Quantcast

Forum Login

feed image
Directory Guides Latest Guides

FastSilicon's Guide To Storage Technology: Part 1 PDF Print E-mail
Wednesday, 03 January 2007
Article Index
FastSilicon's Guide To Storage Technology: Part 1
SATA (Serial ATA)
SCSI (Small Computer Systems Interface)
Conclusion

EIDE (Parallel ATA)

storage2EIDE, or sometimes called simply IDE disks, are the cheapest and lowest end of consumer mass storage devices. What makes them low end? Well for starters, compared to their brethren, they are just slower. I am using slow as a relative term, because it's not like you can move 50 million groups of information every second can you? IDE/EIDE mass storage devices are just plain slow. The drive itself is usually comprised of 6-10 platters (the individual metal discs that hold the data), two heads for each platter, and a spindle speed (speed at which it rotates) set nice and low at either 5400 or 7200 revolutions per minute. Now, this isn't exactly a slow rotation. Can you move your arm in a circle 5400 times in a minute and accurately hit any point on your arm on every revolution? No. But a machine can. The main difference between the lowest end of mass storage devices and the highest end is their spindle speed. The faster a platter spins, the faster the read heads can read data off it.

storage3In the midst of all of this negativity, IDE/EIDE drives have 2 significant advantages over their faster, more expensive brethren. The first of these is price. When it comes down to it, IDE/EIDE disks are just plain cheap. 300 Gigabyte drives can be had for just $70. That is a nice chunk of storage for cheap, agreed? The second major benefit of IDE/EIDE storage is their platform adoption. IDE/EIDE is the most common storage option on consumer grade PC's, and is widely available. Also on a side note, as a sort of secondary point to advantage 2, is the mass array of storage options in IDE/EIDE disks. You can have a very large storage system for only a few hundred dollars. We are talking 2-4 Terabytes of storage capacity for less than $500. IDE/EIDE disks are absolutely unmatchable in terms of storage per dollar. Case and point: If you are looking for cheap and dirty massive amounts of storage, there is nothing better than a large disk array of IDE drives.


 
© 2003-2008 Fastsilicon Media. All Rights Reserved