# Which Brand to Select for 1TB HDD



## harishgayatri (Sep 13, 2009)

I am planning to buy 1TB HDD from One of the following Brands

Western Digital 1TB Green Edition 10EADS
Hitachi Desktar 7K1000.C

A few questions are 

1. How good is Hitachi in Performance and Does it offer 32MB Cache?
2. How is its RMA. How much Time will it Take to Replace the Drive? 
3. Is it SATA 1 Back ward Compatible? Becoz I have a SATA 1 Mobo.

Please Post your answers

Also please post the Model no for Hitachi


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## Krow (Sep 13, 2009)

1. All HDD's are more or less the same in terms of performance, if you are planning to buy, ask for warranty of each, WD/Hitachi/Samsung.
2. No idea, my 3 yr old hitachi 160GB is still running like a charm, so never had any trouble.
3. Yes its backward compatible, but it will affect performance as SATA 1 has limited bandwidth compared to SATA2.


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## harishgayatri (Sep 13, 2009)

Thanks for the Reply Techalomaniac

Well then I will prefer to get Hitachi for Myself since It doesnt give any problems.

Thanks anyway.


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## damngoodman999 (Sep 13, 2009)

SEAGATE 7200.12 will no problems ! but 1TB WD CAVIER is best


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## krishnandu.sarkar (Sep 13, 2009)

Well according to me go for WD. But I'll suggest not to buy 1TB HDD. Rather buy 2 500GB HDD. Go for WD. Seagate r crashing @ high rates.


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## desiibond (Sep 13, 2009)

priority 1 : Western Digital Black 1TB: 7k
priority 2: Western Digital Blue/Green: two 500Gb HDDs: 5k total
priority 3: Hitachi/WD 1Tb HDD: 4.7k


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## Xeno (Sep 13, 2009)

desiibond said:


> priority 1 : Western Digital Black 1TB: 7k
> priority 2: Western Digital Blue/Green: two 500Gb HDDs: 5k total
> priority 3: Hitachi/WD 1Tb HDD: 2.7k



 wait wait, 1TB for 2.7k from WD and Hitachi ? are these more prone to failures or what  ?

and IMO having two disks than one is better otherwise you could be stuck without a functioning pc till the time it was replaced, if the only one you had fails. Although 1TB WD black probably is super guaranteed  ? almost like 4.5k more than the normal one.


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## Krow (Sep 14, 2009)

^Hehe.. He meant it is for 4.3k and not 2.7k. desii is getting overloaded.


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## desiibond (Sep 14, 2009)

^^hehe. typical typo error


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## hell_storm2006 (Sep 14, 2009)

WD without a doubt. Seagate, a big no! Hitachi as the second option!


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## harishgayatri (Sep 14, 2009)

Please Check the Reviews from Bittech.

It says the WD performance for Green is pretty ugly due to its variable Spindle speed

Here is the Link *www.bit-tech.net/hardware/storage/2009/03/13/western-digital-2tb-green-wd20eads-review/1

Hence I would be preferring Hitachi.

The Model no I got from Primeabgb is HDT721010SLA360 which is from the Desktar 7K1000.B

The price is Rs.4025 (pretty stunning).

Does anyone know where I can get the 7K1000.C 

Only Difference between B and C models is the Buffer size and amount of platters used and their individual sizes.


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## Arnab boss (Sep 14, 2009)

Prices r increasing due 2 pujas month..' as wd black cavair 1tb was 6.3k in august...'

Hitachi is a good option but inquire abt the rma services...'


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## harishgayatri (Sep 15, 2009)

Arnab boss
Please Support your comment by giving the Revised prices


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## hell_storm2006 (Sep 15, 2009)

harishgayatri said:


> Please Check the Reviews from Bittech.
> 
> It says the WD performance for Green is pretty ugly due to its variable Spindle speed
> 
> ...



Who asked you to go for Green. Green performance suffers because its meant for a different reason. Its not made for performance, its made for power and energy saving. So if you check for Caviar Blue or Black reviews you would see a whole new story! So please do a little research.


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## harishgayatri (Sep 15, 2009)

Hellstorm

WD does not have 1TB product in Blue. If it had I would have gladly purchased it.

Black is out of Question becoz I am not into gaming/Video editing. Plus the Heat generated by my system is sufficent enough and I dont want something to add on to it.

Hitachi on the other hand Has a 1TB product matching my needs (excluding the 32MB Buffer which is available with 7K1000.C series and not with 7K1000.B series).

Hence I will get Hitachi from Primeabgb on Tuesday (22-9-2009) which is priced at Rs.4025


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## hell_storm2006 (Sep 16, 2009)

Sorry about that, didn't know you were going for 1TB only option. If you are planning to buy a 1TB one then you can go for black! It doesn't matter if you game or not!


