Best brand of hard drive?

void · Feb 5, 2004

I'm starting to get a little suspicious of my IBM Deskstar 45GB hard drive.
Twice in the last few days I have heard a noise come out of my computer. Both
times it was kind of like a squealing noise that lasted for almost a second.
And both times the noise happened while I was saving a file, which is why I
suspect the hard drive.

So what's the best brand of hard drive nowadays? A few years ago I would have
said IBM and maybe Quantum are good brands, and Seagate and Western Digital
are terrible brands. But a few years is an eternity in the computer world, so
maybe IBM is not so good nowadays.

Rod Speed · Feb 5, 2004

I'm starting to get a little suspicious of my IBM Deskstar 45GB hard drive.

You should.

Twice in the last few days I have heard a noise come out of my computer.
Both times it was kind of like a squealing noise that lasted for almost a
second. And both times the noise happened while I was saving a file,
which is why I suspect the hard drive.

It is likely dying.

So what's the best brand of hard drive nowadays?

No such animal.

A few years ago I would have said IBM
and maybe Quantum are good brands,

Quantum has had its share of duds too, particularly the FireBalls.
I always maintained that it was tempting the gods to call it that.

and Seagate and Western Digital are terrible brands.

You'd have been wrong.

But a few years is an eternity in the computer
world, so maybe IBM is not so good nowadays.

They appear to have got thru they worst of their
disasterous problems with their GXP drives but
have now flogged the entire operation to Hitachi.

I still dont care for the way they do things, particularly with RMA
returns, no cross shipping, and the fact that they never did have
the balls to ever admit to any problem with their GXP drives.

So I punish them by not touching their drives and
that's sure to have the Hitachi suits pouring from their
windows like lemmings as soon as they realise that.

I like Samsung's currently. Amazingly quiet, so quiet that
you have to check carefully that its spun up, even with the
covers still off the PC. Full 3 year warranty on all their drives,
unique in the industry currently. And very decent drives too.

Main problem is that they ship less than anyone else and
so they are certainly harder to find in the market and you
dont get the most aggressive price discounting with them.

Paul · Feb 5, 2004

So what's the best brand of hard drive nowadays?

Never pay them just for their "brand".
so-called "brand strategy" - it's just something like this
http://www.age-of-the-sage.org/psychology/pavlov.html

And usually, you don't know who manufactured the parts of this
"branded product". Sometimes, you don't even know who manufactured the
product.

void · Feb 6, 2004

I did some research and saw a lot of complaints about Western Digital and
Maxtor drives, so I eliminated those brands. So it was between Seagate and
Samsung. The Seagates supposedly are noisier and hotter than the Samsungs,
and also don't perform as well (according to a review on storagereview.com),
so I ordered a Samsung SP1213N (120GB w/ 8MB) from newegg.com. I hope it
works out well.

Will Dormann · Feb 6, 2004

void said:
I did some research and saw a lot of complaints about Western Digital and
Maxtor drives, so I eliminated those brands. So it was between Seagate and
Samsung. The Seagates supposedly are noisier and hotter than the Samsungs,
and also don't perform as well (according to a review on storagereview.com),
so I ordered a Samsung SP1213N (120GB w/ 8MB) from newegg.com. I hope it
works out well.

Seagate noisier?

http://storagereview.com/php/benchmark/bench_sort.php
Select to sort by noise level.

The 4 quietest drives are Seagates.

-WD

Arno Wagner · Feb 7, 2004

Previously void said:
I'm starting to get a little suspicious of my IBM Deskstar 45GB hard
drive. Twice in the last few days I have heard a noise come out of
my computer. Both times it was kind of like a squealing noise that
lasted for almost a second. And both times the noise happened while
I was saving a file, which is why I suspect the hard drive.

So what's the best brand of hard drive nowadays? A few years ago I
would have said IBM and maybe Quantum are good brands, and Seagate
and Western Digital are terrible brands. But a few years is an
eternity in the computer world, so maybe IBM is not so good
nowadays.

I would have supported the statement about Seagate a few years ago.
Today I think Maxtor and Seagate are fine. Samsung may be the
way to go if you need the HDD to be quiet. WD seems still suspicous,
and IBM/Hitachi is suspect for the next few years.

From personal experience, I have now 40 Maxtors running and
4 Seagates. No problems so far except for some Maxtors that where
damaged (dropped) during shipping. One thing with the damaged
Maxtors though: The SMART-status still read "passed" when one
of them already had 1500 reallocated sectors and was unusable
slow. Now I monitor reallocated sectors in all these disks.
None has shown up so far. Also Maxtors need airflow and Seagates
should have airflow or a cooler.

With Maxtor you have to be careful with the warranty. I think
currently it is 3 Years for HDDs with at least 120GB and 8MB
cache. For Seagate something like this, but checck the website
to be sure. Samsung unfortunately offers only 1 year, and my
personal policy is not to buy HDDs with less than 3 years
warranty.

