16mb or 32mb hdd cache?

[rob123]

right now NCIX has 500 gb seagates with 16mb cache for $68.99.
the 32 mb cache is approx $10 more.

my situation: i dont like to burn things to dvd. i like to have them relatively instantly available. i like to just buy more hard drives. so with the exception of my "C" drive everything else is just storage for "files" to be played back

my question is: just for storage and playback of "files" does the extra 16mb of hdd cache make much or any difference?

thx for your time

rob123

[Jack Rabbit]

The effects of larger cache on hard drives are hard to measure with benchmark tools. There are very few real world situations where you would be able to actually see a difference.

I'm guessing you mean like movies and music and documents and stuff. You can copy a 700M movie in a couple of minutes but if you "use" it you will want to get that same data over the 120 minutes of run time so the drive will be mostly idle. The average MP3 playlist is probably 50-100M long so by the time it started to repeat you would have overflowed the cache and the drive will have to go back to the disk.

[rob123]

thx kindly for the reply. i've gone around the web a lot more and it seems that for the "C" drive it may or may not matter, depends on the application. for other drives in the system that are used as i indicated i use mine it doesnt really matter.

i know i found an answer ( sort of) on the web but i like to come here to get an unbiased, friendly opinion where a newby isnt looked upon with condescension.

i would like to thank Jack Rabbit for his quick reply.

rob123

[Jmac]

I have both the 7200.10 (16 MB) and 7200.11 (32 MB) drives and I would definitely opt for the 32 MB version. It's faster and quieter, though I'm not sure if I can attribute either of those directly to the cache size.

[Jack Rabbit]

Originally Posted by Jmac

I have both the 7200.10 (16 MB) and 7200.11 (32 MB) drives and I would definitely opt for the 32 MB version. It's faster and quieter, though I'm not sure if I can attribute either of those directly to the cache size.

According to the Seagate web page you get 16M 7200.11 drives but NCIX does not seem to sell them so I am guessing the OP is comparing a 7200.10 to an 7200.11. All other things being equal the cache is probably not worth it but there are other factors to take into consideration. The 7200.11 are RoHS compliant and consume less power. The are also not the first generation for perpendicular recording technology so they are probably better at it. For $10 I would get the newer one.

[freakgeek1337]

The 7200.11 are much more durable than the 7200.10s. That alone would be the winning factor.

7200.9
7200.10
7200.11

[Dashock]

use 3 7200.11 and 3 7200.10 in my house and the 7200.11 run quieter and cooler and i already have to send 2 of my 7200.10 into repair so ill let it speak for itself i love seagate though!