What HD should I look at for my DAW PC?

Looking for a new hard drive dedicated exclusively to Cakewalk Sonar's audio
folder (where all the audio swapping will go down during playback).

It will be the 3rd HD on the system (WinXP x64, although I am running 32-bit
Sonar on it for plugin compatibility reasons), huge in size (500gb minimum)
and probably SATA (I've 2 SATA slots remaining).

What do you recommend I get? Raptor? Barracuda? Something else? Fastest seek
time should probably be #1 priority, right?

Again, this will be almost ONLY for real-time audio file reading/swapping.

On Oct 22, 7:42 pm, "M.J.S." <n...@thanks.com> wrote:[color=blue]
> Looking for a new hard drive dedicated exclusively to Cakewalk Sonar's audio
> folder (where all the audio swapping will go down during playback).
>
> It will be the 3rd HD on the system (WinXP x64, although I am running 32-bit
> Sonar on it for plugin compatibility reasons), huge in size (500gb minimum)
> and probably SATA (I've 2 SATA slots remaining).
>
> What do you recommend I get? Raptor? Barracuda? Something else? Fastest seek
> time should probably be #1 priority, right?
>
> Again, this will be almost ONLY for real-time audio file reading/swapping.[/color]

Unless you're doing massive file sizes and lots of them, just about
anything will work these days. I've had great luck with Maxtor drives
and they are cheap.

On Mon, 22 Oct 2007 22:42:57 -0400, "M.J.S." <no@thanks.com> wrote:
[color=blue]
>Looking for a new hard drive dedicated exclusively to Cakewalk Sonar's audio
>folder (where all the audio swapping will go down during playback).
>
>It will be the 3rd HD on the system (WinXP x64, although I am running 32-bit
>Sonar on it for plugin compatibility reasons), huge in size (500gb minimum)
>and probably SATA (I've 2 SATA slots remaining).
>
>What do you recommend I get? Raptor? Barracuda? Something else? Fastest seek
>time should probably be #1 priority, right?
>
>Again, this will be almost ONLY for real-time audio file reading/swapping.[/color]


What's audio "swapping"?

Get the quietest one. Any current drive is well up to the job. If
you use software synths, put their sample data on a different physical
drive. But, most important of all, install maximum usable RAM so disk
accesses can be minimised.

On Oct 22, 10:42 pm, "M.J.S." <n...@thanks.com> wrote:
[color=blue]
> What do you recommend I get? Raptor? Barracuda? Something else? Fastest seek
> time should probably be #1 priority, right?[/color]

Actually, unless your computer is in another room, or is already so
noisy that you won't hear the disk drive, the highest priority is
something that you won't find in a spec sheet and rarely will find any
anecdotal reports, and that's mechanical noise. The good news,
however, is that with today's disk drives, they're all very quiet,
substantially quieter than drives of ten, or even five years ago. I've
been buying a new drive for my Mackie hard disk drive every few
months, and it seems that each one is quieter than the previous one.

Disk drives are pretty much a commodity item today and there doesn't
seem to be any particular standouts as to speed, noise, compatibility,
or reliability. I don't even think the duration of the warranty is an
indication of how reliable a drive is. No warranty is going to pay you
to re-record everything that was on the drive when it died. Worst
case, if you actually have an opportunity to take advantage of the
warranty, they'll send you a replacement drive.

Just buy something and don't worry.

Gotcha. Thanks Mike (and Danny & Laurence)

"Mike Rivers" <mrivers@d-and-d.com> wrote in message
news:1193138414.825214.15130@z24g2000prh.googlegroups.com...[color=blue]
> On Oct 22, 10:42 pm, "M.J.S." <n...@thanks.com> wrote:
>[color=green]
>> What do you recommend I get? Raptor? Barracuda? Something else? Fastest
>> seek
>> time should probably be #1 priority, right?[/color]
>
> Disk drives are pretty much a commodity item today and there doesn't
> seem to be any particular standouts as to speed, noise, compatibility,
> or reliability. Just buy something and don't worry.[/color]

"Laurence Payne" <NOSPAMlpayne1ATdsl.pipex.com> wrote in message
news:m3krh3p11rclumr7opl5ed0r8etr1uep1g@4ax.com...[color=blue]
> On Mon, 22 Oct 2007 22:42:57 -0400, "M.J.S." <no@thanks.com> wrote:
>[color=green]
>>Looking for a new hard drive dedicated exclusively to Cakewalk Sonar's
>>audio
>>folder (where all the audio swapping will go down during playback).
>>
>>It will be the 3rd HD on the system (WinXP x64, although I am running
>>32-bit
>>Sonar on it for plugin compatibility reasons), huge in size (500gb
>>minimum)
>>and probably SATA (I've 2 SATA slots remaining).
>>
>>What do you recommend I get? Raptor? Barracuda? Something else? Fastest
>>seek
>>time should probably be #1 priority, right?
>>
>>Again, this will be almost ONLY for real-time audio file reading/swapping.[/color]
>
>
> What's audio "swapping"?
>
> Get the quietest one.[/color]

And if that's the choice, the quiet-pc parts reviews indicate that Sanyo
makes the quietest drives. Seagate used to, but no longer makes this a
priority. It should be noted that all 7200 rpm drives are pretty quiet
these days, but the residual noise may still be audible if a silent pc or
suitable laptop is used in close proximity to the mikes. I do this, so I
had to look at the issue.