Arno

CSS · Feb 7, 2004

Arno Wagner said:
I would have supported the statement about Seagate a few years ago.
Today I think Maxtor and Seagate are fine. Samsung may be the
way to go if you need the HDD to be quiet. WD seems still suspicous,
and IBM/Hitachi is suspect for the next few years.

From personal experience, I have now 40 Maxtors running and
4 Seagates. No problems so far except for some Maxtors that where
damaged (dropped) during shipping. One thing with the damaged
Maxtors though: The SMART-status still read "passed" when one
of them already had 1500 reallocated sectors and was unusable
slow. Now I monitor reallocated sectors in all these disks.
None has shown up so far. Also Maxtors need airflow and Seagates
should have airflow or a cooler.

With Maxtor you have to be careful with the warranty. I think
currently it is 3 Years for HDDs with at least 120GB and 8MB
cache. For Seagate something like this, but checck the website
to be sure. Samsung unfortunately offers only 1 year, and my
personal policy is not to buy HDDs with less than 3 years
warranty.

The warranty on Samsung HDs in the US is three years. See:
http://www.samsungusa.com/cgi-bin/nabc/support/warranty/b2c_warranty_main.jsp?eUser=

I recently purchased a Samsung 160 gig after having three WD drives each
fail for various reasons within a short period of time after install (two
developed a high-pitched whine within a week of install, the other started
causing problems at boot-up after about a year). WD's three-year warranty
was, to me, essentially worthless. The WD drives failed so quickly (all
within a year) and the refurbished replacements only had a one-year
warranty. I could have gotten a warranty replacement for the last WD
failure, but I decided not to bother.

Samsung is also much, much quieter than WD (not as quiet as the Barracuda,
but darn close). As soon as Samsung makes a 200+ gig drive, the whiny WD
200 gig is going to be replaced (if it lasts that long).

Arno Wagner · Feb 7, 2004

Previously CSS said:
Arno Wagner said:

Previously void <[email protected]> wrote:

Click to expand...

[...]
The warranty on Samsung HDs in the US is three years. See:
http://www.samsungusa.com/cgi-bin/nabc/support/warranty/b2c_warranty_main.jsp?eUser=

Nice. Maybe we will get that in Switzerland also. The I'll definitely
give Samsung a try.

Arno

David A.Lethe · Feb 7, 2004

Previously CSS said:
Previously CSS said:

Arno Wagner said:

Previously void <[email protected]> wrote:

Click to expand...

[...]
The warranty on Samsung HDs in the US is three years. See:
http://www.samsungusa.com/cgi-bin/nabc/support/warranty/b2c_warranty_main.jsp?eUser=

Click to expand...

Nice. Maybe we will get that in Switzerland also. The I'll definitely
give Samsung a try.

Arno

Isn't this whole thread a bit silly?
Best brand?!!!

What is the "best" brand of memory, CPUs, or toothpaste? There is no
best brand. There can't be one unless all manufacturers made only one
product, and they all had the same specifications. Would you ask the
question what is the best brand of car? Why do you ask this about
disk drives?

Go back to square one. What are your performance requirements, what
is your target price, your desired reliability/MTBF, warranty
requirements, how many GB do you need, etc...

SLB · Feb 7, 2004

Isn't this whole thread a bit silly?
Best brand?!!!

What is the "best" brand of memory, CPUs, or toothpaste? There is no
best brand. There can't be one unless all manufacturers made only one
product, and they all had the same specifications. Would you ask the
question what is the best brand of car? Why do you ask this about
disk drives?

Go back to square one. What are your performance requirements, what
is your target price, your desired reliability/MTBF, warranty
requirements, how many GB do you need, etc...

Hehe i agree totally. As for seeing more posts about WD and Maxtor
having issues, WELL DUH there are a ton more of em out there so sure
your going to see more posts.

CSS · Feb 8, 2004

SLB said:
[...]
The warranty on Samsung HDs in the US is three years. See:
http://www.samsungusa.com/cgi-bin/nabc/support/warranty/b2c_warranty_main.jsp?eUser=

Nice. Maybe we will get that in Switzerland also. The I'll definitely
give Samsung a try.

Arno

Click to expand...

Isn't this whole thread a bit silly?
Best brand?!!!

What is the "best" brand of memory, CPUs, or toothpaste? There is no
best brand. There can't be one unless all manufacturers made only one
product, and they all had the same specifications. Would you ask the
question what is the best brand of car? Why do you ask this about
disk drives?

Go back to square one. What are your performance requirements, what
is your target price, your desired reliability/MTBF, warranty
requirements, how many GB do you need, etc...

Click to expand...

Hehe i agree totally. As for seeing more posts about WD and Maxtor
having issues, WELL DUH there are a ton more of em out there so sure
your going to see more posts.

