Maxtor or Western Digital?

[Playitagainsam]

Howdy,

I need to get myself a new hard disk. I want to do some intensive audio-video work (encoding VCDs and DiVX, video capture from the digital camcorder and so on)

At this point, it seems that my two best choices are Western Digital and Maxtor (the stores I go to don't carry IBM, so that's the end of it).

I need a minimum of 40 GB.

So, what should I go for? The 40GB/7200 rpm models, or the 60GB/5400 rpm?

What do you suggest, as far as price, reliability and performance?

EDIT: please check my two other posts in the thread for some more details. Thank you!

 

[sharkeeper]

If you want a single disk I would suggest the WD 400BB. This drive is an excellent performer in real world use. The Maxtor Diamond Max Plus 60 is also very fast AND performs well on a RAID controller (striped) which is unusual for Maxtor disks. Don't get a 5400 RPM drive unless you just intend to fill it up with stuff.

Cheers!

 

[reicherb]

7200 Maxtor.

 

[Playitagainsam]

I feel I should add some more data.

I don't have a Promise card, and I don't think that I even have any slots left in my machine for one... and since I have one of the shopss computers with an Aopen mobo, the current configuration is ATA-33...

I probably need to make room for a Promise card (in which case, I really don't know how I'm going to configure the machine, with the old HD still in place, and an additional disk on a Promise card.)

BUT... if I would only replace the old HD with a new one (say, 40/7200), would that be fast enough for what I need it? even is it's ATA-33, not even 66?

Thanks for your input!

 

[PCResources]

Maxtor without a doubt....

I wouldn't put a WD in a computer that my company sells even if WD would pay me 1500$ for putting it in there (my reasoning for that: why would i want to take a perfectly stable computer and put a crappy piece of HW in it?)...

WD have more problems with their drives than any other company... Low quality, bad performance and low sales haunt WD these days...

Patrick Palm

PC Resources

 

[PCResources]

<< The Maxtor Diamond Max Plus 60 is also very fast AND performs well on a RAID controller (striped) which is unusual for Maxtor disks. >>



Any maxtor disk will work well in a striped setup, just as well as any other disks, RAID 0 is just a way of increasing your risks of HDD failure... I do not know where the info that stripe settings would be better with certain kinds of disks came from... The disk will not care, they will just do their read writes as usual, and the cache will not care, it will just cach what is next as ususal...

Can somebody please explain to me why a RAID 0 setup would be better on some disks than on another?? I just do not get it...

Patrick Palm

PC Resources

 

[azeker1]

I have used Western Digital Drives for years and like them. My old Maxtor was reliable, too. Whichever you decide to get, the 7200 rpm speed difference over the 5400 will be well worth it.

 

[MWink]

I would strongly recommend the Maxtor DiamondMax+ series. They are excellent for video editing and HD intensive stuff.

 

[Basse]

Another vote for Maxtor.

/B

 

[medic]

Another vote for Maxtor DiamondMax+ 7200RPM

I've had two for well over a year and installed about a hundred without any trouble (so far)

 

[skace]

WD hard drives are little metallic nightmares! EVIIILLL.

...So I had 4 in a row go bad, thats just my experiences

 

[sharkeeper]

<< Can somebody please explain to me why a RAID 0 setup would be better on some disks than on another?? I just do not get it... >>



It's particularly troublesome when someone connects two disks to one channel. However, some drives (particularly the Diamond Max Plus 20~40) have trouble with low throughput and lots of spikes in the transfer rate.

IBM drives seem to have the best, although I've tested the newest Diamond Max Plus 60's and they're right up there with IBM. The new WDC 400BB didn't fare so well striped. Promise and Highpoint controllers were used.

Regardless, all disks are NOT alike when striped. Some disks have their firmware programmed to optimise throughput and access time but can affect operation with a striped pair. Different drives do behave differently for sure that is why it is IMPERATIVE to make sure your drives in an array have all the same firmware. It's even a good idea to make sure all the disks have the same revision of pcb as well.

The new WD drives (20BB, 30BB, and 40BB) are great drives and are very fast! As far as reliability is concerned, we'll have to wait to see how reliable they are. I NEVER hold a previous reliability record with earlier drives against a company. Maxtor certainly had their fair share of troubles some years back. Now look at them! IBM's 75GXP (particularly the 46 GB model) has turned into a disaster. I would recommend the WD or Maxtor over the IBM from that standpoint even though the IBM is slightly faster than both.

Cheers!

 

[Kaieye]

I just sent two WD 6.4 gig hard drives back to WD for warranty
replacement in the past five weeks. Go Maxtor...

 

[GregMal]

I just installed my 5th WD (30 gig, 5400, single platter) over the
weekend. I've never had a problem with WD in the past 5 yrs...
Greg

 

[Adul]

just sent a 6.4 GB WD, and a 8.0 GB WD for rma... Waiting for new drives back from them.

 

[Adul]

What about IBM drives?

 

[PCResources]

<< Regardless, all disks are NOT alike when striped. Some disks have their firmware programmed to optimise throughput and access time but can affect operation with a striped pair. Different drives do behave differently for sure that is why it is IMPERATIVE to make sure your drives in an array have all the same firmware. It's even a good idea to make sure all the disks have the same revision of pcb as well. >>



I would say that ALL IDE drives are programmed to optimize thoughput and acess time, so that wouldn't make any difference... Spikes in throughput will be made when necessary and is not limited to Maxtor drives...