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## desiibond (Sep 16, 2009)

@harish, 

I told this many times on this forum. it's better not to go for 1Tb Green or seagate models. Thanks to the competition, they have reduced the quality of HDDs and also not enough homework is being done as they are trying to be "the first one to get out xxx storage on HDD" and this is resulting in poor firmwares.

the failure rate has increased a lot these months. 

as the price difference between two 500GB HDDs and 1TB HDD is just few hundred bucks (mostly 400-500 bucks), I would suggest you to go for two HDDs. Better be safe than sorry.


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## Revolution (Sep 17, 2009)

@desiibond

Please suggest the best 500GB model(with price) in the market ATM.....


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## desiibond (Sep 17, 2009)

WD Blue should be around 2.5k


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## Revolution (Sep 17, 2009)

desiibond said:


> WD Blue should be around 2.5k



Is WD 640GB(Blue Or Green) better VFM than WD 500Gb(Blue Or Green) ?


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## harishgayatri (Sep 17, 2009)

@Bond,
I have considered your advice and the Problem is I have only 2 SATA ports on my Mobo.

I have an External 1TB WD Green My Book Essential Edition with me and I haven't faced any problems so far.

Well about Seagate I am pretty paranoid that I wont be touching that Brand for a While.

Hitachi as far as I have heard has had no such huge problems.

And hence Hitachi 1TB and it is also worth a Try.

Hey Life is full of Risks.


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## desiibond (Sep 17, 2009)

@ Revolution, that should be a good deal. 

@harishgayatri, what I am saying is to be prepared for rainy day. It's easy to recover if you lose say, 160Gb or 250Gb HDD. But 1Tb is insanely huge amount of data to lose. It's just my opinion. anyways, WD and Hitachi HDDs now look better than Seagate's.


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## vamsi_krishna (Sep 17, 2009)

Yes.. Seagate sucks in Portable storage devices. WD rocks.


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## harishgayatri (Sep 17, 2009)

@Bond,

Well I agree with your opinion. It is true that it is insanely Large and Hard to recover when there is a mechanical failure.

No offense, We can't make people agree with our opinion all the time.

Even after Seagate had this many issues my friend insisted me to go for Seagate.

This was his opinion.

I still need you all's help in finding out whether the Hitachi model 7K1000.C is available in the market.

And Thanks to all Who have been actively helping each other (including me)


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## desiibond (Sep 17, 2009)

^^I'll be going to SP Road tomorrow or day after tomorrow and will check the same for you. And btw, that's just my opinion. As a buyer, you take your decision by listening to multiple inputs.


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## harishgayatri (Sep 18, 2009)

@Bond,

True.

Please post about the Hitachi Model as soon as possible.

Thanks again


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## Arnab boss (Sep 19, 2009)

wd 1 t.b black is 6.8k in kolkata...'

Hw abt samsung hdds...?


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## krishnandu.sarkar (Sep 19, 2009)

I think its better to go for 2 x 500GB WD HDD's. Each will cost 2500/-

1stly the price of 2 500GB HDD's r lower than 1 1TB HDD

2ndly Its a not as risky as buying 1TB


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## Krow (Sep 19, 2009)

1TB HDD's come for around 4k now, so they are still cheaper. But not safer.


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## desiibond (Sep 19, 2009)

^^where? I checked yesterday and 640Gb is at 3.5k and 1Tb is 4.5k.

btw, checked in Golcha and couldn't find Hitachi HDDs.


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## Krow (Sep 19, 2009)

^In the post your latest purchase thread, one guy bought Samsung 1TB for 4140 or so.


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## MetalheadGautham (Sep 19, 2009)

Hmm.. I myself am looking for a 1TB HDD. But its gonna be only for ONE reason - archive HUGE amount of files. I'm a photographer and after every photo-taking day trip I end up with 1/2 GB of stuff. Then there are lots and lots of movie DVDs I'm backing up in the form of ISOs. And Soon I'm gonna start archiving my old cassette tapes to FLAC files. Finally, I download distros like a maniac and want a place to store a huge number of CD and DVD iso files.

I'm considering the WD Green 1TB HDD. How is the choice ? Is it reliable for long term (I expect my HDD to last 10 years) usage ?

My OS and games would be on another HDD so the only thing I'm looking for are reliability, VFM and energy efficiency. Not performance, but hey, more performance is always cool.


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## Apple Juice (Sep 19, 2009)

WD Green is good.. Seagate is for teh nooobs.


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## Krow (Sep 19, 2009)

^For the first time, he makes some sense... 

MHG: For storage external HDD's are better IMO.


