Western Digital or Maxtor? Which is better?

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3in4

Spped and reliability are in question. Need to buy a 160gb SATA drive for my new system. Both are in the sub $120 range.
Please let me know ur thoughts.

Dennis
 
I'd buy Samsung (if you prefer quiet) or Hitachi (for the best
performance in the 7200 rpm class), or Seagate as a fallback option.
From WD I'd only buy a 2nd gen Raptor (their 7200rpm drives show
noticeably higher idle noise levels than those of other manufacturers;
in fact, the Raptors are much quieter), and current Maxtors' reliability
seems average at most.

Stephan
 
Spped and reliability are in question. Need to buy a 160gb SATA drive for my new system. Both are in the sub $120 range.
Please let me know ur thoughts.

Dennis
Click to expand...

Maxtor are probably faster, but they are not reliable. After saying
that, my WD drive I bought a few weeks back had a fault, but my
friends assure me I was just unlucky.
 
Both are decent drives.

Maxtor have really improved over the last 12 months or so. Their new drives are
very good. I've used quite a few of their Plus 9 drives which all use fluid
bearings and they are almost silent in operation, fast too. I've not had any
duff ones so far in the last 30 to 50 I've fitted. TBH You wont go wrong with
either make.

John
 
Maxtor currently has serious reliability problems. WD's are solid as a
rock.

--
DaveW



3in4 said:
Spped and reliability are in question. Need to buy a 160gb SATA drive for
Click to expand...
my new system. Both are in the sub $120 range.
 
3in4 said:
Spped and reliability are in question. Need to buy a 160gb SATA drive for my new system. Both are in the sub $120 range.
Please let me know ur thoughts.

Dennis
Click to expand...

I've always used Maxtor drives and have been satisfied with their
performance and reliability. I'm down on Western Digital because there
was a compatibility with the IDE ports on my ABIT KT7A. As I recall,
you had to cut a wire on the cable to make it work. Anyway, I give the
edge to Maxtor just because of the compatibilty. Also, they tend to be
cheaper because I see more rebate aggressive offers for Maxtor. HTH.

arnie
 
reliable??? Seagate

I'd never use 'reliable' and WD in the same sentence in a positive light.

3in4 said:
Spped and reliability are in question. Need to buy a 160gb SATA drive for
Click to expand...
my new system. Both are in the sub $120 range.
 
3in4 said:
Spped and reliability are in question. Need to buy a 160gb SATA drive for my
Click to expand...
new system. Both are in the sub $120 range.
Please let me know ur thoughts.

Dennis
Click to expand...



I have not had a single Maxtor drive go bad in the last 3 years i have used
them. Very quiet and fast. i just got my first WD raptor drive,very quiet and
very fast,although a bit pricey. DOUG
 
KJ said:
I'd never use 'reliable' and WD in the same sentence in a positive
light.
Click to expand...

I'd agree with that. Over the past few years I have had 4 Western Digital
drives fail on me. Two were replaced under warranty. One of the replaced
ones failed as well.

On the three systems I currently have running, I have 3 Maxtors and 1 WD
(because someone gave it to me - and its the kids' computer, so no great
loss if it dies) The Maxtors are great. Quiet, reliable, seem to perform
well.

--
"Outback" Jon Gould | Let those who RIDE,
2003 Kawasaki Concours (wreck)|
1976 Honda CB750F (needs work)| DECIDE.
1972 Yamaha DS7 (project) |
(e-mail address removed) | HELMET LAWS SUCK
CQ CQ CQ de KC2BNE |
______________________________|____________________________
AMD XP 2400+ @ 2105 MHz 768M PC2100 DDR @ 280 MHz
Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe 120GB and 40GB Maxtor HD
Asus GeForceFX 5600 (330/650) Cornerstone 21" Monitor
Sony 52x40x52 CDRW NEC MultiSync 17" Monitor
Sony 8X DVD+-RW Nostromo n50 Speedpad
http://folding.stanford.edu - got folding? Team 33432
 
Just goes to show that everyone will offer their opinion which are
typically based on a very small sample set of experiences. In my
experience, I've had 2 drives fail, a Seagate (1 gig) and an IBM GXP
drive (20 gig). Nary a failure with many Quantum, WD, and Maxtor
drives. But a sample set of approximately 20-30 (my experiences) out
of the hundreds of millions of drives produced does not yield valid
statistical data.

