Raptor for gaming?

[RCPilot]

I've read several reviews on the Raptor HDD & can't get a feel for how much better it would perform in games, if at all.

I don't care about anything else it can do. I'm just interested in gaming performance. My get feeling on my research tells me it should really show itself gaming.

I need a new HDD for my second machine & if the Raptor would give me a significant boost in gaming I'd just soon get one & hand down the JB I'm running. I'm trying to justify the price. I can get 2 JB's for the price of 1 Raptor. 36 gigs doesn't bother me at all. I only have 12 gig on a 80 gig JB now. That's about all I have ever had on a HDD.

I just game. Well I do PhotoShop also, but any high end gaming machine will do PhotoShop well.

Thanks for the help

Honey, what's that smell? Don't bother me now I'm working on my computer! OOPS!

 

[rebturtle]

Pilot,
The hard drive is probably the most limiting factor in today's systems. The only thing that will outperform this upgrade would be a good RAID 0 setup (or two Raptors in RAID 0!). Here's the possible issue: Can you get your OS stable on RAID? If you have any doubts, I'd go with the Raptor. Of course, you didn't tell us about the rest of your system, but as I remember it's a solid setup.

<A HREF="http://rebturtle.com" target="_new">rebturtle</A>
<A HREF="http://www.geocities.com/rebturtle/TurtleTech.html" target="_new">My System</A>

 

[RCPilot]

Rebturtle,

I'm sure my OS would take a RAID 0 setup. I'm running XP Pro so that shouldn't be any problem. The rest of my gaming system is:

ASUS A7N8X Deluxe
XP 2500
2x256 Hyper X 3200
WD 80 gig JB
PNY TI4600
Antec 1080 AMG case, 430 True Power PSU
Viewsonic A90f+

Yea, it's a pretty solid system, stable as a rock. Around 13200 in 3Dmark 2001SE. I play Serious Sam Second Encounter & SOF2 at 1280 x 1024 @ 75 HTz. I haven't ordered the Raptor yet, I'm still trying to figure it out.

System that I'm putting together with handed down parts for the wife:

ASUS A7V8X
XP2400
2x256 Hyper X 2700

These are all the parts I have so far on this setup. Need HDD, vid card, case, ROM, & Burner. I can either hand down this JB I'm running & buy the Raptor for my gaming rig, or get another JB or 2 for RAID 0.

When I studied using RAID 0, I came to the conclusion that RAID 0 would load the games faster, but wouldn't play one bit differently. Am I wrong on this?

The hard drive is probably the most limiting factor in today's systems.

I agree with that. The Raptor seems to be the first SATA HDD that looks to perform well, after reading the benches. I was impressed at both performance & price. It peeked my interest. So any info on which way to go would be appreciated for sure. I am leaning toward getting a Raptor to try out anyway, just haven't ordered yet. Newegg dropped the price on Raptor's already. Started at $155, went down to $143.

Honey, what's that smell? Don't bother me now I'm working on my computer! OOPS!

 

[Guest]

With 512MB RAM, the only time you will notice the faster hardrive while gaming will be when you first start the game and, loading new game levels. Neither of these are going to affect in game play.

Games are built that way on purpose since the developers of games don't want to put up with that crap either. If you only had 8MB RAM or something the story would be slightly different, but a Raptor wouldn't help you much even then.

 

[RCPilot]

knewton,

That's exactly what I've came to after researching it. I found the same thing with RAID. So I guess I'll hang with the cheaper WD, JB HDD's & save some $$$.

Like I said, the only other thing I do is PhotoShop for the Family. PhotoShop would benefit from a Raptor, but I use PhotoShop about 10% of my CPU time, at most, maybe less. My rig runs PhotoShop super fast. So the gain I would make there wouldn't amount to much in the overall scheme of things for me. I game & that's the big reason I build puters. That's what I do. Everything else comes along for the ride. I'll put the $$$ towards a vid card when Doom 3 comes out. Got to get the latest for that.

Thanks for the info guys. I'll be around.

Honey, what's that smell? Don't bother me now I'm working on my computer! OOPS!

 

[Bosse]

I will buy a Western Digital Raptor 36,7GB SATA coz my goal is to get the [-peep-] computer to start fast as hell when i push the startbutton !!! : )

 

[Bosse]

I will buy a Western Digital Raptor 36,7GB SATA coz my goal is to get the [-peep-] computer to start fast as hell when i push the startbutton !!! : )

 

[sjonnie]

Heh, I believe that is called 'hibernate'.

<A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/myanandtech.html?member=114979" target="_new">My PCs</A> 😎

 

[RCPilot]

Man mine boots like a raped ape now. 60 seconds fast enough? LOL Got to hit Pause to see what is posting.

Don't know what you mean at all there.

Honey, what's that smell? Don't bother me now I'm working on my computer! OOPS!

 

[Bosse]

I´ve heard that WD and most of all WD Raptor doesn´t work that well at all together with NV2 chipset, true ????

 

[scottkli]

I had looked at the raptor for gaming also. But I work with lots of other high cap. stuff so 36gb dosnt last long. Especially when you have a few high GB games on your system, many mp3's and DVD videos. I went with two of the WD80JB in Raid 0. Got operating sys., and other media stuff on one. And have the other drive specified for gaming and pagefile. This seems to do alot better than one drive alone. I used the extra money to upgrade my ram to 1gb with another 512mb Corsair piece.

Antec PLUS1080AMG
ASUS P4C800 Deluxe
Pentium P4 2.6ghz 800fsb
2x 512mb Dual Channel DDR
2x 80GB(JB) Serial ATA Raid 0
Hercules 3D Prophet AGP8X ATI9800 Pro
Viewsonic 19" Flat CRT
Plantronics DSP-400
Sony DRU510A DVD+
Intellimouse Explorer
Cable Modem

 

[Bosse]

Can someone PLZ explain that 2 drives and raid 0 stuff for me, how does it work? and what´s so great about it ?

 

[lhgpoobaa]

Read the RAID FAQ.


Two W.D. JB's in RAID0 would undoubtedly beat the raptor in sustained read write performance, though nothing beats it in quick read write operations and low seek times.

Personally IMHO the raptor would make a better boot drive, which involves reading lots of files from differeing locations.
Gaming wise it might be better, but loads usually only occur at the start of a level, so the benefit to games would be minor.

<b>My PC is so powerful it it makes a 286-16 look slow!</b> :lol:
<A HREF="http://www.picturetrail.com/master_poobaa" target="_new">PooBaa's Pics!</A>

 

[RCPilot]

Mine WD JB sure works well with my Nforce 2. I've always ran WD drives & have yet to have one fail on any board. I wouldn't be one bit afraid of sticking a Raptor on this one.

Honey, what's that smell? Don't bother me now I'm working on my computer! OOPS!

 

[RCPilot]

That's what I came to conclude as well. For now with the JB's so cheap, I'm going that way. SATA gets any better I can always change. Like I said I'm looking for gaming speed is all.

Honey, what's that smell? Don't bother me now I'm working on my computer! OOPS!

 

[lhgpoobaa]

Exactly... you have to look at the fundamentals of the raptor...
For a BIG cost increase what do you get?
A moderate speed increase BUT ALSO a Large capacity decrease

<font color=blue>Many modern games <b>must</b> be played multiplayer. And those you encounter online are, almost as a rule, <b>complete and utter cockmongers.</b></font color=blue> :frown: