Quote Originally Posted by I4one
nice review; well done

While contemplating the scsi4me.com deals you posted (through 6/30) - an whether or not scsi (15k cheetahs) or sata (10k Raptors) - i'm curious as to how these compare in all aspects (performance / heat / noise / reliability / price per GB). I understand the costs of the scsi will also require an scsi card (adaptec no doubt), and that any 15k is 'usually' more expensive inherently (especially per GB).

I guess I'm leaning towards a SATA approach for now, mostly b/c while the scsi solution may own in some areas - I think no matter which I'm going to need a newer Setup (Mobo/CPU/RAM, etc) anyway to handle the higher data tranfer rates.

*edit;
PM me if you think I should start a thread related to this instead, if only to keep this sticky kinda "clean"
StorageReview.com said it extremely well when it said: "Overall, for non-server use, Western Digital's Raptor WD740GD is the fastest single hard disk one can buy regardless of spindle speed, interface, or price."

SATA is a very nice standard. SCSI gives you the option of using 15K drives, but the law of diminishing returns says that the 10K Raptors are a better deal. If you have enough money to go with SCSI, by all means, go for it. Otherwise stick with SATA and 10K drives and you'll be good to go.

SCSI is very nice but is kind of in a about-to-be-obsolete setup. Serial-Attached-SCSI (SAS) is about 6 months from fruition and that is going to make current Parallel SCSI setups pretty dated. SAS is going to move SATA to a new level.

The 15K Cheetahs and 29320 controllers I posted are very good deals, they are still hit or miss over Raptors. Going SCSI is more of a mindset than a performance set. There's no downside to going Parallel SCSI right now, but there's not too many upsides either.

-MrD