Hard drive upgrade

[Kevstir]

Hi

I?m currently in the process of upgrading my computer and wondering what drive to get , im after a 200/250gb sata drive , I usually go for Seagate drives which have been very reliable and was wondering if I should just stick with them ??? I want the fastest I can afford (which isn?t much); I can?t afford the raptors so there out of the question.

Iv got an asrock dual sata 2 motherboard that has support for sata 2, should I go for a sata 2 drive or is sata 150 enough??

im just collecting bits at the moment so far I have the asrock dual sata board , 3700 64bit (which I want to overclock) iv still to pick memory but I think I will be going for 1gb (2x512)Corsair (TWINX1024-3200C2PT) CL2 , that memory should be fine shouldn?t it??

I only got an ati 9600 (not se) at the moment but will be getting a pcix card later when have some more money , so , I really want to get everything right before I upgrade the graphics card

Any help would be great guys

Kev

Ps: im not a big gamer so the 9600 will do for now..

 

[Kevstir]

done some research on the hard drive and think it will ether be another seagte or an hitachi 250gb deskstar, are the deskstar's better now than when they were made by ibm??

what about my choice of memory?

Cheers

Kev

 

[Rommels]

Seems fine.
If you like Seagate just stick with them.
I got a 250GB SATA seagate and it is just fine and dandy.

 

[cleverhandle]

If you haven't already, you'll want to read the 250GB drive roundup just posted on StorageReview.

 

[Kevstir]

Originally posted by: cleverhandle
If you haven't already, you'll want to read the 250GB drive roundup just posted on StorageReview.

yeah i did earlier , thats what made me think about the deskstar lol, iknow the old deskstars were realy bad when ibm made them but not sure if there any better now

 

[htmlmasterdave]

Personally I much prefer WD over Seagate.

 

[alimoalem]

i'd get a single stick of 1gig for now if you want only a gig so u can upgrade to 2x1gig later on

you can get the hitachi but you should consider the western digital se16, too

otherwise, i think your system looks good

 

[Bobthelost]

The deskstar is faster, but the seagate has a better warranty.

Look at this http://www.storagereview.com/map/lm.cgi/survey_login for reliability surveys of pretty much any drive made. You do have to register but it's a useful place to check out anyway.

Look at this write up: http://www.storagereview.com/articles/200601/250_1.html

Deskstar wins for the most part.

 

[Kevstir]

Thanks guys

With regards to the memory, would I see any performance difference from running 1 stick of 1gb ram or 2 512's running in dual channel??? I would rather get it sorted the now as I don?t plan on spending anything on the compy for a while after this upgrade. well I might add a new graphics card lol

 

[Bobthelost]

2x512 is better than 1x1gb.

The difference for dual channel isn't huge with A64s, but since you're not going to be upgrading for a while i'd stick with 2x512.