About a new Hard Drive

Ghot · 18 Apr 2021

Jaylob4 said:

Thanks.

He hasn't mentioned ram or requiring it, just wanted to surprise him with a little extra, he's a great lad, they all are.

I agree, I wouldn't do odd things with ram, match or nothing but if 16gb is enough, I think I will leave it for now.

I will grab an extra cable, just in case.

That's what the board looks like, I can see inside the case but most of MB it is obliterated by a whopping great graphics card and the biggest CPU fan I've seen.

Thanks again Ghot, very much appreciated

.

The single SATA cable on amazon UK was 4.99, the three pack was 5.51
Get the three pack... that way when he wants another 4TB drive, you'll be set.

/edit

I'm addicted to this stuff. I blame England.

Amazon.com

hdmi · 18 Apr 2021

Jaylob4 said:

Bless you Ghot, thankyou.

I'm going to order today WD red 7200RPM.

I don't suppose my GS has any connector cables for the HDD, what do I need to get him?

I'm going to stretch the budget a bit and get him an extra stick of ram, he has 16gb of ram on board, no idea what make or speed, I will find that out and match it.

I note his ram slots, 2 are filled Dimm A2 & Dimm B2, can I just buy an extra 4 gig of ram and what slot should it go into?

Thanks for the conversion info' I will get him to sort it-------or may me give it a go myself.

For stability and performance, it's always better to buy memory as a 'matched kit' so, to upgrade from 16GB (2×8GB) you want to get a 32GB (2×16GB) matched pair. It means you'd need to get rid of the old RAM sticks, and, the vast majority of games available on Steam do not benefit at all much from such an upgrade so then the net result will be more akin to homeopathy. Save your money towards a future upgrade of the GPU card and maybe also a bigger and faster SSD─and towards a full overhaul of the whole PC for when the time is right.

On a side note, while I agree that the WD Red are excellent HDDs, the read speed is still slow compared to any modern SSD. If you really need that much extra storage capacity and you don't want to break the bank, HDDs will be the best choice. But the WD Red is intended to be used in a NAS that keeps the drives spinning 24/7, which, typically, a gaming rig isn't. If a HDD crashes, people who are smart just buy a new one. Outside of a NAS, they don't fret over the fact their HDD choice has a couple percent less durability on average, as this doesn't in any way eliminate the need to make reliable backup copies of important data so when they choose a HDD, they go first for performance vs cost ratio, small theoretical differences in reliability always second excepting only maybe if the price difference is like almost zero difference. So, absolute brand loyalty tends to be only for those who believe in some kind of fantasy world that makes them feel like they are the smartest people who ever lived.

Jaylob4 · 18 Apr 2021

Ghot said:

The single SATA cable on amazon UK was 4.99, the three pack was 5.51
Get the three pack... that way when he wants another 4TB drive, you'll be set.

I'm addicted to this stuff. I blame England.

BIB, will do, I thought two cables were required to connect HDD to board and power?

jbcarreon123 · 18 Apr 2021

Jaylob4 said:

BIB, will do, I thought two cables were required to connect HDD to board and power?

the power cables is included in the PSU...

If the SATA Power cables cannot find or missing (for modular power supply), you can buy it on Amazon. Note that it is needed to fit in the right slot, or you have a flirty nightmare. (I don't know if the PSU manufacturer has proprietary slots)

Ghot · 18 Apr 2021

Jaylob4 said:

BIB, will do, I thought two cables were required to connect HDD to board and power?

The wide cable is the power. It already comes with the power supply.
The smaller cable is the data cable, which runs from the drive to the motherboard.

If he built the computer himself, the SATA power cable(s) came with the power supply.
Hardwired on a non-modular power supply, or loose in the box on a modular power supply.

If it was a prebuilt computer, look for extra SATA power cables folded up and stashed in the case somewhere.

The SATA power cable can be purchased too, depending on the type of power supply.
It will usually be 6 pin PCIe connector on one end or molex on one end.
Either type will be 15 pin SATA power on the other end.

Any local computer store will have or can get one of those also.

Can't really find links for SATA power cables, without knowing what the power supply situation is.

Jaylob4 · 19 Apr 2021

jbcarreon123 said:

the power cables is included in the PSU...

Ghot said:

The wide cable is the power. It already comes with the power supply.
The smaller cable is the data cable, which runs from the drive to the motherboard.

Of course- of course, dumb of me.

When we built our PC about 6-7 year ago, I used a Corsair brand PSU 400w affair, which has been great.

But most of the connectors were the white plastic 4 pin jobs--much later when I installed a couple off SSDs, I converted the existing power connectors so I could connect them,--I forgot--stupid

I was referring to that memory, thinking of my GS needs.

Thank you Ghot, thank you JB.

Ghot · 19 Apr 2021

Jaylob4 said:

Of course- of course, dumb of me.

When we built our PC about 6-7 year ago, I used a Corsair brand PSU 400w affair, which has been great.

But most of the connectors were the white plastic 4 pin jobs--much later when I installed a couple off SSDs, I converted the existing power connectors so I could connect them,--I forgot--stupid

Thank you Ghot, thank you JB.

White plastic 4 pin jobs are molex connectors.

Like this...

With male molex...
Cable Matters 3-Pack 4 Pin Molex to SATA Power Cable (SATA to Molex) - 15cm: Amazon.co.uk: Computers & Accessories

With female molex...
StarTech.com SATA to LP4 Power Cable Adapter - F: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics

jbcarreon123 · 19 Apr 2021

Jaylob4 said:

But most of the connectors were the white plastic 4 pin jobs--much later when I installed a couple off SSDs, I converted the existing power connectors so I could connect them,--I forgot--stupid

That 4-pin connector in an white shell or plastic is called molex connectors.

/edit

3 in a half inch drives are using either SATA or Molex connectors or both.

Ghot · 19 Apr 2021

Or you could just get something like this...

EVGA G3 550 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (220-G3-0550) - PCPartPicker

Not too expensive and has a 7 year warranty.
Is also fully modular, so you only use the cables you need.

1 x 24Pin ATX
1 x 8pin (4+4) EPS (CPU)
3 x 8pin (6+2) PCIE
6 x SATA
4 x Four-Pin Peripheral
1 x Floppy

Why it has a floppy connector... who knows. LOL

sygnus21 · 19 Apr 2021

Ghot said:

@Jaylob4

Western Digital Red Pro 4 TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (WD4003FFBX) - PCPartPicker

The Red Pro is nice but it's really suited to NAS (I have four 6TB Red Pro drives in my 4-bay WD NAS box). I'd recommend a 4TB WD Black ($149.99) which is what most gamers who use HDD's for their games use. I used them until I went HDDless in my system opting instead for a dedicated 2TB SSD drive for all my games, and removing the games I no longer want or play.

And since the motherboard is an ASUS Prime B 350 Plus, I'm 99.999.999 percent sure it's running in UEFI mode, so there's no issue with large drives. I think we need to keep it simple for the OP.

My two cents.

BTW, I too have Steam as well as some other game platforms all my games are on my 2TB SSD drive.

Edit... I see the OP is going with the Red instead; not a bad choice