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Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10000RPM SATA-150

Monday, August 15th, 2005 | Hard Drives, Reviews

Enterprise level speed and performance hard drives are now available in the consumer market. The Western Digital Raptor sets new levels for performance in a drive that is intended for the high level everyday computer.

This drive is the first of it’s kind to provide 10000RPM platter (the plates inside the hard drive) speeds to the SATA drive market.

Drives of this speed have been reserved for SCSI drives for servers and in corporations. The problem was that those drives were prohibitively expensive and always required a special SCSI card to use them.

So how much does this drive improve on current drives?

First the standard specs:

• Name: Western Digital Raptor
• Size: 74GB
• Spindle speed: 10K RPM
• Buffer memory: 8MB
• Average read seek speed: 4.9msec
• Average write seek speed: 5.9msec
• Interface: Serial ATA-150

The speed of these drives is really fast compared to other drives. The very low seek times and connection speed allow it to transfer nearly 50% more than a 7200RPM disk, also over a SATA connection.

The drives are quiet, especially in light that older 10000RPM SCSI drives were very noisy, these make about the same as a 7200RPM. They also don’t produce much heat, at least compared with a 7200RPM again, but don’t stack them directly over each other.

At around 200 bucks this drive is still very expensive, you can get a slower drive of the same size for around $65, also with a SATA-150 interface.

The main reason for the high speed is the newer and more advanced technology. There is always a premium for having the newest thing, and these are out of the ordinary in terms of their speed.

Due to the high price I would recommend them only if intensive hard drive use, like video editing is something you do all the time. I would still want a second large storage drive for space. Though the Raptor is big enough for my uses if it isn’t enough for yours, a second big one for storage is a good idea.

This drive really is fast, it’s just up to you if you want to fork out so much money, but the speed increases will definitely put a little grin on your face.

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