HARD DRIVES
We only recommend SATA
Hard Drives. For servers, we recommend RAID arrays to automatically backup your data.
Up until 2003 the IDE or ATA
specification was the primary standard for 3.5” and 2.5” hard drives. The 2.5” hard drive is primarily used in
laptops and tablet computers and a 12 ms (millisecond) average access time is
typical. Average access time for a 3.5”
hard drive is 9 to 10 ms. SCSI is another
specification for hard drives, but these drives are expensive and they have
expensive controllers with many differing standards. SATA drive speed now approaches SCSI speed
with some models.
RECOMMENDATION: Our current recommendation is the 36 GB
Western Digital SATA Raptor Hard Drive.
It runs at 10,000 rpm, so it needs adequate cooling, but its big
advantage is an average access time of 5.4 milliseconds. It is available (as of Dec 2003) for less
than $140. See more facts at www.infoworld.com/140 .