Sata questions.

[OnFire_SE]

Hello

I'm currently using a single IDE hardrive and want to upgrade.

Question is, is this the right time to go Sata since Sata 300 seems to be round the corner. Is it best to wait for Sata 300 or is there no difference since I dont think even Sata 150 drives use the full bandwidth.

Also, I intend to use 2x Sata drives on raid 0, will I see a big difference in performance. PC used for general use and games.

Finally, I'm looking at Maxtor drive with NCQ, will my motherboard make use of NCQ, or does it not work like that.

Thanks in advance and just incase my sys specs are:

XP2500m @ 2400 1.65v
NF7-S
1gb Kingston Hyper-x PC3200
ATI 9700 pro @ 375/333
80gb Maxtor ATA133 7200rpm.

[Tmod]

For general computer use RAID will not show much improvement. Yes the data transfer will be faster but unless you just want to screw around with RAID or are really into video editing or gaming you will not need that much performance.

I run it just because I like screwing with this stuff.

[OnFire_SE]

I like messing with this stuff too. Basically I wanna have the fastest and most future proof available, plus for a start Windows XP is taking wwwwaayy too long to load, with only minimal programs installed.

Just not sure whether or not to wait for Sata 300 as I'm waiting at the mo anyway for NF4 Sli and a bit of a price drop for 6800GT so I can afford two of em.

[Super Nade]

Welcome to the Forums!!!!!!

Did you defragment your HDD? Maybe that would help with XP load times. I'd get a SATA simply because the bandwidth it offeres is still under-utilized by the average user. If you are lookig for fast drives, go for the raptor.

Raid 0 is pretty useless for the avg home user IMHO. You won't see any remarkable difference and there is always that underlying risk of losing all your data if any 1 HDD decides to fail.

[OnFire_SE]

I'm willing to take the risk with Raid 0, I will use my old IDE drive to back up important stuff and as I'm only using one drive at the moment I'm kind of in the risk area anyway.

BTW yes I'm all defragged and reg cleaned etc. Raptors sound great but didnt really wanna spend that much and I have a silent PC.

[OnFire_SE]

Thanks for the welcome too. :burn: