SATA or PATA? What's your next HDD?

[Lunar Leaper]

Actually this poll is a spin off from the Disk space or LCD monitor?-poll.

Bâshrat the Sneaky wasn't convinced if SATA is worth the $. I am.

Whats you opinion?

[nateklomp]

I've got a 200GB Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 SATA150 drive, $200US.

A 200GB Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 ATA133 drive at the same shop goes for $89US.

They're exactly the same HDD, only the SATA has a kludge that allows it to run on SATA controller--same drive, different interface.

Only noticeable difference is the CPU usage, ~20-25% lower when using the SATA controller. However, the same effect can be achieved with a ~$20 SATA-to-PATA adapter.

The choice is clear...I just made the wrong one:'(

[Lunar Leaper]

I've got a 200GB Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 SATA150 drive, $200US.

A 200GB Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 ATA133 drive at the same shop goes for $89US.

They're exactly the same HDD, only the SATA has a kludge that allows it to run on SATA controller--same drive, different interface.

Only noticeable difference is the CPU usage, ~20-25% lower when using the SATA controller.  However, the same effect can be achieved with a ~$20 SATA-to-PATA adapter.

The choice is clear...I just made the wrong one:'(

Yeah, well, I did the same thing...

But can you mirror (RAID1) using PATA disks and PATA-to-SATA adapters?

[jcarle]

Buy SATA. Why buy PATA? SATA is the future standard. PATA is on it's slow death. It's like saying, "I'm going to buy a new car." then going into a dealer and buying a 77 Chevrolet Impala.

[nateklomp]

Buy SATA. Why buy PATA? SATA is the future standard. PATA is on it's slow death. It's like saying, "I'm going to buy a new car." then going into a dealer and buying a 77 Chevrolet Impala.

Actually, SATA may be the standard, sometime in the future . However, It is not yet a proven technology (BETAMAX, anyone?), and probably won't be until its cost-to-benefit ratio improves.

IMHO, your analogy is flawed...it's more like saying, "I'm going to buy a new car," then dragging yourself to a factory in Detroit to buy a "Concept" car.

Following the same analogy, many "forward-thinking" (read:gullible) people during the 1970's gasoline crisis believed that the new (at the time) electric cars were the "future standard." They foolishly invested in an immature technology which has yet to enjoy nearly the success predicted over 30 years ago.

The cost-to-benefit ratio just doesn't add up.

Lunar Leaper: yes, AFAIK they behave exactly as a "native" (kludged) SATA drive. Actually, I'm unaware of ANY truly "native" SATA drives currently in retail. They're all using the same kind of bridge chip found on the PATA-SATA adapters.

[Bâshrat the Sneaky]

I totally agree with nateklomp.

At the moment there's NO difference in speed at all, nor access time. The only advantage is the better cables, and the fact you can use SATA for external use too.

Although I have to disagree with nateklomp when he's saying there aren't native SATA hdds yet. There are some Seagate hdd's which support SATA natively.

Maybe with the coming of NCQ there will be a difference...

[SiMoNsAyS]

i've got to disagree with Bâshrat about there's NO difference in speed at all. it's a simple fact, when i compare my SATA drive with others IDE133 i've got about 7/10% more perfomance (less cpu use and a faster copy). also as he said better cables, a (optional) external use and the most important for me, with my SATA drive i can connect 4 IDE devices more . for me the problem always been the money, they're still expensive

[mendipjohn]

If I upgrade, it will be too SATA, not because it offers any that much extra performance, but because my mobo has SATA connectors so I can use those wee 9mm cables that are tidier and increase airflow.

When I spashed out on a decent PSU, i now have native SATA drive power connectors, so i wouldnt need any converters or whatever. Basically SATA looks to be the emerging standard of the future, so if I later upgraded my system board etc, my hard disk would be future proofed and could be reused, though i expect IDE will be around for years to come from now! And since SATA works the same when it comes to software compatibility, there arent really any great disadvantages to switching eventually.

[prathapml]

At the moment there's NO difference in speed at all, nor access time. The only advantage is the better cables, and the fact you can use SATA for external use too.

True. Almost no speed increases. Its only when SATA 2x comes in, that the real party will get going. Until then, I'm happy with SATA.

[Drewdatrip]

In my experince from working at a computer store, the Sata drives dont offer a huge spped differnce or any for that matter interms or mb/s but it does utilize less cpu as well as it seems to load large huge amount of folders and files, within explorer...so im guessing the burst might be abit ore consistant.

But the reason why i selected the SATA is that currently there is very little difference in price for the drives. In some cases they are the same or even cheaper then the PATA.

I made the switch to a WD 160SATA when my 120 died

Nothing massive but i think it was a wise chose

|Drew|

[jcarle]

Actually, SATA may be the standard, sometime in the future .  However, It is not yet a proven technology (BETAMAX, anyone?), and probably won't be until its cost-to-benefit ratio improves.

What in the hell are you talking about? If you think that Serial ATA is going to disappear like the BetaMax did, you've got some serious revision of the future of the PC market to do.

