catbarf on 26/4/2008 at 23:09
Hi, I'm currently working on assembling a new computer, and I need a new hard drive. The thing is, I'm not sure how it interacts with the rest of the computer. Now, I really don't care about load times- is that all it affects, besides storage capacity? Would I be safe with putting a crappy hard drive on an otherwise good PC, or will it drag down my performance?
Jetsetlemming on 26/4/2008 at 23:14
A crappy HD is more apt to failure. Filling your hard drive up to the point where there's less than a couple free GB will result in reduced performance from less space for the virtual memory, and the less free space the more fragmentation of files, which will lead to longer load times (and if it's bad enough it can cause some games to rarely crash while loading something). Other than that, the only other factors to a hard drive are storage and read/write speeds. A 250 to 500 GB hard drive is in the sweet spot of price for GB right now, and I fully recommend one. Better safe than sorry when it comes to storage, right?
catbarf on 27/4/2008 at 01:31
I just ordered a 320GB hard drive. I never plan on using that much (Seriously, the 80GB hard drive on my old PC [which since failed] was more than enough for all my games), so I don't think clogging will be an issue and I don't think I'll have fragmentation problems.
Am I correct in that read/write speed won't matter much once the level loads, providing I keep a small virtual memory cache size?
denisv on 27/4/2008 at 07:06
Yes, unless
1) you don't have enough ram to load the entire level into memory
2) you're playing one of those games with continuous worlds like Oblivion that stream things from the hd as you go around
theBlackman on 27/4/2008 at 10:51
I've got 750 gig IN my system, and a couple of 160 gig externals for BU. With the video files and Music apps I run, I even manage to stress those at times.
Jetsetlemming on 27/4/2008 at 13:46
Quote Posted by denisv
Yes, unless
1) you don't have enough ram to load the entire level into memory
In this case, you're fucked no matter what, performance is going to be abysmal unless the game was designed not to load the level all at once.
Most games have active data streaming, to unload textures and older parts of the level as you go on, and load up what's coming ahead. Your video card's bandwidth and RAM speed matters far more than your hard drive's speed, though. Just about any modern HD is good enough for just about any game. :P
Dux on 3/5/2008 at 21:39
A large HD can contain more partitions though. For example to separate your Documents from the system partition and to install a Vista/XP/Linux multiboot on one HD. Also, you can make backup/play images of your dear old CD's.
And data streaming is pretty important, I think.
Samsung's HD's are said to be more quiet.
I just bought a new pc and a 750GiB HD gave the best price / GiB. It happened to have a 32MB cache as well, which is double the standard 16MB.
Good luck!
bikerdude on 4/5/2008 at 08:42
hmmm
Once you have experienced a raid array on your home computer, you would never say "Im not bothered about load times" ever again.
Most motherboards have raid support, I'm currently running 3x Hitachi Deskstar 7k80's which give me a throughput of up to 170mb/s, access times of less than 8ms and a windows load time of under/around 30sec (Xp/vista).
Games like T3, Oblivion, Stalker all benefit from running on a raid array, the load times are 2-3x faster.
If you need the lowdown on how to setup a raid array drop me a pm or we can chat about it in here.
biker
theBlackman on 4/5/2008 at 09:10
Of course, if a RAID array craps out on you you lose everything, unless you use a professional recovery company.
bikerdude on 4/5/2008 at 10:40
Quote Posted by theBlackman
Of course, if a RAID array craps out on you you lose everything, unless you use a professional recovery company.
er, no...
* I use an external USB 2.5" harddrive (laptop drive, powered of the USB port)
* I use a free backup util called "syncback" (its like synctoy only better) to back up my data every night.
* And last but not least I use ghost (using the -ffx -fni flag in the command line so it sees my raid array) - via a USB stick to take a snapshot of my C drive once ive built it with all my apps etc.
biker
