Hard Drive recommendations?

[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Hard Drive recommendations?

Posted: 3/29/2002 8:19:06 AM EDT

My hard drive is dying so I'll need to pick up a new one this weekend. I don't want IBM because I've had awful experience with them (brand new drives dying after 6 months) and no maxtor either (slow and noisy..at least they were a couple years ago). My dying drive is a western digital which laster about 3.5 years...that's not very impressive but I've had better luck with WD than with IBM. Are seagate drives worth considering? My friend's is approaching two years and it seems to be of pretty good quality. I'm not to worried about specific sizes...anywhere from 30-80gb probably but I do want 7200rpm and ata100. Any specific or general thoughts would be welcome. Thanks!

Posted: 3/29/2002 8:32:08 AM EDT

[#1]

From what I remember about Seagate is that there IDE drives suck, but I think they have gotten better over the years. WD make an ok product, I have seen a lot of failures with other people systems, but for me I have not had a single drive fail on it’s own out of the 7 that I have in use here.

With that said, I say get one of those new Seagate 7200 RPM, they use some kind of liquid system to support the platter instead of ball barring and should be supper quite and fast. I think $100 will buy you a 40 or 60 gig HD these days.

Edited to add links:
[url=http://www.datadrive4all.com/index.cfm?t=pif&id=9415]Drive Vender[/url] first hit on pricewatch
[url=http://www.seagate.com/cda/products/discsales/marketing/detail/0,1081,383,00.html]Drive Specs[/url]

- Sulaco

Posted: 3/29/2002 8:50:57 AM EDT

[#2]

You gotta keep in mind that in this industry a lot happens in a few years. I happen to have a pair of Maxtors at 7200RPM, they don't really make any noise at all. As far as speed, your Motherboard or IDE interface needs UDMA support. Your drives can be as fast as they come, but can't do shit with a slow interface.
You can probably tell if the support is there by looking at your bios settings. If it's not, you'll probably want to pick up a new IDE card as well.

Posted: 3/29/2002 8:54:21 AM EDT

[#3]

WD is the leader in IDE right now. I've used their drives almost exclusively for four years and have had two in-use failures and one OBF on 12 personally owned drives. The other 10 are are still turning to this day. (7 IDE and 3 SCSI)

The two that failed were a 2.1 GB (Out of Warranty:died after a long and valorous career as an NT boot drive), and a 6.4 GB that died after a "friend" borrowed it (Dropped the drive and broke off the power receptacle: made a hideous screeching noise thereafter...no, I didn't bother to try and RMA it, I did get a replacement HDD from said "friend")

I've had one (pleasant) RMA experience with them. An OBF 8.4 GB drive, turnaround was under 14 days, and I am 5 days away by UPS ground.

Good drives, great service overall.

Posted: 3/29/2002 4:28:29 PM EDT

[#4]

We've been installing Seagate and WD drives (50+ over 2 years) with no failures so far.

Posted: 3/29/2002 9:29:29 PM EDT

[#5]

You know heat is the enemy of drives (especially drives spinning at 7200+), so no matter what you do, make sure you have a good flow of air from front to back.

I have systems running 10 year-old SCSI drives with zero failures that I attribute to the additional fans I put in those systems.

Posted: 3/29/2002 10:19:49 PM EDT

[#6]

Maxtor, maxtor, maxtor.

IBM is the only drive I've ever had that had a head crash a few years ago and I couldn't recover the data. Will never buy another one.

WD, had one failure. I think they're the 'volume leader' but I havent been particularly impressed.

After I started using Maxtor drives I haven't had a single problem with them. They're pretty much all I install anymore. YMMV.

Posted: 3/30/2002 5:58:03 PM EDT

[#7]

I couldn't tell you a brand but I would for sure get it 10gig (at least) bigger than you think you will need. Has anyone noticed that all the programs are getting huge lately?? Why is that

Posted: 3/30/2002 6:04:18 PM EDT

[#8]

Buy Western Digital , great RMA policy , its what I've used for 4 years in my business of computer building .