If we were discussing the future of say, BTX form factor motherboards, I'd be 100% with you. However, Serial ATA IS a proven technology, it's an available technology and it is the future standard of storage technology. This is no TOY that people are just checking out, it's the much needed replacement for the aging technology of EIDE. It supports all the functionality and advantages that SCSI could deliver but at a cost-benefit ratio that makes the product affordable and that's why it's growing in popularity so quickly. And also why EVERY SINGLE storage manufacturer is moving their technology towards Serial ATA based drives. So much so that they're even migrating their technology within their optical drives as well.

And the use of a bridge chip is EXPECTED this early in the adoption cycle. It's a suicidal approach to manufacture native solutions when the growth cycle hasn't even begun it's real take off. There are chances that due to the slowdown in pc replacements in the last few years due to the increase in lifespan of a typical new pc that the changeover could take well over a decade. However, in 20 years from now, just like a REGULAR IDE (not EIDE) drive STILL works in a NEW pc, your Serial ATA drive that is bought with current generation bridge technology will STILL be good in the new pcs of then.

The performance difference between a Serial ATA drive and a Parallel ATA drive is most often NIL. That is to be expected since they're usually THE SAME DRIVE. What you fail to take into consideration is the INTERFACE advantages of Serial ATA.

A quote from SearchStorage.com demonstrates this:

With today's parallel ATA implementation, pairs of devices share a common cable in a master-slave relationship. This interaction between devices results in the available bandwidth being shared between the devices. Additionally, since the devices on the cable interact, they must be jointly qualified, resulting in the substantial expansion of the system integrators' qualification matrix in order to comprehend all possible combinations of devices. By contrast, serial ATA is a point-to-point interface where each device is directly connected to the host via a dedicated link. Each device, therefore, has the entire interface bandwidth dedicated to it, and there is no interaction between devices. This means software can be streamlined, eliminating the overhead associated with coordinating accesses between the master and slave device sharing the same cable.

There are also NUMEROUS advantages to Serial ATA that have nothing to do with performance, such as:

• Improved air flow within the computer's case due to reduced air flow restriction.
  
• Elimination of the cost of replacing the hard drive (or purchase of an EIDE interface card) in a future motherboard upgrade if EIDE is not supported on board of the motherboard.
  
• Serial ATA supports Hot Plugging, Parallel ATA does not.
  
• Serial ATA requires no master/slave/device id configuration.
  

Serial ATA is not like going to buy a "concept" car, it's like taking out the cash and driving a car of the year fresh of the dealer's lot instead of buying and older, perhaps last year's model car. It's to be expected that if you want the cutting-edge, freshest, to be future technology that you'll have to pay. But it does not mean it does not have it's benefits.

The argument could be said with cars too. Someone in 1985 who decided that they were going to spend the extra $5,000 to buy the brand-new car that feature brand-new technology called Fuel Injection were the ones laughing in the end after everyone was done scaring away from this unknown future technology that's "bound to never catch on" because in the winter while everyone was pumping their carburetors trying to get their damned cars started, they just turned their key and left.

It would be a recommendation that because you predict the demise of a future technology that you properly educate yourself in the current developments of that said technology, because as it seems to be right now, you know few people that have serial ata drives and you find them to expensive. That doesn't make a good basis to determine the future outlook of technology. I hope you didn't make the same uninformed prediction about the demise of, say, cd-roms or dvds?

[Drewdatrip]

jcarle

I do agree with many of your points of argument..i do not agree with your harsh words towards some of the community. Everyone is entitled to his or her own opion.

Argument is acceptable but flaming is not.

This is sort of a premature post seeing as how no one has really started flaming, however,this thread could quickly get out of hand

Thankx for everyones understanding.

Everyone should just knock it down a few notches

Thankx

|Drew|

[jcarle]

Agreed and understood.

[majere2020]

ok hears how i see it

Product Specifications

Manufacturer - Maxtor

Type - Internal

Interface - ATA 133 (IDE)

Capacity - 200 GB

Buffer Size - 8 MB

Spin Speed - 7200 rpm

Max. Data Transfer Rate 133 MB/s

Depth - 147 mm

Width - 101.6 mm

Height - 26.1 mm

Weight - 1.39lb

Average Seek Time - <9.0 ms

Average Latency - 4.17 ms

Start / Stop Cycle - >50,000 min

price £68

Product Specifications

Manufacturer - Maxtor

Type - Internal

Interface - SATA 150 (Serial ATA)

Capacity - 200GB

Buffer Size - 8MB

Spin Speed - 7200rpm

Max. Data Transfer Rate - 150MB/s

Depth - 147mm

Width - 101mm

Height - 26mm

Weight - 630g

Average Seek Time - 9.3ms

Average Latency - 4.2ms

Cylinders - 16,383

Heads - 16 Physical

Error Rate - <1 per 10E 15 bits read

Start / Stop Cycle - 50,000 cycles

Temperature Range - 5°C - 55 °C

Shock Tolerance - 60G @ 2ms half-sine pulse (operating) / 300G @ 2

price £71

both maxtor dimond 10

on paper the ata drive is faster but raid is also good in my opnion stick with ata SATA

is out of date sliod state should be hitting the market soon 1/2 years but with sutch a small price diffrence it dose not matter. and sorry to bring this up but you can swap a

pata drive your just not ment to and cable select is not that mutch of a bother now is it

[sonu27]

SATA any day.