Sound Devices uses Sanyo drives in their recorders. They have tested various
makes for shock resistance, and found that Sanyo drives are the leaders in
this also. Inspired by the utter quiet of the drives in my SD recorders, I
re-equipped my laptops with Sanyo 160 gb vertical recording drives. The
lack of noise is quite gratifying.

Bob Morein
(310) 237-6511

"Mike Rivers" <mrivers@d-and-d.com> wrote in message
news:1193138414.825214.15130@z24g2000prh.googlegroups.com...
[snip][color=blue]
> Disk drives are pretty much a commodity item today and there doesn't
> seem to be any particular standouts as to speed, noise, compatibility,
> or reliability.[/color]

Actually, there are. Sound Devices bought another company's shaker table.
Their tests indicated that the specced shock resistance had nothing to do
with the actual experimentally determined values. Samsung topped the list.

Bob Morein
(310) 237-6511

"Soundhaspriority" <nowhere@nowhere.org> wrote in message
news:OcadnZS2b_iqsYPanZ2dnUVZ_o6knZ2d@giganews.com...[color=blue]
>
> Sound Devices uses Sanyo drives in their recorders. They have tested
> various makes for shock resistance, and found that Sanyo drives are the
> leaders in this also. Inspired by the utter quiet of the drives in my SD
> recorders, I re-equipped my laptops with Sanyo 160 gb vertical recording
> drives. The lack of noise is quite gratifying.[/color]

Forgive my obstuseness, but what exactly is a vertical recording drive?

"M.J.S." <no@thanks.com> wrote in message
news:471e91e9$0$47115$892e7fe2@authen.yellow.readfreenews.net...[color=blue]
> "Soundhaspriority" <nowhere@nowhere.org> wrote in message
> news:OcadnZS2b_iqsYPanZ2dnUVZ_o6knZ2d@giganews.com...[color=green]
> >
> > Sound Devices uses Sanyo drives in their recorders. They have tested
> > various makes for shock resistance, and found that Sanyo drives are the
> > leaders in this also. Inspired by the utter quiet of the drives in my[/color][/color]
SD[color=blue][color=green]
> > recorders, I re-equipped my laptops with Sanyo 160 gb vertical recording
> > drives. The lack of noise is quite gratifying.[/color]
>
> Forgive my obstuseness, but what exactly is a vertical recording drive?
>[/color]
Don't even think about obtuseness :) No one should have to apologize for any
question.

It refers to a transition in hard disk technology that's covered in the
trade rags. It's perfectly transparent to you, the user. All 3.5 inch drives
over 500 gb in capacity use vertical recording, and all 5400 rpm 2.5 inch
drives over 120 gb of capacity use it. Technically, it means that the
magnetic flux lines are oriented perpendicular to the platter surface, which
makes a smaller "domain size" possible, which increases data density.

Bob Morein
(310) 237-6511

Soundhaspriority wrote:[color=blue]
>
> And if that's the choice, the quiet-pc parts reviews indicate that Sanyo
> makes the quietest drives. Seagate used to, but no longer makes this a
> priority.[/color]

Are you sure you don't mean Samsung?
[url]http://www.silentpcreview.com/article657-page1.html[/url]

(Silent PC review is a mine of information on keeping PCs quiet, BTW.)

I've installed a number of Samsung Spinpoint drives and they have
remained very quiet after a couple of years continous use.
[color=blue]
> It should be noted that all 7200 rpm drives are pretty quiet
> these days[/color]

True - all drives made in the last few years use a type of bearing that
is intrinsically quiet and long lasting. Mounting the drives on an
elastic suspension drmatically reduces seek noise, and the drive noise
from almost any new HD is less than other noise sources such as the PSU
and case fans.

Anahata

"Anahata" <anahata@treewind.co.uk> wrote in message
news:13huh5ae2g57389@corp.supernews.com...[color=blue]
> Soundhaspriority wrote:[color=green]
> >
> > And if that's the choice, the quiet-pc parts reviews indicate that[/color][/color]
Sanyo[color=blue][color=green]
> > makes the quietest drives. Seagate used to, but no longer makes this a
> > priority.[/color]
>
> Are you sure you don't mean Samsung?
> [url]http://www.silentpcreview.com/article657-page1.html[/url]
>
> (Silent PC review is a mine of information on keeping PCs quiet, BTW.)
>[/color]
Yes, by God! Thanks for the correction.

Bob Morein
(310) 237-6511

1.) If its SATA Raid make sure the drives are spec'd for RAIS, as they have
different error correction timing than standard drives

2.) Obviously look for STATII 3.0GTbits/s

3.) Heat, look for drives that run cooler (WD, Samsung)

4.) Cost per MB and performance WD750GB is one of the fastest and best
values out there the 1TB are still too pricey

5.) Go to [url]www.tomshardware.com[/url] and review their HD Charts for some
comparisons and reviews.


--
Donald C. Burr
Chief Technology Officer
TruckCenter.com, LLC



"M.J.S." wrote:
[color=blue]
> Looking for a new hard drive dedicated exclusively to Cakewalk Sonar's audio
> folder (where all the audio swapping will go down during playback).
>
> It will be the 3rd HD on the system (WinXP x64, although I am running 32-bit
> Sonar on it for plugin compatibility reasons), huge in size (500gb minimum)
> and probably SATA (I've 2 SATA slots remaining).
>
> What do you recommend I get? Raptor? Barracuda? Something else? Fastest seek
> time should probably be #1 priority, right?
>
> Again, this will be almost ONLY for real-time audio file reading/swapping.
>
>
>
>[/color]