I have heard all of this before, i have set up systems with mixed drives in RAID 0 and RAID 5 arrays just to see if anything anyone said about it would happen, because it did not make any sense to me...

Well guess what, you still cannot explain it properly, and i still have no problems with my mix of Maxtor, quantum and fujitsu drives (on a Adaptec IDE RAID card), and i am pretty sure they use different firmware... ;-)

I also use a combo of two Atlas 10K coupled with two Seagate 15X drives in a RAID 5 array without problems, have been for the last year...

Different speeds, firmwares, interfaces (as long as they are backwards compatiable), brands do not affect the stability of a RAID 0 array, it is the actual RAID 0 array that doubles the risks...

The rumours about different drives being better than others when used in RAID 0 is turning into an urban legend...

Patrick Palm

PC Resources

 

[Motero]

I've never had a problem with my WD hard drives, but I have been hearing horror stories with them lately. I'd say go with Maxtor.

 

[limsandy]

Maxtor, 7200 rpm, ATA/100
IBM offers better service I think.

 

[Playitagainsam]

Wow, thanks for the overwhelming responses!

Maxtor it is, then.

Any observations regarding my second post - the one in which I was musing over various setup posibilities (Old HD in current location PLUS new Maxtor on a Promise versus just new Maxtor instead of old HD, and that's it?) I'm particularly concerned about speed and capacity of handling large quantities of data...

But let me explain what I have in mind. I need to put on VCD/DivX a number of films that I have on Laserdisc. I want to maintain the audio-video quality, though, so that's why I'm considering using the DivX over VCD.

Therefore, I need to capture huge amounts of data, through my camcorder/IEEE 1394 setup, without dropping frames, and be able to convert this raw video and audio onto... well, MPEG-4 or MPEG-1, again, without dropping frames and using highest possible resolution. Basically, that's it. I figured 40 GB should be aplenty, but I'm still concerned with speed.

There you have it, in a nutshell.

 

[twong82]

go with Maxtor

 

[sharkeeper]

<< I would say that ALL IDE drives are programmed to optimize thoughput and acess time, so that wouldn't make any difference... Spikes in throughput will be made when necessary and is not limited to Maxtor drives... >>



Yes they are optimized in their own way. However, some manufacturers will tune these optimizations for a particular benchmark, for example. This timing causes the transfer aberrations as seen in WB99 disk inspection test; transfer.



<< I have heard all of this before, i have set up systems with mixed drives in RAID 0 and RAID 5 arrays just to see if anything anyone said about it would happen, because it did not make any sense to me... >>



What if anything did you use to test the results? Read/Write speed amongst various block sizes and que depths?



<< Well guess what, you still cannot explain it properly, and i still have no problems with my mix of Maxtor, quantum and fujitsu drives (on a Adaptec IDE RAID card), and i am pretty sure they use different firmware... ;-) >>



Just because it works doesn?t mean it?s working they way a user would want it to in order to see the benefits of doing so in the first place!



<< I also use a combo of two Atlas 10K coupled with two Seagate 15X drives in a RAID 5 array without problems, have been for the last year... >>



Apples and Oranges! We are talking about ATA devices. SCSI devices must adhere to strict ANSI guidelines. The chances of things going extremely awry are far less here.



<< Different speeds, firmwares, interfaces (as long as they are backwards compatiable), brands do not affect the stability of a RAID 0 array, it is the actual RAID 0 array that doubles the risks... >>



I?m not talking about the overall stability of an array. I?m talking about it working like it should; a user that wishes to stripe two or more drives is looking for increased read and write rates. They are not concerned with fault tolerance. If they are as concerned about fault tolerance as they are with STR, they would use RAID 50 and ECC!




<< The rumours about different drives being better than others when used in RAID 0 is turning into an urban legend... >>



These are NOT rumors but fact! There are hundreds of users having the same problem that goes back to mid 1999. The problem first showed up with Maxtor disks. If you go over to Storage Review?s messageboard, you will see what I?m talking about!

The problem (outside of any other problems like ?it doesn?t work!?) is across the entire volume, the STR will indicate strange patterns in the graph. These are unlike the downward spikes seen in HD Tach where the OS is accessing the tested volume. WB99 inspection runs in realtime to reduce the chance of interference from other processes. Even so, the ?problem? drives would show a very repeatable ?zig-zag? pattern which resembles a stitch produced by a sewing machine.

If you assemble systems for people your main concern is to get it working stably. Of course, most users that are interested enough to stripe their disks for better R/W performance are going to have the know how to test it with familiar and downloadable software. This is where these difficulties emerge.

Cheers!

 

[novice]

I know from firsthand experience that Western Digital has a good RMA program, and I have heard that Maxtor is also very good replacing defective drives. The difference seems to be that Maxtor drives don't need replacing as frequently as the Western Digital. Good choice in going with Maxtor. I really like the 4 that I have and so far they have been very reliable. My last remaining Western Digital (an RMA replacement) has already started the occasional random click, which signals the beginning of the end. After I RMA the replacement, I think I will &quot;fleabay&quot; the next replacement drive and buy another Maxtor. Then I will be done with WD. Chuck

 

[dcdomain]

<< Maxtor, 7200 rpm, ATA/100
IBM offers better service I think. >>



Other way around. Maxtor has terrific service, replacing almost all drives when they go bad. IBM refuses to replace OEM drives, I've heard plenty of stories regarding that issue.

 

[AncientPC]

7200 Maxtor, I have about 4 or 5 WD old hard drives, and the newer drives' quality is going to absolutely sh!t . . .