--
Best regards,
Kyle
| reliable??? Seagate
|
| I'd never use 'reliable' and WD in the same sentence in a positive
light.
|
| | > Spped and reliability are in question. Need to buy a 160gb SATA
drive for
| my new system. Both are in the sub $120 range.
| > Please let me know ur thoughts.
| >
| > Dennis
| >
|
|
 
Its a toss up..
Some prefer Maxtor, others WD.
I use nothing but WDs and Maxtor.
Out of all the drives I've installed - the highest failure rate goes to WD.

Having said that - in my own system I used 2 maxtor 120 SATA's in a RAID 0
config. One failed after only 4 weeks. It's replacement is a WD.
The arrangement is different now, but the WD is noticably quieter than the
remaining Maxtor.
BUT...if I did some analysis I bet I'd find the Maxtor is faster....
Then again - if I had the $$$$ I wouldn't dick around with any flavour of
IDE.
I'd do it right and buy Fujitsu SCSI's....

JT.
 
Maxtor are probably faster, but they are not reliable. After saying
that, my WD drive I bought a few weeks back had a fault, but my
friends assure me I was just unlucky.
Click to expand...

In the 20+ years I've been purchasing drives I can say that every vendor
produces a batch of bad drives in cycles. As you switch from the current
problem vendor they clean up their problem and the next vendor comes out
with a bad batch, then the next vendor, etc...

What you need to do is find a vendor that still provides a 3+ year
warranty on their hard drives and then read current technical reviews on
the drives. In most cases, unless a drive fails in the first 30 days
it's going to operate for years without a problem.
 
The WD 250GB I bought has only 1 year warranty. They have an extended
warranty to go 3 years for around $20. Maybe I should buy the extended
warranty. Does anyone know if they have restriction on when you can buy the
warranty? eg. within one month of purchasing the warranty?

TIA
 
I have had Maxtor in the past and encountered nothing but problems. I have
usd WD ever since with no problems. I have been using the WD 80gig 8mb
cache.


3in4 said:
Spped and reliability are in question. Need to buy a 160gb SATA drive for
Click to expand...
my new system. Both are in the sub $120 range.
 
cpliu said:
The WD 250GB I bought has only 1 year warranty. They have an extended
warranty to go 3 years for around $20. Maybe I should buy the extended
warranty. Does anyone know if they have restriction on when you can buy the
warranty? eg. within one month of purchasing the warranty?
Click to expand...

The 1 year warranty is a manufacturer's warranty.

The extended warranty is probably the vendor's warranty, and
hence the purchase time frame and the terms of the warranty
would be set by the vendor. If it is a vendor's warranty, make
sure the vendor has been around for a few years and seems likely
to be around for a few more - there is not much point in buying
their warranty if they'll go tits up next month.
 
A small follow-up to my previous post. It should be considered that
the usage of each HD has an impact on life expectancy. If the case
has poor ventilation/cooling, you might expect the HD to fail sooner,
particularly the 7200 rpm (or faster) HDs which tend to run quite
warm.

Presently, I have 2 HDs in this system, a WD and an IBM, both 40 gig.
The IBM is running 6-10 degrees C hotter due to the case design and
the internal placement of the HDs. I expect the IBM may not last as
long under these conditions. Presently, the WD drive is at 36C and
the IBM at 42C. I note the IBM drive is used only for early morning
HD backup right now, so it spins-down most of the time, yet its temp
remains much higher than the WD drive due to it's position within the
case (the IBM drive rests in a 5-1/4 drive bay that also includes a
front USB connection (it's an Antec USB panel product, and I noticed
there were internal mounting ears for mounting a HD to it, so that's
where I mounted my backup drive). The USB panel/drive mount adapter
includes slots on the front for air to enter/exit, but up high in the
case where it's mounted, it's difficult to get air to move. I may try
one of those HD coolers I've seen at a few sites. I might also try
changing my fan arrangement to only draw air into the cabinet (reverse
all my fans so all blow out).

