Deal: WD 500GB Sata Hard Drives $150.00 [Sitemap] - Digital Grin Photography Forum

Art Scott

Dec-21-2006, 08:56 PM

So here's my question:

I don't know any HD manufacturers. They're all strangers to me. One has a 500gb drive for $150. Another has a 250gb for $179. There are others that are cheaper/larger or smaller/more expensive.

How do you know which to buy and why?:scratch

When I was working in the computer mfg'ing industry there was only 4 actual manufacturers of hdds....they were Hitachi, Western Digital, SeaGate and Maxtor....we kept some of all of them around at times and at others it was just what ever was available...but the favs were Seagate & Hitachi with Maxtor in third and western Digital coming in last...this was based on noise level and warranties......from Experience Seagate is still the quietest and has best warranty (5yrs) while the rest range from 90 days to 1 yr....

So make your pick by Warranty and price.....I still favor Seagate due to quietness and warranty....If you look you'll find great prices on Ebay and Tiger Direct and other online retailers that sometimes will be much cheaper than Best Buy even paying the S/H.......

Good luck and hope this has been of help.

gluwater

Dec-21-2006, 11:02 PM

Western Digital Raptors are sweet but pretty expensive.

Gary couldn't you have posted this earlier? I checked at the local Best Buys and they were all out. How's it goin up in Michigan?

Zanotti

Dec-22-2006, 05:02 AM

Seagate and Maxtor merged as a company, but I believe they still market under tow names.

NHBubba

Dec-22-2006, 08:00 AM

the favs were Seagate & Hitachi with Maxtor in third and western Digital coming in last...this was based on noise level and warranties......Just to play devils' advocate, Seagate drives have proven to be some of the least reliable for me. I have had zero failures from Maxtor or WD in recent memory, yet I've had 3 Seagate drives go belly up in the last 18 months alone.

Fortunately they do honor their warranties and get replacements out to me. I'm only down for about a month or so, that's all. :huh

dragon300zx

Dec-22-2006, 11:00 AM

Western Digital Raptors are sweet but pretty expensive.

Gary couldn't you have posted this earlier? I checked at the local Best Buys and they were all out. How's it goin up in Michigan?

If anyone want's one of these I will go out and pick one up as long as they still have them here which they should cause there was a bunch of them. And I can ship them out.

Things are going ok. Michigan is cold, trying to figure out what traveling I want to do this next year. Need to get out to chicago soon.

DavidTO

Dec-22-2006, 12:19 PM

trying to figure out what traveling I want to do this next year.

Glacier.

dragon300zx

Dec-22-2006, 04:31 PM

Glacier.

I thought that was full up already?

I just checked for glu and there are a bunch of stores here with these still in stock. I have limited funds as I haven't made a deposite recently (haven't had time to get to the bank) but if there are a couple more people who want them I should be able to get a few just PM me.

DavidTO

Dec-22-2006, 06:20 PM

I thought that was full up already?

:nah

mikeb380

Dec-22-2006, 07:59 PM

When I was working in the computer mfg'ing industry there was only 4 actual manufacturers of hdds....they were Hitachi, Western Digital, SeaGate and Maxtor....we kept some of all of them around at times and at others it was just what ever was available...but the favs were Seagate & Hitachi with Maxtor in third and western Digital coming in last...this was based on noise level and warranties......from Experience Seagate is still the quietest and has best warranty (5yrs) while the rest range from 90 days to 1 yr....

So make your pick by Warranty and price.....I still favor Seagate due to quietness and warranty....If you look you'll find great prices on Ebay and Tiger Direct and other online retailers that sometimes will be much cheaper than Best Buy even paying the S/H.......

Good luck and hope this has been of help.
Art, my impression was thatSeagate bought WD several yearts ago and consolidated the Manufacturing lines. I've bought both and have seen no difference in noise level. As far as warantee, it makes no difference. If the equipment gets through the first 70 hours it will work through any warantee. When I was working on computers I would use norton to run seeks and writes and reads non stop for 3 days or so, that way it was in warantee if it broke. Now, I throw it in my computer and hope and I've only had one drive die on me, a seagate 80gig drive and it lasted over 3 years. It sounded like a stripped gear with no lube for about 3 years or so.
Michael

mikeb380

Dec-22-2006, 08:04 PM

Man, everybody knows Mickey M0use is a duck!! :clap

mikeb380

Dec-22-2006, 08:21 PM

I just checked and Best Buy here ( well, one out of two stores) has them in stock. at sale price.
Western Digital - 500GB Internal Hard Driv --- Columbiana Mall SC 370 Harbison Blvd, Sale: $149.99
They have them BO on the web site but expect some within the next century.

