mixing hard drives together

solutionizesolutionize
edited July 2009 in Hardware
I'm getting a new DAW setup tomorrow, is it ok to use 1 Hard drive IDE to run OS (XP) and then use 2 X SATA 2 hard drives for samples and tracks?

specs:

- Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 LGA775 'Yorkfield' 2.83GHz 12MB-cache (1333FSB) Processor
- Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3P Intel P45 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
- Antec 300 Three Hundred Ultimate Gaming Case - Black
- x 2 Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache
- Corsair TX 650W ATX SLi Compliant Power Supply
- x 2 Corsair XMS2 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 PC2-8500C5 TwinX Dual Channel

:wink:

Comments

  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    For DAW I'd recommend pure SATA across the board; IDE is completely outmoded. Why would you want to use IDE for anything?

    Just go three SATA drives
  • lordbeanlordbean Ontario, Canada
    edited July 2009
    It's possible he still has an IDE drive around from an older system he wants to use. However, I don't know what DAW is, so I can't offer any actual advice here.
  • solutionizesolutionize
    edited July 2009
    primesuspect wrote:
    For DAW I'd recommend pure SATA across the board; IDE is completely outmoded. Why would you want to use IDE for anything?

    Just go three SATA drives


    The reason is because I still have two IDE drives from my previous computer so I thought I would make the most out of the left overs, instead of wasting one of them, why not use it for just OS. Just found out that my mobo has 1 ATA slot which is equivalent to IDE so would be ideal.

    Why do you think It's not a good idea to use it with the other 2 SATA?
    Also I don't want to spend another £40 for another SATA (even though it's dirt cheap these days)
  • solutionizesolutionize
    edited July 2009
    DAW (digital work station) computer just for audio
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    Having spent years building custom DAW workstations, trust me on this; even "just an OS" drive should have maximum bandwidth available.

    If you REALLY can't spend the money, then go ahead and use your IDE drive; but it's like buying a sports car and then putting crappy petrol in it.

    What audio card are you using? Is it a 24 track card? Firewire? PCIe?
  • solutionizesolutionize
    edited July 2009
    primesuspect wrote:

    What audio card are you using? Is it a 24 track card? Firewire? PCIe?

    Yeah I wouldn't want to mess up my shiny new sports car:D,
    so then I guess just use 1 SATA for OS and 1 SATA for music/samples/tracks...???? I just never really thought about seperating my hard drives like this until i read about it quite recently so i want to get it right.
    I'm using the M-Audio Delta Audiophile 2496. Will upgrade eventually.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    The ideal setup for your situation would be OS and apps on SATA 0, audio scratch disk on SATA 1. If you wanted to use the IDE drive as a Pagefile scratch disk, that might actually help. What OS are you using?

    The Delta 2496 is a decent card, but don't expect full 24 track live recording on it; you'll need to go much bigger for that. How many live tracks are you going to be recording?
  • solutionizesolutionize
    edited July 2009
    primesuspect wrote:
    The ideal setup for your situation would be OS and apps on SATA 0, audio scratch disk on SATA 1. If you wanted to use the IDE drive as a Pagefile scratch disk, that might actually help. What OS are you using?

    The Delta 2496 is a decent card, but don't expect full 24 track live recording on it; you'll need to go much bigger for that. How many live tracks are you going to be recording?


    I have just realised this morning that my old computer has 1 SATA (either sata1 or sata2) hard drive where the OS is installed and then I have 1 IDE hard drive. So in total I have 4 hard drives. Should I use 3 SATA or 3 SATA with 1 IDE?

    What is Page scratch disk?

    I have been using XP PRO 32bit all this time but since my DAW is a 64 compatible I will then go with WIN XP 64bit and see how it goes plus the only way I can really enjoy the 8 GB RAM is if I work with XP 64bit.

    This DAW is more for a post production, mixing mostly although I will record few tracks for it will only be one track at a time so that's fine.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    if all you're doing is post and maybe 2 or even 4 tracks at a time, then this machine will perform admirably.

    You can move the windows paging file to the IDE disk, but with 8gb of ram and 64bit xp (a smart move, btw) this is basically unnecessary.
  • solutionizesolutionize
    edited July 2009
    primesuspect wrote:
    if all you're doing is post and maybe 2 or even 4 tracks at a time, then this machine will perform admirably.

    You can move the windows paging file to the IDE disk, but with 8gb of ram and 64bit xp (a smart move, btw) this is basically unnecessary.

    Yeah I hope it works smoothly,
    So I'm going to go with this hard drive setup,
    1 SATA for OS
    1 SATA for Samples
    1 SATA for Projects,

    would it mess up the performance or anything else if I used the IDE hard drive as a drive to back up my Projects once in a while? More precisely if the IDE is plugged in the mobo with the other 3 SATA drives, could it create any conflict in the system?
  • miragemirage
    edited July 2009
    I used one of these with a 160GB Seagate IDE harddisk. It worked well (no NCQ though) without any major performance loss (that harddisk is not fast anyway). Ordered another one to eliminate the IDE cable of a DVD-ROM in my home server which is blocking the air intake.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    No, keep the IDE plugged in, it definitely can't hurt system performance just by virtue of being plugged in. I'm just saying don't use it for any "active" audio purpose.
  • solutionizesolutionize
    edited July 2009
    primesuspect wrote:
    No, keep the IDE plugged in, it definitely can't hurt system performance just by virtue of being plugged in. I'm just saying don't use it for any "active" audio purpose.

    Cool dude will do,
    thanks a lot for the advice.
    Seems to be running ok, just need to install a 1000 things now and see what this baby is capable of.
    :rockon:
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    Get yourself an avatar, look around the other forums, say hi, and stick around. You've found a great place to hang out :)

    Welcome to IC!
  • TimTim Southwest PA Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    SATA and IDE drives will work in the same computer, but if you were doing something special like RAID or whatever, I'd say go with all of one kind.

    My new PC I built in January (just before the price of 4870's dropped :O) has a new 500 GB SATA drive for the OS and backup file storage, while my older 250 GB drive has my WoW and TF2 files on it and a bunch of movies and other videos and stuff. It's all backed up on the 500 GB drive in a special folder, but I normally run it all from the 250 GB drive.
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