Just how big? (and fast)
Apr 09 '00 (Updated Feb 22 '08)
The Bottom Line Go with what you can afford, like I said. For most, a 500GB SATA 150 OR 300 drive in the 100.00 range is the way to go.
Honestly, I find that most people are looking for the biggest and the best that they can afford. Personally, I think that is probably just about as good a theory as anyone could espouse on this particular item.
Now, most of you probably have a pretty good idea of exactly what a hard drive is, but I notice that there are quite a few people who have problems distinguishing "memory" from them. A Hard drive is a storage system, usually the one that contains the operating system(like Windows). It generally is much faster and more readily accessable than CDs, DVDs, Floppies and other storage mediums. It is, generally, your primary storage system and is very important to overall performance of your system. It is where you normally store regularly accessed files and where a program is stored when it is "installed" on your system. Memory, on the other hand(also referred to as RAM or Random Access Memory) is where the executing parts of a program are stored while it is being used. Memory is solid state(meaning that there are no moving parts) and is extremely fast in comparison to your hard-drive. Hard-drives do have moving parts and are not nearly as quick. Also, anything stored in RAM is lost when power is cut, which is not the case with Hard-drives(the data is there, within reason, until you get rid of it).
Now this gets a bit complicated because of something called: Virtual Memory; the concept of virtual memory is basically taking part of your hard drive capacity and using it to increase the amount of RAM that you have (virtually). All your modern operating systems do this, and so your hard drive's speed and storage capacity CAN have quite a bit to do with the performance of your system. The speed of the drive (as characterized by several characteristics that I'll go into further detail on later in this article) is extremely important for a power user (like gamers). The thing to keep in mind when thinking about the size of a hard drive is that you should always have room for expansion AND SOME EXTRA. Remember, the operating system is using part of the hard drive as RAM; if it can't, because that room is filled with something else, you're computer isn't going to run well, at all.
There are actually a number of things that I consider important when buying a new HD:
1. Size, the amount of data you will be able to store and, in effect, one element of the length of time it will be useable.
2. Speed, how it will affect the overall system performance and specific applications.
3. Compatability, will you be able to use it? Or will you be able to use it to its full potential.
4. Reliability, how long will it last(usually measured in MTBF(Mean Time Between Failure).
5. Price, what's it gonna cost ya.
SIZE: Go with the biggest that you can afford, within reason. Hard-drive technology has come a long way in the last few years and most of the new ones are very capable of fulfilling the averages users needs for several years. On the other hand, and the reason I recommend buying a "larger" drive, buying a little larger will give you more time before you have to think about replacement. Also, a lot of people talk about alternative storage mediums(like CD-R((CD recordable)), DVD-R, DVDRW, ZIP, Tape and etc.) and these are great products, but if you are going to be using the programs or data regularly, you will be disappointed at the comparatively slow speed of these alternatives. Now, don't go crazy, 500 Gigs really is a lot of space, but you will find that software is getting larger and is going to continue on that trend. Games, CAD, Music files, PICs and large applications add up over time and it can be a real pain to have to pick and choose(not to mention locate) what you want to delete. And, the premium on a larger drive is usually not what it is on a faster CPU; usually 15-20 bucks can give you that extra lee-way you're looking for.
Let's stop and talk about size for just a minute more. First, lets look at what a GB is real quick. A GB is 1024 MB (not 1000 as so many people claim, although this is close enough for most estimates), A MB is 1024 KILOBYTES (KB), A KB is 1024 BYTES, A byte is 8 bits... Okay, I'm getting carried away here. Use these numbers to estimate how many GB of hard drive capacity you will need for: Number of music files (in mp3 format) x 4MB, number of stored movies x 800MB (in one of the standard formats, without extras), add 100GB if you are using VISTA, or 50GB if using XP and then double this. Gamers, and those with large number of applications, will need even more. I generally don't recommend anything less than 500GB to anyone these days (if you're buying a new drive). Listen, I remember 20mb hard drives... I remember thinking that my 540MB and 850MB drives would hold all the information in the world.... Now, I have 22TB (1024GB/TB) of storage that I carry around with my notebook and I'm quickly running out of space (yes, I use a lot of external hard drives) and while most of you won't need that much, you WILL CERTAINLY NEED MORE NEXT YEAR THAN THIS AND THE YEAR AFTER AND SO ON.
SPEED: There are lots of things that go into calculating a system's performance, but one of the most important is the speed of it's primary storage sub-system(if it takes longer to read it, then it doesn't matter if you can "process" it faster). For almost everybody, the IDE interface is still perfectly fine, but SATA 150 and SATA 300 are now the standards and the hard drive interfaces have changed more over the last couple of years than the 15 before that. If you think that something better is definitely called for, then I recommend studying those technologies directly. Quite frankly, I really do like the faster drives, but for most people, they simply aren't worth the money(like a Ferrari or Lamborghini...very cool, but not really needed or economical for getting from point a to point b). The general SATA drives are extremely fast in comparison to their siblings of yester-year. YOU PROBABLY WON'T SEE THE DIFFERENCE IN THE HIGH-END Disks and the industry standard models, but you will see the difference in the slowest pieces and the industry standard. Get a good medium speed drive if you fit into the normal 98-99% of us. As far as rpm ratings, higher is faster(usually) and usually doesn't cost "too much" more; at a premium of about 10bucks on most models, 7200RPM drives will perform a bit faster than the 5400RPM drives. The 10,000RPM and faster drives can give you a major boost in performance, but generally at the a much higher cost and with a lower long term reliability.
COMPATABILITY: SATA 150 and SATA 300 are the standards of the day, although most systems will happily accept an IDE drive.
RELIABILITY: This is not normally a major problem these days(thankfully), but it still hasn't gone away completely. Remember that if your hard drive fails, you simply don't have a working system and all that valuable data, unless you faithfully back up everything, everyday to tape or CD-R or etc. is gone. I am usually not a big brand freak, but the most reliable drives I've used have been from companies like Western Digital(most reliable I've seen), Fujitsu and Quantum. I stay away from cheap no-name drives.period.
PRICE: I've tried to go into this quite a bit already and the only thing I really feel that I should add is that HDs are really inexpensive these days in comparison their function and former sky-high prices. Don't be afraid to splurge a little, but don't go hog wild. For most users, 100-125 bucks should net you a pretty good drive.
AS OF Feb 21, 2008 the 250GB drives can be picked up for around $80 or less, a 500GB drive can be had for around $100 and 750GB drives from major manufacturers are at just over 150 bucks, depending on the manuf. and model. At these prices, I think the 500GB should be a good choice for most people.
NOTE: If you are adding an additional IDE drive to an existing system, SERIOUSLY consider making it the master and or primary boot drive; it'll give you a speed boost(maybe not a huge one, but a free one) over the older drive.
Happy hunting and if you have any questions at all, please don't hesitate to email me. Thanks.
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Member: Richard Alcorn
Location: Altus, OK
Reviews written: 19
Trusted by: 18 members
About Me:
Safety & Efficiency Consultant, Roughneck, PC Tech, Webmaster, Entrepreneur and All-Round Eclectic Nut.
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