Hard drive buffer size ??

[MrWolf]

Simple and quick question,how better would a WD caviar blue with 16 mb of cache perform compared to old maxtor 80 gb with 2 mb of cache,i mean overall computing speed(write speed,read speed) and gaming ???

 

[sminlal]

I'm going to paste here what I wrote in this thread: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/279619-32-32mb-cache-16mb-cache#t1902303

Of all the factors that affect a drive's performance, cache is by far the least important. The most important factors are the spin rate (RPM) of the drive and the platter density. More spins per second = more data per second, and higher platter density means more data per spin = more data per second.

Cache is important, but once you get beyond a certain amount it doesn't really give you any better performance. Since cache memory is cheap, all the manufacturers include enough of it to optimize the performance of the drive. As a result, differences between one drive and another don't really make a noticeable real-world difference.

In fact, the most common reason for different cache sizes is because the platter density is different and so the drive needs more cache to hold "x" tracks worth of data. In this scenario the drive with more cache will perform better, but it's because of the higher platter density, not because of the extra cache.