Need Advise on DIY PC


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Kevin

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Jan 18, 2002
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Hi,

I am planning to get a new DIY PC on moderate budget. I wanted a SFF barebone systems but most of them do not have raid for HDD. For those that have, they cost a bomb!

1. For my old PC, the guy who sold it to me in SLS advise me to put 2 of my IDE HDD through Raid connection (instead of the IDE) but not running raid as mirror backup. I am not sure whether this is call "Raid 0", can someone confirm it? The transfer rate on this connection is faster than HDD on IDE connection.

2. Now, for my new PC, I will be getting SATA2 HDD and connect through SATA2 on motherboard. Since SATA2 has a transfer rate of 3Gb/s, do I still need to go through the Raid connection? Would it increase the transfer rate further? Please advise.

I will be using the PC for Video/Photo Editing and home video encoding. Hope my question make sense as I am not a very Technical person in IT. Any advise is greatly appreciated

The new PC currently is following config.

Pentium D 930
Gigabyte 8I945P-Pro MB
2 Gb RAM
2x250Gb SATA2 HDD
PowerColor X1600 Pro Graphic Card.
Cooler Master Centurian 534 and extreme power 500W

Thanks,
Kevin
 

Kevin said:
Hi,

I am planning to get a new DIY PC on moderate budget. I wanted a SFF barebone systems but most of them do not have raid for HDD. For those that have, they cost a bomb!

1. For my old PC, the guy who sold it to me in SLS advise me to put 2 of my IDE HDD through Raid connection (instead of the IDE) but not running raid as mirror backup. I am not sure whether this is call "Raid 0", can someone confirm it? The transfer rate on this connection is faster than HDD on IDE connection.

2. Now, for my new PC, I will be getting SATA2 HDD and connect through SATA2 on motherboard. Since SATA2 has a transfer rate of 3Gb/s, do I still need to go through the Raid connection? Would it increase the transfer rate further? Please advise.

I will be using the PC for Video/Photo Editing and home video encoding. Hope my question make sense as I am not a very Technical person in IT. Any advise is greatly appreciated

The new PC currently is following config.

Pentium D 930
Gigabyte 8I945P-Pro MB
2 Gb RAM
2x250Gb SATA2 HDD
PowerColor X1600 Pro Graphic Card.
Cooler Master Centurian 534 and extreme power 380W

Thanks,
Kevin


1/ put 2 IDE HDD through Raid connection but not running raid as mirror backup - So it is not running Raid 1 or mirror. They are running Raid 0 and no fault tolerant. One harddisk fail and all fail and OS will fail to boot up.


2/ since the motherboard supporting raid then configure Raid 1. GigaRAID Controller delivers completely solution for storage interface to increase fault tolerance, improve data access performance. One harddisk fail and system still running. After replace the faulty Hdd system will come back to Raid 1 again.


Your PC config should be powerful enough to run Video/Photo Editing and home video encoding.
 

Think u better post in HWZ for more and better answers. Down here, most ppl concentrate on Camera only. ;p
 

i dont think u need a raid setup for yr situation because it's to back u up when hDD crashes.

and raid card costs very much. so not for u.

basically since u need speed, u need a sata2 hDD, and those HDD that have 16mb cache. like Western digital 2500KS. (250GB disk with 16mb cache, as opposed to 8mb)

simply put, a bigger cache will increase data read, write, and access times.

the graphics card not sure sufficient for video editing or not since it;s a midrange card.
plus i think yr power supply unit must be more powerful, a 480W ?
 

380W? That's not enough.
 

JL1500k said:
1/ put 2 IDE HDD through Raid connection but not running raid as mirror backup - So it is not running Raid 1 or mirror. They are running Raid 0 and no fault tolerant. One harddisk fail and all fail and OS will fail to boot up.


2/ since the motherboard supporting raid then configure Raid 1. GigaRAID Controller delivers completely solution for storage interface to increase fault tolerance, improve data access performance. One harddisk fail and system still running. After replace the faulty Hdd system will come back to Raid 1 again.


Your PC config should be powerful enough to run Video/Photo Editing and home video encoding.
Thanks for the advise.
 

BBTM said:
Think u better post in HWZ for more and better answers. Down here, most ppl concentrate on Camera only. ;p
Thanks for the pointer. Mostly Gamer there and they talk about high end systems. I also seldom post in the HW Clinics so nobody reply me one lah! :sweat:

Actually here got some bros work in IT line.
 

Murcielago said:
i dont think u need a raid setup for yr situation because it's to back u up when hDD crashes.

and raid card costs very much. so not for u.

basically since u need speed, u need a sata2 hDD, and those HDD that have 16mb cache. like Western digital 2500KS. (250GB disk with 16mb cache, as opposed to 8mb)

simply put, a bigger cache will increase data read, write, and access times.

the graphics card not sure sufficient for video editing or not since it;s a midrange card.
plus i think yr power supply unit must be more powerful, a 480W ?
Thanks for the advise. Yah, is a midrange card since I don't play 3D games, only utilise the 2D functions. I will try 1st lah!