Here are my "stats":
3 WDs. 3 failures.
1 Seagate. No failures.
1 Samsung. No failures.
60% of my drives have failed over the past two years.
100% of my WD drives have failed
0% of my Samsung and Seagate drives have failed.

I've had a TON more WD drives that any other brand. And a TON more WD
failures.

void · Feb 8, 2004

What is the "best" brand of memory,

It might be a tie between Crucial and Mushkin for the top spot.

CPUs

Given all the problems I've experienced and read about the various chipsets
for AMD cpus, I would have to say Intel. Obviously a chipset problem isn't
the CPU's fault, but you can't use a CPU without the chipset and motherboard.
I am already favoring an Intel cpu for my next computer, whenever I decide
it's time to upgrade.

, or toothpaste?

For $1 or $2 per tube, I don't really care what brand I buy.

There is no
best brand. There can't be one unless all manufacturers made only one
product, and they all had the same specifications. Would you ask the
question what is the best brand of car?

For cars, most people probably don't care about the brand as much as where it
is made (i.e. USA or Japan).

Why do you ask this about
disk drives?

If there is one component in your computer that you want to be sure is the
best, it is the hard drive. Out of all the bad things that can happen on a
computer, losing data is probably the worst.

Arno Wagner · Feb 8, 2004

Previously CSS said:
[...]
Here are my "stats":
3 WDs. 3 failures.
1 Seagate. No failures.
1 Samsung. No failures.
60% of my drives have failed over the past two years.
100% of my WD drives have failed
0% of my Samsung and Seagate drives have failed.

I've had a TON more WD drives that any other brand. And a TON more WD
failures.

What you call a TON, I call a statistically insignificant small
sample. 3 I not a ton when making this sort of statements. Even
my sample of about 40 Maxtors is still too small. Usually
you cannot even begin to make reliable statements unless you have

100 devices. The problem here gets additional difficulties from

different operating conditions.

Aeno

J. Clarke · Feb 8, 2004

void said:
It might be a tie between Crucial and Mushkin for the top spot.

Given all the problems I've experienced and read about the various
chipsets
for AMD cpus, I would have to say Intel. Obviously a chipset problem
isn't the CPU's fault, but you can't use a CPU without the chipset and
motherboard. I am already favoring an Intel cpu for my next computer,
whenever I decide it's time to upgrade.

What problems have you heard of or experienced with AMD or nVidia chipsets?
Or the recent SiS for that matter?

For $1 or $2 per tube, I don't really care what brand I buy.

For cars, most people probably don't care about the brand as much as where
it is made (i.e. USA or Japan).

Other than a few die-hard Japanese-haters I don't think anybody really cares
about that enough to research it--the brand name gives no information about
country of manufacture anymore.

Bob Davis · Feb 8, 2004

Here are my "stats":
3 WDs. 3 failures.
1 Seagate. No failures.
1 Samsung. No failures.
60% of my drives have failed over the past two years.
100% of my WD drives have failed
0% of my Samsung and Seagate drives have failed.

I've had a TON more WD drives that any other brand. And a TON more WD
failures.

On the contrary, my stats over the past four years:

WD, 7 drives, no failures
IBM, 4 drives, 1 failure
Maxtor, 1 drive, no failures

chrisv · Feb 9, 2004

I did some research and saw a lot of complaints about Western Digital and
Maxtor drives, so I eliminated those brands.

Well, seeing how popular those two brands are, yes, you'll see a fair
number of complaints. They're about as good as any other company, it
seems to me. I buy Maxtors.

chrisv · Feb 9, 2004

CSS said:
I've had a TON more WD drives that any other brand. And a TON more WD
failures.

Bad luck, maybe? Myself, harddrive failures are something I almost
never see. For work and home, I've probably deployed 100 of them in
the last 10 years, and I can't recall a real hard "crash" of ANY of
them. Most of them have been WD, with Maxtor being my favorite brand
lately. A few IBM's and Seagates, too.

They just don't fail.

CSS · Feb 9, 2004

chrisv said:
Bad luck, maybe? Myself, harddrive failures are something I almost
never see. For work and home, I've probably deployed 100 of them in
the last 10 years, and I can't recall a real hard "crash" of ANY of
them. Most of them have been WD, with Maxtor being my favorite brand
lately. A few IBM's and Seagates, too.

They just don't fail.

I've never had any HD failures in the almost 20 years I've been involved
with PCs either, until the past year and a half or so. To be fair, I
consider the WD drives to have "failed" when they develop an unbearable
high-pitched whine after a few days of operation, as two of mine did (the
third was a hard failure that scrambled data). Maybe not a hard "failure"
per se, but they started out quiet and got noisy to the point I couldn't
stay in the same room with the PC.

Best brand of hard drive?

void

Rod Speed

Paul

void

Will Dormann

Arno Wagner

CSS

Arno Wagner

David A.Lethe

SLB

CSS

void

Arno Wagner

J. Clarke

Bob Davis

chrisv

chrisv

CSS