How To Configure PC for Best Photoshop Performance???

I just got a 150GB Raptor 10,000 rpm hard drive w/ 16MB buffer. I’m trying to determine how best to use it for fastest PS CS2 performance.

Here’s my rig:

cpu: AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ 2.0 GHz (OC’ed to 2.48 GHz, stable) mobo: DFI LP nF4 SLI-DR, great board & BIOS
ram: 2 x 1GB OCZ Platinum Dual-channel DDR500 (PC4000, 250 MHz, running 1:1, 3-3-2-7) gpu: ATi AIW X600 Pro, 256MB, 4 pixel pipes, …old… yada yada. OS: XP Pro SP2 32-bit
Apps: Adobe CS2 Premium Suite & Macromedia studio 8
hdd’s: 3 x 250GB Western Digital Caviar SE16’s 7200 rpm, 16MB buffer, SATA II ———————————————————— –

I’m currently running 2 x 250GB as RAID 1 (mirrored):
Partition (p/n) 1: 4096 byte clusters (req’d for boot), OS, programs, extensions, filters, utilities, security.
p/n 2: 32kb clusters: files, docs, photos, videos, music, website designs, etc.

1 x 250GB is full back-up for disk images of boot & mirror array, and archives. ———————————————————–

I tend to like partitions and larger clusters, not just for access/write performance (a little better), but because I don’t need to defrag my drives hardly at all. I like RAID 1, it offers better back-up so I don’t always worry if I haven’t backed-up recently enough.

I don’t want to buy another 250GB ($70) to go RAID 1+0, my next hdd’s would be 400GB or larger… I’d like to work w/ what I’ve got. Then again… RAID 1+0 might be best, huh?

I realize my video card has almost no performance value to PS, hence the lagging card (also bought to xfer analog video tapes to digital). I’m NOT a gamer, so I’ll leave this alone for now.
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Here’s what I’m thinking of (space is BEFORE formatting):

150GB Raptor:
p/n 1: 38GB, 4096 byte clusters, OS, programs, utilities, security, games, etc. I need 15% empty for defrag in Windows.
p/n 2: 102GB, 64kb clusters, Adobe CS2 Suite, photos, videos, music, and other large files. p/n 3: 10GB, 64kb clusters; used as a temporary disk for xfers from my camera/mem card for post-processing. Then saved to Raptor p/n 2.

2 x 250GB Caviar SE16’s- RAID 1, mirrored array:
p/n 1: 100GB, 16kb clusters; files, docs, address books, e-mail archives, etc. p/n 2: 150GB, 64kb clusters; archived (less recent than Raptor p/n 2) photos, videos, and other large files.

1 x 250GB Caviar SE16 for full disk images of Raptor and RAID 1 array, for complete back-up. Using 4096 byte clusters, would make this drive bootable in emergency, right?
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Obviously, the 250GB for back-up is redundant after a RAID 1, maybe I should add it to the RAID 1 for faster access/write times? Or sell it for about $50? I’d rather use it if I can.

It also can seem redundant to have photos on the Raptor AND the RAID 1, but I can shoot LOTs of GB’s of photos pretty quick, so I’ll need somewhere to save/move ’em. Mostly, I want to utilize the Raptor’s speed while Post-Processing.

Does this seem like a good set-up w/ my gear? Is there a better way to configure all this? Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks in advance. Cheers.

-david