There's a new revision to the Seagate S-ATA drives, which has boosted performance considerably -- it's something they've done to the command queuing... not sure about the details, but performance seems to be on par with the 10,000 rpm Raptors now.


J.

...and the seagates are supposed to be fairly quiet, too.

Here's 300GB SATA for $229:

http://shop3.outpost.com/product/4116853

This one doesn't have NCQ though... I might be oldfashioned, but I get 2*200GB w/o NCQ for 10 euros more than what that 300GB drive costs here, plus the ability to spread the load on two discs...

The Seagates are not on par with the 10k rpm Raptors, but close to it. The noise level is a lot better than with the raptors. For more details, I'm refering to this.

@Another User said:

In any case, no current SATA hard disk is ready to hold a candle to the WD740. The data rate is too high and the access times are too short.

Read full article here:
http://www6.tomshardware.com/storage/20041116/index.html">http://www6.tomshardware.com/storage/20041116/index.html

Personally, no seagate comes near any DAW in my world... ever again.... if you know a little about the manufacturing background, and seagate in generell.... well.... enough said

Hehe, I linked to that before... and you know about Maxtor's and Hitachi's manufacturing background? I don't of neither, but could imagine they are all about the same...

@PolarBear said:

This one doesn't have NCQ though...

The 300GB does have NCQ.

Evan Evans

Ah, I rated by the price, the link you were providing didn't workfor me before, and I assumed we were talking about Seagate. There are however two Seagate 300GB S-ATA models, one that has NCQ and one that doesn't. Since this is a Maxtor, you are right. Haven't seen tests on this drive yet, so can't say how it is performing. It still applies though, that I can get more capacity and therefore could spread the load on two discs for about the same amount of money.

PolarBear

I have a part-time job at a Mac service and 2nd hand sales shop (been there about 3.5 years). We've been through all the major manufacturers of ata drives, and Seagate is by far the most reliable, and the best all-round performer, for the money. Maybe "Tom" has shares in Western Digital?
And besides, knowing what happens "back stage" at the average restaurant would probably stop most people eating out! [:D]

J.

@jbm said:

I have a part-time job at a Mac service and 2nd hand sales shop (been there about 3.5 years). We've been through all the major manufacturers of ata drives, and Seagate is by far the most reliable, and the best all-round performer, for the money. Maybe "Tom" has shares in Western Digital?
And besides, knowing what happens "back stage" at the average restaurant would probably stop most people eating out! [:D]

J.

[8-)] yeah, thats why I stopped eating junk food long ago. [:D]

Seriously, from my own experience, seagates are not reliable at all in heavy duty environments, and plenty of befriend admins and heavy duty operators think the same. I gave it another go 18 month ago with 160 gig drives.... 4 out of 6 went nuts, bunkers, krrrks, .... in less than 6000 hours.... muchas gracias... [6]

And yes, I have a little inside in QM of Seagate production, not maxtor or any other, just late night beers with people who have to sign responsible on a lets say relevant scale ... and boy I would not like that job at all [:D] talking about compromise would be a joke for starters....

Anyways, Seagates are probably the right choice for the average Joe Soap, but for critical apps., personally I would not touch them anymore.

HD production quality went down since demand went up and pricewars caused pressure on manufacturing, thats a fact, I mean come on, lets see the warranty specs, I have 5 years on my Raptors, for a fraction of the costs that I would need for SCSI at somewhat comparable performances. Standard drives come with what... 1 years warranty, if at all.... mind the small print....