I'll pick one up wednesday if they still have any.

Michael

jhilman

Dec-22-2006, 08:27 PM

Art, my impression was thatSeagate bought WD several yearts ago and consolidated the Manufacturing lines. I've bought both and have seen no difference in noise level. As far as warantee, it makes no difference. If the equipment gets through the first 70 hours it will work through any warantee. When I was working on computers I would use norton to run seeks and writes and reads non stop for 3 days or so, that way it was in warantee if it broke. Now, I throw it in my computer and hope and I've only had one drive die on me, a seagate 80gig drive and it lasted over 5 years. It sounded like a stripped gear with no lube for about 3 years or so.
Michael

Actually, Seagate bought Conner... WD is still it's own company. Hitachi is formally IBM. I own Hitachi and WD drives. While I was in the IT industry(I still am actuall), building and rolling out workstations, we used Seagate drives and had many failures. We also used Maxtor drives and I replace a bunch of them in legacy systems. They last for a while but get real noisy when they are about to die. Bottom line is ALL hard disks are going to fail at some point. WD can extend the 1 year warranty out to 3 for a fee, and I highly recommend doing that, but I've collected on my warranty with WD twice and both times I got advanced shipping of a new drive with my credit card.(nothing was ever billed to it). And both times my capacity had increased due to my model being discontinued. I'll stick with WD for my money.

davev

Dec-23-2006, 04:45 PM

Ok, so I checked Worst Buy on line to see if the have them in town.
They have them at 8 stores near me. But I need info.

I'm using an Imac. The hard drive says it's compatible with PC's. It doesn't
say anything about Mac's. Does anyone have this in an external USB box
using it on a Mac?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Thanks.

dragon300zx

Dec-23-2006, 07:25 PM

It should work as long as you know how to format the drive to a mac then it should be fine. The drives aren't partitioned or formatted at all out of the box. A sata drive is a sata drive in a mac or a PC as long as the mac has the drivers for it shouldn't be a problem.

Deacon

Dec-23-2006, 08:34 PM

I just picked up a Lacie 500gb for $179 at COMPUSA. They have an immediate price reduction then an online rebate for $60 to net the cost at $179. I think I paid over $350 a year ago. The current HD has held up very well, no problems. The first one shorted out, cat pulled the plug out during operation. They replaced the HD no questions asked.

Impressed,

deacon

Shima

Dec-23-2006, 09:16 PM

Just for those who don't know, Best Buy sales go Sunday-Saturday...

...so there will be new sales tomorrow. It was a great week for buying hard drives though!

I love working at Best Buy :) (Geek Squad here ^_^)

Treven

Dec-24-2006, 12:04 PM

The first of Dec I bought a WD 250 gig external drive for my VAIO, for $150. I'd list them as Seagate, WD, & Maxtor a distant third. I've had bad luck with Maxtors in the past so I'd probably do without if Maxtor was all that's available. I got my drive at Best Buy.

mikeb380

Dec-24-2006, 01:53 PM

The 500 gig HD is off sale at best buy but they have the WD 250 in either SATA or the Ultra ATA for $80.00. I don't know these two interfaces, what does each do and which should I buy? :dunno

bwg

Dec-24-2006, 02:45 PM

The 500 gig HD is off sale at best buy but they have the WD 250 in either SATA or the Ultra ATA for $80.00. I don't know these two interfaces, what does each do and which should I buy? :dunnoSATA is faster, but it's a newer interface so you need to check see what your computer can handle. If your computer was new in the last year or so it probably has a SATA interface, but check to make sure.

That is a great deal, I'm not a huge fan of WD (I've had 2 fail in the last year), but i'm tempted at that price.

mikeb380

Dec-24-2006, 04:38 PM

SATA is faster, but it's a newer interface so you need to check see what your computer can handle. If your computer was new in the last year or so it probably has a SATA interface, but check to make sure.

That is a great deal, I'm not a huge fan of WD (I've had 2 fail in the last year), but i'm tempted at that price.

Hi, webguy
Thanks for the answer, I thought that was the case but wanted to be sure of it.I do have SATA on the MB so I can just plug and format, right? Or do I need drivers for win98se? I'll probably get XP Pro next week and may wait til then to install.

bwg

Dec-26-2006, 03:23 AM

Hi, webguy
Thanks for the answer, I thought that was the case but wanted to be sure of it.I do have SATA on the MB so I can just plug and format, right? Or do I need drivers for win98se? I'll probably get XP Pro next week and may wait til then to install.Wait till you get XP as I dont *think* 98 will be able to see all 250GB.

tonyd

Dec-26-2006, 10:51 AM

Just to play devils' advocate, Seagate drives have proven to be some of the least reliable for me. I have had zero failures from Maxtor or WD in recent memory, yet I've had 3 Seagate drives go belly up in the last 18 months alone.

