I'm not into video or graphics or anything of the sort but i am thinking of upgrading all my HD's to SCSI. What are the benefits?? Would gaming (loads and such) be faster?
At this point, SCSI's main advantages are that the bus manages itself instead of leaning on the CPU; that the bus can reorder commands to optimize performance; that SCSI hardware tends to be higher quality (more durability); and that it's better for RAIDs, and for sustained reads (read: huge files - think Photoshop, database or video applications, not games).
Unless you bought or set up a RAID, you wouldn't notice all that much difference in performance using 7200RPM SCSI drives - especially not in games, which are already designed to use drives as little as possible. If you went to 10K or 15K drives, especially in RAID, you'd notice several differences: First, there would be a definite speedup on those occasions when your games went to disk; second, you'd find yourself driven slowly insane by the heat and the loud whine of the drives; lastly, there would be a big, smoldering crater where your bank account used to be.
My advice: Stick with ATA. Make sure you have a healthy amount of good RAM. If you're running games off the CD, rip them to the HD. Unless you're after maximum game performance at all costs (including the ability to hear the sounds of the game!) it's just not worth it.
Comments
Unless you bought or set up a RAID, you wouldn't notice all that much difference in performance using 7200RPM SCSI drives - especially not in games, which are already designed to use drives as little as possible. If you went to 10K or 15K drives, especially in RAID, you'd notice several differences: First, there would be a definite speedup on those occasions when your games went to disk; second, you'd find yourself driven slowly insane by the heat and the loud whine of the drives; lastly, there would be a big, smoldering crater where your bank account used to be.
My advice: Stick with ATA. Make sure you have a healthy amount of good RAM. If you're running games off the CD, rip them to the HD. Unless you're after maximum game performance at all costs (including the ability to hear the sounds of the game!) it's just not worth it.