Best Hard Drives????

[1ctabor]

Which ones do you recommend and Why? Is it worth it to go huge or stay in the 80gig range and get more quality over quanity?

[Fhantazm]

I HIGHLY reccomend the WD Special Edition 120Gig HD. Its a perfect balance between speed and storage with its 8meg cache.

[gateways_rule]

I would also recommend that 120GB WD hard drive. Also, I would recommend that you check out Maxtor and Seagate hard drives.

[s1203372]

I think it's impossible to name one IDE hard drive the best right now. For speed, the 200 MB WD Special Editions are the current cream of the crop, with the IBM 180GXP following and then the smaller WD Special Editions. For quietness, nothing touches the Seagate Barracuda IV and V. Reliability is owned by Quantum, but good luck finding one.

Check storagereview if you want to see details.

[superjohnny]

Hey s1203372 IBM is selling their drive business because of the high failure rate of the 75GXP (is that the right one? I always forget which model). Quantum sold their assets to Maxtor and are now focusing on data security. Ever wonder why Maxtor switched to liquid bearings? Quantum technology.

Where you been man?

Western Digital, Maxtor and Seagate are ruling the PC drive market right now. I use dual Maxtor 40GB drives striped in my main system and they work great. The "sweet spot" in buying right now is 80 GB for around $100.

[s1203372]

Originally posted by superjohnny
Hey s1203372 IBM is selling their drive business because of the high failure rate of the 75GXP (is that the right one? I always forget which model). Quantum sold their assets to Maxtor and are now focusing on data security. Ever wonder why Maxtor switched to liquid bearings? Quantum technology.

Where you been man?

Western Digital, Maxtor and Seagate are ruling the PC drive market right now. I use dual Maxtor 40GB drives striped in my main system and they work great. The "sweet spot" in buying right now is 80 GB for around $100.

OK, lets look at these point by point.

1. IBM is selling their hard drives due to high failure rates on the 75GXP - Nope. They are selling their hard drive business because they have developed nanotech based technology that will replace hard drives that they think they can bring to market in about 5 years. That, coupled with the fact that HDD's is a low margin arm of IBM, makes selling their business a very smart move. Since the 75GXP, IBM has had 2 other lines which perform quite well (120GXP and 180GXP) and one that was about industry standard (60GXP). Before the 75GXP, they had never had a bad HDD line. The IBM selling because of the 75GXP is a popular myth, but one that bears little scrutiny to dismiss. Here the EE Times article with info on the nanotech HDD replacement tech (2nd or so paragraph from end, millipede tech): http://www.eetimes.com/sys/news/OEG20021105S0036 Here's another article you might find enlightening on the subject: http://radio.weblogs.com/0001275/2002/06/11.html Lastly, they are not actually selling out to Hitachi - they retain a 30% stake in the business.

2. Quantum sold out to Maxtor - True, and Maxtor is still marketing Quantum drives under the Maxtor brand, because Quantum carries quite a bit of weight in the marketplace. Go look at their SCSI list - It's all Quantum. They also still sell Fireballs.

3. Source of fluid dynamic bearings - Actually, that was Seagate, not Quantum. Last paragraph, Seagate started using them in HDD's in 1997. Maxtor got the idea from them. http://www.seagate.com/cda/newsinfo/...95^5^1,00.html

Where have I been? Out researching and learning. you?

Edit : fixing URLS

[number1sixerfan]

I've had good experiences with Maxtor and Western Digital drives.

[xaero1]

I just bought a 60gb Maxtor DiamondMax 9 which has fluid bearings... i haven't heard the bloody thing once!

Its a nice drive, although i don't know how it compares in terms of performance with Seagate and IBM drives.

[Nasty]

Well, I currently have a Western Digital 120GB WD1200BB hard drive with a standard 2MB cache. But will I see any performance difference by switching to a Maxtor 120GB DiamondMax Plus 9 with an 8MB cache?

[s1203372]

Originally posted by Nasty
Well, I currently have a Western Digital 120GB WD1200BB hard drive with a standard 2MB cache. But will I see any performance difference by switching to a Maxtor 120GB DiamondMax Plus 9 with an 8MB cache?

I'm sure you would, although I can't find any reviews to show it. You would also see substantial improvements by going with a 120 or 180 GB 180GXP w/ 8MB buffer or a 200 GB (not the smaller varieties) WD2000JB. The smaller WD's are fast, but can't keep up with the two drives I just mentioned.