So uh... No new significant devlopments in internal HD technology in 4 years?

Well, I'm significantly upgrading my PC. Lots of great games lately that have really started beating up on my 8800gt based rig that I built 4 years ago. Now just seems to be a really good time to do it with better support for quad core cpu's, DX11, and Physx being some of the reasons worth upgrading.

But the one area that seems to be pretty stagnant has been the Hard Drive space. I'm particularly talking about HD speed, as it's obvious HDs have gotten cheaper and bigger over the years. My 4 year old HD spins at 7200 rpm, and it looks like internal HDs are still spinning at 7200 for the budget minded consumer. The release of Sata 6 from what I've read doesn't really make things better on this end either. If I'm missing something, let me know. I've been out of the game for a good 4 years.

So does that mean that they really are faster now? Should I compare cache instead? I'm running with a 7200rpm doing only 16mb... I hope that's pretty slow by today's standards, hehe. Looks like 64mb cache are the standard now.

Oooh, I haven't even heard of SSD's before... They're pretty pricey though. Would you recommend using an SSD just as my primary HD to hold my OS and a couple games? I'd probably be able to afford a 120GB one for that extra boost in performance. And the fact that they're silent makes them really attractive...

Oooh, I haven't even heard of SSD's before... They're pretty pricey though. Would you recommend using an SSD just as my primary HD to hold my OS and a couple games? I'd probably be able to afford a 120GB one for that extra boost in performance. And the fact that they're silent makes them really attractive...

phan1

Yes, just for OS, and 1 or 2 games. SSD's are insanely fast.

I think you have to look at it from the perspective of time - The basic method of how a hard drive works hasn't really changed in the best part of 30 or more years. While we've seen gains in terms of weak magnetic fields, DMA, interfaces (from IDE to SATA) and all sorts of cunning read-ahead/access tricks, new gains are just much harder to come by with the same technology (while also competing with "the future" technologies like SSDs for research).

yah SSD is pretty effing awesome. I literally take 20 seconds to boot up my computer and open up any program i want. My SSD is an older model too with a WEI of only 6.9 compared to the newer ones that get between 7.5-7.9.

Edit: Just timed it, takes exactly 32 seconds.

RPM+Cache+Plattersize=performance

Over the last 4 years platter size has increased tremendously. Last time I looked there were drives out there with 750GB platters.

The reason platter size gives you more performance is as the density increases the area each data takes up decreases so it takes less time for the spindle to cover much more data.

Todays 7200rpm drives are faster than 15k rpm drives from 10-15 years ago. I was comparing my 1.5TB wd green (5400 rpm) to my old 80GB maxtor 7200 drive and it outperformes it in every category. The biggest difference being the 80GB drive has 4 20GB platters and the 1.5TB drive has 3 500GB platters. The next biggest difference is size of the cache 8MB vs 64MB

But the one area that seems to be pretty stagnant has been the Hard Drive space. I'm particularly talking about HD speed, as it's obvious HDs have gotten cheaper and bigger over the years. My 4 year old HD spins at 7200 rpm, and it looks like internal HDs are still spinning at 7200 for the budget minded consumer. The release of Sata 6 from what I've read doesn't really make things better on this end either. If I'm missing something, let me know. I've been out of the game for a good 4 years.phan1

Western Digital still do their line of Raptor drives that spin at 15K, but they have been outperformed by SSD technology.

If you hadn't heard of SSDs, then chances are you are also unaware that now is not a good time to be buying harddrives. The floods that hit Thailand in October hit the major harddrive factories of Western Digital, Seagate, Toshiba and the supply chains for more, which pushed harddrive prices through the roof. They are coming back down to more sensible levels now, but if you can wait until March / April next year, then you should be able to get much more for your money.

[QUOTE="phan1"]But the one area that seems to be pretty stagnant has been the Hard Drive space. I'm particularly talking about HD speed, as it's obvious HDs have gotten cheaper and bigger over the years. My 4 year old HD spins at 7200 rpm, and it looks like internal HDs are still spinning at 7200 for the budget minded consumer. The release of Sata 6 from what I've read doesn't really make things better on this end either. If I'm missing something, let me know. I've been out of the game for a good 4 years.Avenger1324

Western Digital still do their line of Raptor drives that spin at 15K, but they have been outperformed by SSD technology.

If you hadn't heard of SSDs, then chances are you are also unaware that now is not a good time to be buying harddrives. The floods that hit Thailand in October hit the major harddrive factories of Western Digital, Seagate, Toshiba and the supply chains for more, which pushed harddrive prices through the roof. They are coming back down to more sensible levels now, but if you can wait until March / April next year, then you should be able to get much more for your money.

Which makes now an even better time to buy SSDs.

I am personally waiting for SSDs to drop to about 100 bucks for the 200GB+ ones.

The technology is out there.

For instance Holographic storage has been out there for years but, just hasn't caught on. It has the potential to be faster and easily hold much more storage but, there just hasn't been enough investment in the technology. They need more research and development in it to increase the read times.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/storage/ge-backs-500gb-holographic-storage/1467

Nickola Tesla discovered how to send electricity harmlessly wirelessly through air a century ago yet we still don't use it. Had investors backed the technology we wouldn't be having the problems with limited battery life. The problem is the true driving force for tech is money and not the technology itself.

Thanks for the input guys! Big help! I just bought a 120GB Crucial M4 today and I'm totally excited about it. Exactly the thing I was looking for in next-gen technology.

On a side note, have MONITORS evolved much in 4 years? They've gotten cheaper, and a 24" widescreen has now become the standard for PC gaming. But no new technology to get that excited about right? I was hoping retina display monitors would have started popping up by now but it looks like it's still far away. I mean, it's still easy to pick out individual pixels on my monitor... I'm actually still very happy with the SIZE of my monitor (19" Dell Ultrasharp 2007), but it's still pretty far off from looking as you're peeking through a window. I probably should be thankful that such a thing has not happened because that type of upgrade is really expensive and I'm already breaking the bank. :) Actually, what would REALLY make me want to upgrade is a viable solution for the Anti-glare coating vs glossy mointor issue. If someone can find a really good middle-ground for that issue, that would be a viable upgrade for me, as I really hate AG coating and I also really hate glare as well...

I have a 4 year old seagate 250GB 7200RPM HDD and a recently bought seagate 500GB one, there is definitely a noticeable performance difference between the 2.