--
Best regards,
Kyle
| Just goes to show that everyone will offer their opinion which are
| typically based on a very small sample set of experiences. In my
| experience, I've had 2 drives fail, a Seagate (1 gig) and an IBM GXP
| drive (20 gig). Nary a failure with many Quantum, WD, and Maxtor
| drives. But a sample set of approximately 20-30 (my experiences)
out
| of the hundreds of millions of drives produced does not yield valid
| statistical data.
|
| --
| Best regards,
| Kyle
| | | reliable??? Seagate
| |
| | I'd never use 'reliable' and WD in the same sentence in a positive
| light.
| |
| | | | > Spped and reliability are in question. Need to buy a 160gb SATA
| drive for
| | my new system. Both are in the sub $120 range.
| | > Please let me know ur thoughts.
| | >
| | > Dennis
| | >
| |
| |
|
 
I suspect installation has a lot to do with the HD life. I installed 2
maxtor drives in the front lower portion of the case that had no fans set up as
raid O. The drives were very warm, almost hot to the touch even with
the side cover off. I then installed 2 fans that blew cold air across them
and they were not even warm. I could see if the drive was installed where
there was no cooling they would fail after a while. DOUG
 
Thanks for the info guys. I ordered a WD 160gb SATA drive yesterday for $115.

Seems lots of people think these 2 brands are equally reliable. I guess what it came down to was speed and noise.
The avg read time is listed faster for the WD, and on many reviews the WD is quieter.
 
More off topic info. Another lil follow-up on case air flow.

I have reversed only 1 fan in my case (a rear mounted case fan near
the CPU, now it blows outward instead of inward, a second lower front
mounted fan draws air in). My HD temps have now both dropped, thus it
appears I've achieved air flow nirvana for my present setup, CPU temps
are down a bit, and HD temps are 31C (WD) and 32C (IBM) now. The
change in air flow dropped the temp of the IBM HD by about 10 degrees.
CPU is running a bit cooler now also (2-3 degrees) thus case air
movement must be better. A more precise description of what I've done
is I've lowered the air pressure in the case causing more air to flow
in thru case vents, including the vents near the IBM drive mounted in
the USB panel/bay.

--
Best regards,
Kyle
| A small follow-up to my previous post. It should be considered that
| the usage of each HD has an impact on life expectancy. If the case
| has poor ventilation/cooling, you might expect the HD to fail
sooner,
| particularly the 7200 rpm (or faster) HDs which tend to run quite
| warm.
|
| Presently, I have 2 HDs in this system, a WD and an IBM, both 40
gig.
| The IBM is running 6-10 degrees C hotter due to the case design and
| the internal placement of the HDs. I expect the IBM may not last as
| long under these conditions. Presently, the WD drive is at 36C and
| the IBM at 42C. I note the IBM drive is used only for early morning
| HD backup right now, so it spins-down most of the time, yet its temp
| remains much higher than the WD drive due to it's position within
the
| case (the IBM drive rests in a 5-1/4 drive bay that also includes a
| front USB connection (it's an Antec USB panel product, and I noticed
| there were internal mounting ears for mounting a HD to it, so that's
| where I mounted my backup drive). The USB panel/drive mount adapter
| includes slots on the front for air to enter/exit, but up high in
the
| case where it's mounted, it's difficult to get air to move. I may
try
| one of those HD coolers I've seen at a few sites. I might also try
| changing my fan arrangement to only draw air into the cabinet
(reverse
| all my fans so all blow out).
|
| --
 
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