I do amateur editing, so don't want/need to pay for a RAID set up. But I'm a bit conflicted about 2.5" vs 3.5".
I'll be using an SSD for the OS drive. As for storage, I was initially going to go with a 1TB
2.5" 7200rpm drive (or two), but then I've seen a few comments that a
3.5" 7200rpm drive has faster sustained transfer speeds than a 2.5" equivalent, along with claims that because the 3.5" drives are larger, they have more solid/reliable parts. I've read a couple claims of lower latency as well. I'm having trouble finding a solid discussion on the subject, so this is bits and pieces of info I've seen on various sites.
As for speed, the HGST 7K4000 3.5" supposedly has a
sustained transfer speed of 171MB/s ("typical"). While the
HGST 7K1000 2.5" 7200rpm has a 'media transfer rate' of 160MB/s MAX (1284 megabits/s). A
WD Black 6TB 3.5" drive (just for comparison) claims a max of 218MB/s. I don't think I've seen a 2.5" drive claim a max over about 160MB/s.
Incidentally, HGST drives are said to be the most reliable hard disks, having the
lowest failure rate of the big three brands in 2013 and 2014. The WD Blacks seem to have blazing benchmarks, but fail much more often.
I'd love to drop down to 2.5", but it seems to me 3.5" is still a worthy contender?
Any feedback would be great.
thanks