Wah 480W, my electricity bill! :sweat:

Actually I am thinking about SFF if I don't need Raid. But SFF don't have 480 PS right? I find the Mid toer casing too big lah! Want to use something smaller.
 

Bluestrike said:
you can also try VR-zone. I believe you find more ans there then here.
Huh! Serious ah! Will try there but have to register 1st.
 

i mean, since u are doing editing, maybe u would need something more powerful ?

anyway, if mid tower too big, try going to mATX, micro atx. something smaller than the usual
 

Go for a Macintel :thumbsup:
 

Murcielago said:
i mean, since u are doing editing, maybe u would need something more powerful ?

anyway, if mid tower too big, try going to mATX, micro atx. something smaller than the usual
Yah, on a budget so try the midrange card 1st lah. If cannot work then no choice upgrade to higher end card lor! :D

Any micro casing to recommend? Not much choice leh! The Centurian 540/1 only few cm smaller then no point lah! :(
 

i dunno much micro casings. but here's a site to try, i mean since price is more impt than asthetics in yr case( i suppose) then pick the cheapest.

www.thepotterhouse.net
 

Murcielago said:
i dunno much micro casings. but here's a site to try, i mean since price is more impt than asthetics in yr case( i suppose) then pick the cheapest.

www.thepotterhouse.net
Thanks, is this site in Singapore? Heard about them.

Yes, price is more impt than asthetics in my case but still must be cheap and good!
 

I don't advice you to get SFF type of system especially if you are getting Intel chip.
Heat is the biggest problem. Intel processor general a lot of heat and it average running temperature is between 60-70 degree. If you are running 2x 7200rpm hard disks, it will generate more heat within that small SFF case. You will probably need to dedicate fan or air-con to cool the system. Heat will shorten the lifespan of your system and might give you unpredictable problem.

I use to run an Intel PC (medium tower) and I can feel the casing get warm after an hour of usage in non-aircon environment.

Since you are using the new PC for Video/Photo editing, I would recommend you to get a mac or an AMD system which is cooler.

Run RAID 1 for protection.
 

Kevin said:
Wah, that siong ah! If go for 480w/500W my electricity bill! :sweat:
it's not about the bill... if ur peripherals need the power and it doesn't get it, my as well not have them at all. can u imagine ur hard drives not getting enuff power when you are trying to save your files, for instance?

mostly, if you ur PC needs more power than wat the psu can supply, the psu will just blow up.... well not literally, the fuse will blow, or worse... then whole pc cannot work at all till u get a new psu, in which case u'd end up buying a more powerful one when u could have in the first place.

the number on the psu is a rating, it doesn't mean that u will use more power, it depends on ur pc. anyway i still think that the most power hungry peripheral is the monitor. just turn off the monitor when u dun use the computer dun even need to shut down.... that's wat i do. and nowadays, the monitor is plugged straight to the wall, not to the PC (for power). somebody correct me if i'm wrong.
 

Kevin said:
1. For my old PC, the guy who sold it to me in SLS advise me to put 2 of my IDE HDD through Raid connection (instead of the IDE) but not running raid as mirror backup. I am not sure whether this is call "Raid 0", can someone confirm it? The transfer rate on this connection is faster than HDD on IDE connection.
yes, this is the Raid 0. Provides no redundancy, but better performance.

Kevin said:
2. Now, for my new PC, I will be getting SATA2 HDD and connect through SATA2 on motherboard. Since SATA2 has a transfer rate of 3Gb/s, do I still need to go through the Raid connection? Would it increase the transfer rate further? Please advise.
SATA2 has a theoritically speed of 3GB/s. However, the actually transfer is usually dependant on the HDD. a 7200rpm hdd will generally give a speed below 66MB/s. Even so, u can still consider going RAID 0 as that is a cheaper alternative to SCSI HDD. Or, you can get a 10/15k rpm SATA2 HDD (Raptor).

Murcielago said:
simply put, a bigger cache will increase data read, write, and access times.
this is a misconception. the cache is like a RAM for the HDD. more cache means more temporary storage for the data.

Ola said:
Run RAID 1 for protection.
i normally don't advise home user to use RAID1, unless that the data is so important that it must stay online all the while; or you have extra cast to spare to get another HDD. Better option is to have a external storage such as external HDD (which only power on it when needed such as to do back up) or to burn your data into DVD+-R)


for power supply wise, i would suggest getting a 420W PSU. do take note that PSU are not 100% power efficent. normally they are 80~90% efficient. meaning, a 420W will generate mayb a actual watt of 380W instead. There are some websites that can help you calculate your power needs based on the conponents installed. do a search on google.
 

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