WD 120gb SATA Opinions?

[RangerJoe]

Looking at getting the SATA version of this drive, should I spend the extra $20 or so and get it? or go for the IDE 120gb?

Thanks

[amdmadman]

From What i have seen on the seagate's the is really no improvement going from PATA to SATA unless you raid them. But on the plus side the cable is smaller and takes up less space. So it does look better

[elprawn]

If it's only a matter of money and performance, get IDE. Especially if you want to set-up RAID. SATA is a bit overpriced for a performance gain of about 1%. It's even slower than IDE in some tests. You can expect it to get faster in a few years.

[tyson-chris]

you can't really generalize sata/pata as many drives are different. it is true that the original seagata 'cuda v sata model was wholly similar to the pata in performance.

the 'cuda sata 7200.7 is better in performance i've seen though.

also, look at the maxtor dm+9. the sata is significantly different from the pata model, not only in raid (although especially in raid).

unfortuantely,i hvaen't read any reviews yet of the sata wd caviars, so i can't say whether there's any difference between it and it's pata counterpart. usually storagereview.com is on top of new models, but they haven't gotten anything up yet on the new sata caviars.

[ajrettke]

definetly NOT worth it...bandwidth is not what makes drives great, low seek times are. That's why raptors and SCSI's are awesome. Also there is very little improvment (definetly not noticeable inr eal world performance) from SATA to PATA. you need benchmarking tools to tell the very small difference...spend the 20 bucks to go bigger (i.e. 160gb) or put the20 bucks in the computer upgrade fund, that's my advice.

[RangerJoe]

the thing is, I have already upgraded my entire computer.

http://www.alterahosting.com/~bloody/rangerjoe/Computer%20Pics/Lian%20Li/New_Board/Full_Case%20(Medium).JPG

as you can see in the picture, I have tried to clean my case up as much as possible. SO, in the ideas of "performance increase isnt what im going for"

I like the small SATA cables, thats why I want the drive mostly.

[elprawn]

You could use round IDE cables :D

Although they are a bit clunky compared to SATA.......

[RangerJoe]

indeed. plus, i have the SATA power adapters...that came with the motherboard

[ajrettke]

well the adapters are clunky too...if clean is what ya want then go for it I say....does anyone know where you can buy 6" or 1' long sata cables? Also longer ones like 24-30" ones too (gonna run a CD drive with SATA :p)

[RangerJoe]

the SATA drive has a connector just like a raptor drive. only serial stuff (serial ata power, normal 4 pin power, and the SATA information cable. so there is no adapter.