Fortunately they do honor their warranties and get replacements out to me. I'm only down for about a month or so, that's all. :huh
Perhaps it's just the luck of the draw? :dunno At work we've been purchasing perhaps 50 PC's per year and I've found that the ones that come with Maxtor drives seem to fail like clockwork with the Seagate and WesternDigital drives being the most reliable - But this is just my experience at work. At home I have WD and Seagate drives which haven't failed yet, but are destined to be replaced very soon with 500GB drives.

mikeb380

Dec-26-2006, 11:34 PM

I was going to get that 500gig Best Buy had but they were too fast for me and took it off sale, however, you can get two of the 250s for about the same price. I think $10 more. I can mount two SATA drives on my MB. Can either look at it as twice as safe, or as twice probability of trouble. LOL I gtuess you can flip a coin.

In the last 20 or so years, I've had both Seagate and WD in various conputers and have had good luck with them, only changing for larger drives. I've never used Maxtor because a computer tech told me not to use them and a couple of others which were out and now are gone. I'm still listening. Obedient aren't I? Wish my daughter listened that well.

Thanks for your help and advice, I'll go get the drives tomorrow.
Michael :barb

gus

Dec-26-2006, 11:39 PM

I was going to get that 500gig Best Buy had but they were too fast for me

Like any digital storage relating to computers...just wait a few weeks & it will prob be even cheaper.

mikeb380

Dec-27-2006, 04:51 AM

Like any digital storage relating to computers...just wait a few weeks & it will prob be even cheaper.

Gus, with my luck they will probably have a shortage of magnetic dust in Shanghi and the price of drives will treble. either that or cadmium plates. Or do they use diamond now?

Whatever

Fristles

Jan-06-2007, 09:23 PM

My personal fav. is the Seagate, WD coming in second and then Maxtor.. I have had bad experiences with Maxtor and little less problems with WD - along with few other people I know.

But everyone have their opinions about computer parts :) So it's really up to you what you prefer and what you wanna try out. :D

So here's my question:

I don't know any HD manufacturers. They're all strangers to me. One has a 500gb drive for $150. Another has a 250gb for $179. There are others that are cheaper/larger or smaller/more expensive.

How do you know which to buy and why?:scratch

ian408

Jan-06-2007, 09:33 PM

500mb? feh (http://news.com.com/2300-1041-6147373.html)...

dragon300zx

Jan-06-2007, 09:44 PM

500mb? feh (http://news.com.com/2300-1041-6147373.html)...

Yeah and depending on the price your still onna be better off with 2 500gb drives. But then again I could go from 6 or 7 hdd's to 2. Hmmmm, yeah not worth the extra money right now.

ian408

Jan-06-2007, 10:10 PM

Yeah and depending on the price your still onna be better off with 2 500gb drives. But then again I could go from 6 or 7 hdd's to 2. Hmmmm, yeah not worth the extra money right now.

I don't know about that. We have about 20tb of spinning data.
With some of the new verification techniques, we expect to increase our
storage requirements as much as 100x (yes, that's one hundred times).
At 300mb/disk, that's a lot of disks at RAID-5. Higher capacity drives mean
less space, lower power consumption and reduced HVAC requirements.
Will the cost be low to start out? Doubt it. It'll likely be something more
in the commercial and so called "power user" spaces for some time.
Then again, the time it took to see 250gb drives become common place.

mikeb380

Jan-07-2007, 06:51 AM

500mb? feh (http://news.com.com/2300-1041-6147373.html)...

Ian, that was gig notmeg. I give500meg away, too small to use. well maybe forC drive.

dragon300zx

Jan-07-2007, 09:16 AM

I don't know about that. We have about 20tb of spinning data.
With some of the new verification techniques, we expect to increase our
storage requirements as much as 100x (yes, that's one hundred times).
At 300mb/disk, that's a lot of disks at RAID-5. Higher capacity drives mean
less space, lower power consumption and reduced HVAC requirements.
Will the cost be low to start out? Doubt it. It'll likely be something more
in the commercial and so called "power user" spaces for some time.
Then again, the time it took to see 250gb drives become common place.

I'm talking about me having over a TB of data at home already, I'm not talking about in a commercial setting.