Hard drive recommendations

[Emirzan]

I'm looking to purchase a new hard drive but I'm prepared to admit I don't really know what to look for, basically I'm asking what makes a good hard drive?

I'd like a 500gb model with at least reasonable performance but most important to me is reliability and quiet operation (so not a performance 10k rpm model). Any advice would me much appreciated.

[Mithrandir]

WD 640gb AAKS at just under £52 on scan

[Zhaoman]

WD 640gb AAKS at just under £52 on scan

Quiet, reliable, and best of all: it destroys a RaptorX and matches the speed of a Velociraptor.

[Mithrandir]

even better its £50.xx on this weekend.

[Emirzan]

Thanks guys, sounds like what I want. I've bought western digital in the past and not had any failures (as of yet) so seems like a decent brand. And at that price it's something silly like 8p per gigabyte, most certainly affordable

[inonefly]

Quiet, reliable, and best of all: it destroys a RaptorX and matches the speed of a Velociraptor.

how? i cant see how it beat a raptor for the random access time

[sleepyhead]

Don't forget the Samsung Spinpoint F1 HDDs During the BRIEF period my pc was together and on, that HDD was very quiet. I can only guess that the speed is good too.

[peterb]

Samsung, WD, Seagate - all good drives. Some defend their choice with an almost religious fervour, but basically all will be OK. I personally use samsung - quiet and (for me) reliable. WD are on offer this weekend on Sacn - but Samsung will be there in a week or too - and the saving is only a couple of pounds if you can't wait.

I have also used Hitachi drives in the past - they went through a bit of a bad patch, but I guess they have come thropugh that - but having switched to Samsung, I have s6tayed with them.

The only ones that seem to get negative comments are Maxtor.

You didn't say if the drive was to replace an existing drive, or as a second one in the same machine - but with that amount of data, start thinking backup.

A hard drive is an electromechanical device - so it isn't a question of 'if it fails' - only a question of when - and that applies to any drive - of whatever make.

[Koolpc]

Are those WD one's dual platter?

640 GB Western Digital WD6400AAKS Caviar Blue, SATA 300, 7200 rpm, 16MB Cache, 8.9 ms

[Zhaoman]

All 640Gb drives are dual platter

Makes buying a lot easier

[Emirzan]

Indeed they are, which is the best thing I've learnt this week! Did a bit of trawling through past pages of the hardware forum and there is a discussion here about it:

High density platters! Yarrr!

Been reading up on raid too, very tempted to get 3 of those WD 640GB drives and run them in raid 5

[Koolpc]

So the 640 WD are dual platter? Can Scan confirm this? After one asap!!

[Emirzan]

Well I did a bit of reading on various tech sites and this anandtech article explains it fairly well in my opinion.

Western Digital 640GB - Twice the Platters, Twice the Fun

I suppose a confirmation from scan wouldn't hurt but I don't think there is any version of the 640 GB drive apart from the dual platter one. At least for now.

[Koolpc]

Thanks

[Mithrandir]

THIS might also help.

[wzix]

Check out www.aria.co.uk super specials they normally have different bargains each day on Hard Drives