Posted: 3/30/2002 6:04:56 PM EDT

[#9]

As others have said, Seagate makes a gooddrive. Also, try Quantum. I have a pair of three year old quantum drives in my system, and they're completely reliable.

Again, as others have said, avoid WD. I've heard bad things about IBM drives recently, but have a pair of SCSI 9.1GB Deskstars that have been running great for a few years.

Posted: 3/30/2002 6:10:10 PM EDT

[#10]

IMHO seagate and Quantum drives are great. If you want fast go SCSI, or RAID.

Posted: 3/30/2002 6:19:31 PM EDT

[#11]

As with everything else experience varies. I have built ~ 20 machines the past year and a half. Family friends and coworkers who want something cheap and I just recycle as many parts as I can. Update CPU and motherboard memory and sometimes HD. I get to recycle machines from work so I always have spare parts. I always get an IBM GXP drive when I buy a new HD. I have not had any go bad and I've installed ~ 10. I get them at www.accessmicro.com or www.buy.com. WD does have a new 10,000RPM IDE with an 8mb cache. The review on Tom's Hardware has some good info http://www4.tomshardware.com/storage/02q1/020305/index.html

Robert

Posted: 3/30/2002 6:30:50 PM EDT

[#12]

Seagate Barracuda in 7200RPM is the way to go. They are alot better IDE wise than before. I have built over 100 computers as a past time in the past 6 months. All using Seagate, and not one problem....Good luck in your search.

Posted: 3/30/2002 6:35:41 PM EDT

[#13]

my maxtor drives aren't noisy
and lately they've been getting great reviews in magazines

Posted: 3/30/2002 7:18:59 PM EDT

[#14]

Quoted:
my maxtor drives aren't noisy
and lately they've been getting great reviews in magazines

View Quote

Maxtor is a great drive. My second choice!

Posted: 3/30/2002 7:56:37 PM EDT

[#15]

Diehard IBM Deskstar fan. only drive I have never had fail. Very fast. Work great, I put them in everything I build.

I still have my Quantum, works fine, but the ones that came out after they got bought out by whoever bought them they went to the dogs. The ones I had after that ( U160 SCSI ) crashed about a year and a half after I got them. both of them.

WD remember the 1.6gig? I remember replaceing allot of those for the college kids at CU when I worked out there. I also have a 6.4gig, works as a storage space, but won't work as a bootable device.

Maxtor, never really liked them since the 540MB one I had. They are allright for cheap storage space, but I won't use one for a OS drive.

Seagate used to be awsome, but they went downhill also.

Posted: 3/30/2002 9:11:45 PM EDT

[#16]

Death to Seagate! I used to build a lot of computers and bought a case of ST-251, and they were all bad. Seagate would not honor the warranty. I vowed never to buy another Seagate product as long as I live. It has been 15 years and I still remember.

I use mostly IBM drives now, and have never had a problem with any of them. The last few Maxtors I have are still going too, but I like the IBM's better. I once had a Quantum go out, I their support was fantastic.

Posted: 3/30/2002 9:17:10 PM EDT

[#17]

I had a Quantum Bigfoot drive that died within 1 year. Somehow, the polarity on the drive got reversed, and any machine with it plugged into would not even turn on...I mean, no memory check, nuthin. Remove the drive, and all was fine. It was weird. This was about 2 years ago, but I won't buy another Quantum again.

Posted: 3/31/2002 4:33:44 AM EDT

[#18]

Every Quantam Bigfoot drive I have ever had has died within one year. They did replace them, but who needs the grief? Quantam=BAD. Maxtor has also been a pain in the arse, but I have not tried them in several years. Have never had a problem with Western Digital. All (400 or so) are still running great after 5+ years. Seagate has also worked well, although have had to replace a couple of them. I've had very good luck with [url]www.accessmicro.com[/url] for hard drives and memory. Good service and fast shipping, and you can usually get a competitive price from them. Good luck! [:D]

[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Hard Drive recommendations?

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