Utility to find number of platters?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Bob WIllard
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Bob WIllard

Tony said:
Is there one that will tell me how many platters, etc... are in a WD HD?
Click to expand...

Yep; several: IE, Netscape, Opera, Mozilla, etc. Joint point the
browser of your choice to www.WDC.com, armed with the HD model number,
and look up the specs.

I don't know of a utility which probes HDs to determine the platter
count. Since there is no way to ask a PATA/SATA HD what its real
platter count is, the only way AFAIK is to run rather extensive timing
tests; extensive, in order to defeat the various caches (OS, HD, maybe
but rarely controller). And note that the C/H/S scheme has been bogus
for years, since (nearly all) HDs do internal translation to create fake
C/H/S values.
 
FWIW,

I own 3 DiamondMax9 80GB drives. 2 of 'em have one platter and one of 'em
has 2 platters. The drive with two platters is clearly "thicker" in the
underside-platter region (I don't know of the technical term for this area)
compared to the one platter drive. If you had a similar drive of 'known"
construction, this may or may not work. Again, I am just passing along my
own experience.

Good Luck!!!!
 
Bob said:
I own 3 DiamondMax9 80GB drives. 2 of 'em have one platter
and one of 'em has 2 platters....
Click to expand...


Is the one with 2 platters louder for armature movements?
Is the difference readily apparent so that you can recognize
which HD you are hearing?

*TimDaniles*
 
I believe that it is louder, but I suppose that could be for other reasons
as well..... Sometimes I wonder if I am "trying" to hear it as louder....
Either way, it is not obtrusive at all. I tend to like to hear when my
drives are working anyway :) But within reason of course....
 
Bob said:
I believe that it is louder, but I suppose that could be for other reasons
as well..... Sometimes I wonder if I am "trying" to hear it as louder....
Either way, it is not obtrusive at all. I tend to like to hear when my
drives are working anyway :) But within reason of course....
Click to expand...


Thanks to all for the help.
 
I have a broken WD1000 (100GByte caviar) with the lid off. It's got three
platters. Not sure if all sides are used though.
 
Maybe, maybe not. You are able to determine the number of platters by the
LBA number on the unit. I don't remember the numbers though...

--
Robert Pendell
(e-mail address removed)
 
I have a broken WD1000 (100GByte caviar) with the lid off.
It's got three
My WD1200 (120 Gig) has two platters but earlier ones had
Click to expand...
three.

I hate to sound like an old fart, but WD's old drive naming
scheme was great... Number of platters? Check the first
digit.

I guess with today's capacities there'd be too many trailing
zeros.
 
Alan said:
All you have to do is to look at head map using pc-3000 and you will know
how many heads/platters are in particular HDD
Click to expand...

Interesting. The PC-3000 that I know of is not the utility app that the OP
asked about, since it includes custom hardware. Do you know of an app that
runs under Windows (or even DOS) that will capture and display the real
(physical) C/H/S map info without special hardware?
 
Is there one that will tell me how many platters, etc... are in a WD HD?
Click to expand...

Used to be that the model number gave this info but I think you'd just
have to go research the model on the wdc.com site.
 
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