Thinking about new HD

[BIGSHaW]

Heya fellas....long time

 

I was always big fan of WesternDigital so I was thinkning somehting of their brand around 160Gigs with 7200RPM....

 

Now that kinda HD is very within my budget but I was wondering if there is something out there I dunno about? Last time I heard there were 10k RPM drives??? if its true, is there a big difference in having faster RPM and how does it affects reliablilty?

 

Also feel free to recommend any other reliable brands

 

Thank you

 

EDIT: is there anything good on horizon that I prolly should wait for???

Edited September 18, 2004 by BIGSHaW

[Birdman]

I think 10K drives are a waste of time as long as the max size is under 100GB.

 

I also think WD makes great drives.

 

But I prefer hitachi.

 

I own several Hitachi and they are all great performers.

 

the 7k250 is almost as fast as the 10k WD drive in some tests and is faster than the 7200 RPM drive in most tests.

 

Maxtor has a 16MB buffer drive out, but can't recommend it.

 

7k250 reviews

http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/200311141/index.html

 

http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20031001/index.html

 

Purchase a 7k250 PATA here

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductList....B&Brand=HITACHI

 

SATA here

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductList....B&Brand=HITACHI

Edited September 18, 2004 by Birdman

[All Kill3r]

i'd take Birdmans advice and not get a 10k drive. I have a 10k 36gig raptor drive and and 8mb 40gig 7200rmp IDE drive and can't notice a diff. Get a bigger SATA/IDE drive on 7K rpm with 8mb cache.

[Kenger]

I am running two 74 gig raptors and i can notice the difference in speed compared to one 7200rpm hd.

[BIGSHaW]

Ok thanks for replies fellas!

[auggybendoggy]

shaw,

I recommend samsung spin point fluid silent drives.

 

very nice drives.

 

aug

[BIGSHaW]

silent drivers? u mean they are not making noise at all????

[auggybendoggy]

yea no clicking or spinning.

 

thats all i use and ive got no hd probs.

 

but i specially like having noiseless pc's.

 

thats what I'm aiming for with my co. is to make NO NOISE pc.

its common for musicians with daws (digital audio workstations).

 

if you look at any samsung drives and the part number is SP

then its a spin point. you'll see fluid dynamic bearings in the

descriptions

 

aug

Edited September 19, 2004 by auggybendoggy

[Birdman]

you'll see fluid dynamic bearings in the

descriptions

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

If im not mistaking both WD and Hitachi drives have the same kinda bearings, and both offer low noise options when you check out their S.M.A.R.T. settings(if noise pollution is an issue).

 

For the record the harddrive is usually the last thing you have to worry about when it comes to noise in a PC.

[auggybendoggy]

its true about hd being last on the noise but when I buy the samsung they are out of the box silent. When I've used WD or MAX (never used hitachi) they are a bit louder on the spin.

 

I've never gone into bios and made them silent. I don't think I've ever seen the capability on em.

 

Aug

 

i will check out those smart settings though thanks for the tip

[Guest zerodamage]

Smart Settings should be on if you have it. It is an error tool that many 3rd party applications can use to detect HDD problems.

[Birdman]

True.

 

 

You can also get SMART utilities from the hard drive manufactor that will let you change and monitor settings on the harddrive.

 

Feature Tool (v1.94) 

The Feature Tool allows you to control some of the features of our Deskstar and Travelstar high performance ATA hard disk drives and supports 48-bit addressing, so it will work with the new large capacity drives. This version adds support for our latest drives.

 

Support for Travelstar EA models

Support for Deskstar 7K400

Support for Promise and SIL 3112 SATA Controllers

 

The Feature Tool allows you to:

 

Enable or disable the read-ahead or write cache.

Change the drive Automatic Acoustic Management settings to the:

Lowest acoustic emanation setting (Quiet Seek Mode), or

Maximum performance level (Normal Seek Mode).

Change the predefined capacity of the drive. This option can be used in situations where there is a BIOS limitation and the drive is not recognized. See the  Users Guide for specific details.

Switch the Ultra DMA mode

Change Advanced Power Mode - allows you to change between the lowest power consumption and the highest power consumption (maximum performance level).

Show Drive Temperature - shows the current drive temperature in Celsius and Fahrenheit.

 

Hitachi Downloads Page

Edited September 20, 2004 by Birdman