Two 2TB or one 4TB HDD? concerned with splitting HDD and drive noise.

[DanaS]

I have one SSD that I run my OS and other programs on.
One 1TB internal HDD that is running out of space.
I also have an external back-up drive.

To add more storage, should I buy two 2TB HDD or one 4TB HDD? My concerns are a little different from others.
I read somewhere that with any HDD storage bigger than 2tb, I will have to split my drive into smaller partitions. Is that true? I don't want to split my drive if I do get a large one such as one 4TB.

Also, I am a little concerned with drive noise... I already have two (one SSD and one 1TB). I worry running 4 drives in there will make my computer noisy or even work too hard. Is there anyway I can make one particular drive sleep when I am not using it?

I am a computer dummy so apologies ahead if my question seems silly.

 

[marko55]

You should have no problem with one 4TB drive. The 2TB limit is referring to the initialization of the drive as an MBR disk, which you do NOT want to do. When you initialize the new disk in windows you do it as GPT, which supports >2TB. Then format it like any other drive.

The only benefit to using 2 x 2TB drives would be if you want to put them in a RAID-0 using your on-board chipset in which case you'll get approximately double the read & write performance. This can be an interesting task though if your computer is already up & running with an OS. Its easier if you're doing a fresh build. So for simplicity's sake, I'd just grab a 4TB drive & slap it in.

 

[USAFRet]

4 drives are not particularly noisy.

Up until very recently, I had 6.
3 x SSD and 3 x HDD
Now, it is 4 x SSD and 1 x HDD.

 

[DanaS]

4 drives are not particularly noisy.

Up until very recently, I had 6.
3 x SSD and 3 x HDD
Now, it is 4 x SSD and 1 x HDD.

But I thought SSD doesn't make any noise because it doesn't have moving parts (correct me if I am wrong)?
I will be having 3 HDD if I opt for two 2TB

 

[DanaS]

You should have no problem with one 4TB drive. The 2TB limit is referring to the initialization of the drive as an MBR disk, which you do NOT want to do. When you initialize the new disk in windows you do it as GPT, which supports >2TB. Then format it like any other drive.

The only benefit to using 2 x 2TB drives would be if you want to put them in a RAID-0 using your on-board chipset in which case you'll get approximately double the read & write performance. This can be an interesting task though if your computer is already up & running with an OS. Its easier if you're doing a fresh build. So for simplicity's sake, I'd just grab a 4TB drive & slap it in.

Do you also know if I can set a drive to sleep if I am not using it? My understanding is an internal HDD will constantly run when my computer is turned on even if I am not using the drive. I learned this when one drive I bought is faulty and makes horrible running noise right after installed .

 

[USAFRet]

4 drives are not particularly noisy.

Up until very recently, I had 6.
3 x SSD and 3 x HDD
Now, it is 4 x SSD and 1 x HDD.

But I thought SSD doesn't make any noise because it doesn't have moving parts (correct me if I am wrong)?
I will be having 3 HDD if I opt for two 2TB

Right, SSD's don't
But my previous config (3 weeks ago) also had multiple HDD's.

 

[jsmithepa]

Noise is the ears of the beholder.

Do you also know if I can set a drive to sleep if I am not using it?

You can configure Windows to sleep the HD when idled, but I don't know if this is done to individual drives, or ALL drives.

 

[marko55]

Yeah usually the drives will sleep by default. You can actually do it right from power options in control panel.