Thank you for being a valued part of the CNET community. As of December 1, 2020, the forums are in read-only format. In early 2021, CNET Forums will no longer be available. We are grateful for the participation and advice you have provided to one another over the years.

Thanks,

CNET Support

General discussion

Buying a new Dell - which hard drive set-up?

by drixhen Jul 5, 2006 10:31AM PDT

I'm planning to buy a new Dell XPS 400. I need it ASAP, or otherwise I would wait a few months for the new Core2 Duo processor to be released. Oh, well... Anyway, I have NO idea what hard drive set-up to choose. I think I want two hard drives for back-up purposes. Should I go with the new Dell DataSafe set-up (2 identical drives, one mirrors the other using Norton Ghost 10)? Or should I do the performance RAID 0 set-up? Someone told me to avoid that because there's an increased risk of losing data (if one drive fails, you lose everything on all of them?). Or should I get one fo the SATA drives and then add another internal or maybe external drive later for data backup?

Here are the choices Dell offers:

Serial ATA Drives
1. 160GB Serial ATA 3Gb/s Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/ 8MB cache
2. 250GB Serial ATA 3Gb/s Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/ 8MB cache
3. 320GB Serial ATA 3Gb/s Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/ 16MB cache
4. 500GB Serial ATA 3Gb/s Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/ 16MB cache

Dell DataSafe Drives (Includes main hard drive plus a hidden reserve hard drive)
1. DataSafe 160GB
2. DataSafe 250GB
3. DataSafe 320GB

Performance RAID 0 Drives
1. 320GB Performance RAID 0 (2 x 160GB SATA 3Gb/s HDDs)
2. 500GB Performance RAID 0 (2 x 250GB SATA 3Gb/s HDDs)
3. 640GB Performance RAID 0 (2 x 320GB SATA 3Gb/s HDDs)

Thanks so much for any advice!

-Jenny

Discussion is locked

2 Posts

- Collapse + Expand Details

- Collapse -

RAID or no RAID.that is the question..................

by logger99 Jul 7, 2006 10:52AM PDT

We've run RAID setups for years in our systems for those who wanted speed. A RAID0 is great IF you install a 3rd harddrive for backup..if one of the RAID0 drives goes, you're down. IF you go with any RAID besides 0, the second drive is a copy of the first....it's slower than RAID0, but more dependable.......HOWEVER, with todays huge capacity drives and large cache amounts,it's hard to justify taking chances with a RAID0 setup(or any RAID for that matter). The exception to this would be to use the WD Raptor drives (10,000 rpm) in RAID0 with a backup drive (expensive setup, but almost 33% faster than an equivalent single SATA drive or SATA RAID setups).

- Collapse -

Lots of options...some (much) better than others.

by VAPCMD Jul 7, 2006 3:48PM PDT

Take a look here in the STORAGE FORUM ...you'll find lots of info on drive configuration and backup strategies. My best advice ... avoid RAID ... too complex, too little gain and too much (potential) pain for most users and uses. My recommendation, get two internal HDDs and use the 2nd to backup the first. It's fast for backups as well as restores . . if that should that become necessary. If my primary hard drives becomes corrupt and cannot be corrected by simple means... I can restore a full working image to C: in less than 10 minutes. If the primary drive dies and I have to replace the drive and restore images to C: and D:...it would take less than an 1 hour

If $ permits then add an external HDD just as a precaution.

Enjoy the new system !

VAPCMD

Back to Desktops forum