget (from their perspective) like a Hard Drive.

Pricing of technology is Not an analog curve some time very small addition can be very costly to generate above the main stream use.

 

[Thor86]

150Gb Raptors (Non-X windowd) FTW!

 

[bob4432]

you buy the raptors for the lower seek times, not the str, which can be easily beaten by many 7.2k hdds as data density is going through the roof.

 

[Andvari]

I haven't read the replies, nor any of the first post past the first setence.

But tests have shown that, for some reason or another, RAID 0 Raptors provide very little performance increase whatsoever.

The rule of thumb is if you want a Raptor, use it as an individual drive. If you want RAID, get 7200 drives for that.

 

[aigomorla]

add 2 more raptors for a total of 4

and you get this:

http://i125.photobucket.com/al...aigomorla/IMG_0727.jpg

And yes its very fast.


But 2 drives on raid, i also noticed almost no difference. 4 on raid, and we got a new ballgame.

I wanna drop 2 more, but that would kill my airflow on the rear radiator i have cooling those hard drives.

 

[LOUISSSSS]

agree with the majority. raid 0 is useless for most general usage (and that includes 80% (more?) + gaming.)

 

[0roo0roo]

raid mtron ftw.
der?

 

[aigomorla]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
raid mtron ftw.
der?

1000 Dollars on just the Hard drive in Raid Partion.

mmm... brings me flash backs on my proposed 10g skulltrail rig.

Lol... i cant afford it if you guys are wondering. Skulltrail is out of my league unless i can find the QX9770's for less then 800 each. :T

 

[supaidaaman]

I have a raptor as my main os and gaming drive, and a raid-0 (2x 320gig) for video editing. The raid-0 handles 32gb 1080 video files like butter...very nice for flawless streaming.

 

[sutahz]

Originally posted by: thorin

Originally posted by: nerp
I don't run benchmarks. I just use my computer. And side by side, the Raptor kills my normal 7200 rpm SATA drives in every task.

I'm with nerp on this one. Personally I believe there are two rules.
1) Decide what you want and ignore the price/performance argument(s).
2) Buyer beware, do your research before making the purchase (in this case storagereview.com [or similar] and some postings here would have saved you time/money).

Actually I bought those raptors many many months ago. I just thought i'd share my view of them here. So nerp, you just believe your raptor is faster? So its more of a feeling? How big of a HDD does your normal 7200RPM system have? Raptor have a fresh install and the 7200 system old and fragmented? Admitantly when I bought my raptors and hooked them up I thought they were faster too, because in my mind I wanted them to be. As long as your happy, thats what really matters.
A little research shows RAID0 to be beneficial (people posting synthetic benchmarks and saying its faster for them). But upon further investigation and reading more reviews on RAID0, it was found to be basically useless as well (for my needs).
When I had the 2 raptors though, I did run them in RAID0 and seperatly but for windows startup, game load times, opening a folder w/ lots of small files (a folder w/ about 5k pictures) unraring a large RAR. Doing all that "normal every day stuff" the raptors were a big disappointment.
Just an opinion... just a forum.

 

[Blain]

Originally posted by: LOUISSSSS
agree with the majority...

That's good to know.

 

[Blain]

Originally posted by: sutahz
When I had the 2 raptors though, I did run them in RAID0 and seperatly but for windows startup, game load times, opening a folder w/ lots of small files (a folder w/ about 5k pictures) unraring a large RAR. Doing all that "normal every day stuff" the raptors were a big disappointment.

Originally posted by: Blain
Are you selling your Raptors?

 

[nerp]

sutahz,

my raptors extract large .rar archives much faster than on my 7200.10 seagate and new Samsung Spinpoint. I just did a side by side comparison with the same archive on two drives and the Raptor wins by about 10 seconds.

I used to have Steam installed on the Seagate. Now with steam on the Raptor, CS:S, HL2 and TF2 load up much faster and levels load much faster, too. I haven't sat there with a timer or anything but the difference is noticable enough that I can go from being in the middle of the pack when a level loads to the first guy on the server.

This isn't a fresh install situation, nor is it the case of one drive being badly fragmented and the other not. I've had the Raptor for quite some time and I've been enjoying the performance difference with it on XP -- both old installs and new -- and now Vista, which automatically defrags all my harddrives in the background so fragmentation is a non-issue.

This isn't the case of someone defragging a HD or running some registry cleaner and _thinking_ it _feels_ faster. The raptor has instead given me a huge performance boost -- enough for me to drop my jaw at times.

 

[n7]

LOL @ the RAID-0 user claiming Raptors are crap...oh the irony...

 

[Rubycon]

Get a bunch of them on a real host and watch STR soar like an eagle!

Text

 

[sutahz]

Originally posted by: n7
LOL @ the RAID-0 user claiming Raptors are crap...oh the irony...

"I did run them in RAID0 and seperatly" Oh if only we could read...

 

[SpeedEng66]

The raptor 150gb I put in my wifes rig rocks!
load time on games like sim's dropped to almost no wait (she's not a gamer )
and thats with just one raptor installed :Q

 

[LOUISSSSS]

yea i definitely noticed a huge difference in speed going from a single 7200rpm drive -> 150gb raptor. but then DIDN'T notice ANY speed difference going from single 150gb raptor -> raid 0 raptors.

some things i noticed going from 7200->raptor
-windows boot faster (along w/ shutdown)
-spyware/virus scans faster
-programs open faster
-overall system snappier
-defragment faster

some things i noticed going from single -> raid 0 raptors
-windows boot slower because it adds some raid information screen during boot up thats takes between 15-30 seconds every boot

 

[Blain]

Originally posted by: Blain

Originally posted by: sutahz
When I had the 2 raptors though, I did run them in RAID0 and seperatly but for windows startup, game load times, opening a folder w/ lots of small files (a folder w/ about 5k pictures) unraring a large RAR. Doing all that "normal every day stuff" the raptors were a big disappointment.

Originally posted by: Blain
Are you selling your Raptors?

How much for the Raptors?