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## desiibond (Sep 19, 2009)

MetalheadGautham said:


> Hmm.. I myself am looking for a 1TB HDD. But its gonna be only for ONE reason - archive HUGE amount of files. I'm a photographer and after every photo-taking day trip I end up with 1/2 GB of stuff. Then there are lots and lots of movie DVDs I'm backing up in the form of ISOs. And Soon I'm gonna start archiving my old cassette tapes to FLAC files. Finally, I download distros like a maniac and want a place to store a huge number of CD and DVD iso files.
> 
> I'm considering the WD Green 1TB HDD. How is the choice ? Is it reliable for long term (I expect my HDD to last 10 years) usage ?
> 
> My OS and games would be on another HDD so the only thing I'm looking for are reliability, VFM and energy efficiency. Not performance, but hey, more performance is always cool.



Given the sensitivity of data that you are going to store and the frequency of data writes, I would suggest WD Black for 7k!


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## MetalheadGautham (Sep 19, 2009)

desiibond said:


> Given the sensitivity of data that you are going to store and the frequency of data writes, I would suggest WD Black for 7k!


What's the difference ?

And I don't mind slow copy rates if Green is slower than Black.

And yeah, I would most probably be using XFS for large files, ReiserFS4 for images and EXT4 for normal files to optimize speed.
-----------------------------------------
Posted again:
-----------------------------------------
Does WD Black have any security/reliability enhancements over WD Green ?


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## desiibond (Sep 19, 2009)

as per WD, Black has these features:

Key Features

High Performance Electronics Architecture
# Dual processor - Twice the processing power to maximize performance.
# Colossal cache - Bigger, faster cache of up to 64 MB means faster performance.
Rock Solid Mechanical Architecture
# Dual actuator technology - A head positioning system with two actuators that improves positional accuracy over the data track(s). The primary actuator provides coarse displacement using conventional electromagnetic actuator principles. The secondary actuator uses piezoelectric motion to fine tune the head positioning to a higher degree of accuracy. (2 TB only)
# StableTrac - The motor shaft is secured at both ends to reduce system-induced vibration and stabilize platters for accurate tracking, during read and write operations.
# NoTouch ramp load technology - The recording head never touches the disk media ensuring significantly less wear to the recording head and media as well as better drive protection in transit.
Massive Capacity - WD Caviar Black SATA drives are available in capacities
up to 2 TB.
Compatible - We perform tests on hundreds of systems and a multitude of platforms in our FIT Lab™ and Mobile Compatibility Lab to give our customers confidence that our drives will work in their systems.
5 Year Limited Warranty
Ideal For

Power computing applications such as multimedia, video and photo editing, and maxed out gaming computers.

How this WD hard drive protects your data

    * Data Lifeguard is an exclusive set of data protection features, including shock protection, an environmental protection system and real-time embedded error detection and repair. WD's Data Lifeguard technology automatically finds, isolates, and repairs problems that may develop over the life of a hard drive.

    * Data Lifeguard Tools are software utilities designed for WD hard drives that work with the embedded Data Lifeguard features to make hard drive installation,diagnostics and repair both simple and worry-free.

    * ShockGuard instantaneously protects the hard drive against damage from bumps and vibrations while it is running. This technology enables WD Caviar drives to achieve industry-leading shock specifications.


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## MetalheadGautham (Sep 20, 2009)

^^Hmm.. OK.

But then WD Green is 4.5K compared to WD Black which is 7K, 2.5K extra. Is it worth it ?
-----------------------------------------
Posted again:
-----------------------------------------
^^Hmm.. OK.

But then WD Green is 4.5K compared to WD Black which is 7K, 2.5K extra. Is it worth it ?


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## max_demon (Sep 20, 2009)

i had purchased WD Green Herd it is environment friendly , so got this .

save earth , save electricity


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## MetalheadGautham (Sep 20, 2009)

WD Website said:
			
		

> As hard drive capacities increase, the power required to run those drives increases as well. WD Caviar Green drives make it possible for energy-conscious customers to build systems with higher capacities and the right balance of system performance, ensured reliability, and energy conservation.
> 
> Key Features
> 
> ...




only data life guard is missing. is it really needed ?


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## Krow (Sep 20, 2009)

I still say that WD Green is better for you MHG. WD Black is not worth the premium considering that WD Green is pretty reliable. Keep sacnning it for bad sectors and use HDD health metering softwares just to be on the safer side in the case of a faulty drive.


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## MetalheadGautham (Sep 20, 2009)

Techalomaniac said:


> I still say that WD Green is better for you MHG. WD Black is not worth the premium considering that WD Green is pretty reliable. Keep sacnning it for bad sectors and use HDD health metering softwares just to be on the safer side in the case of a faulty drive.


My OS auto checks certain partitions (and I would include this HDD as well) after every n-number of mounts (I choose n=25) for errors. Is that enough ?


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## desiibond (Sep 20, 2009)

^^it's not just reliability. WD Black gives transfer speeds of 2x WD green and Blue.

here are the benchmarks: 

*www.tomshardware.com/charts/3.5-hard-drive-charts/compare,658.html?prod[2057]=on&prod[2239]=on


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## Krow (Sep 20, 2009)

That will do for a daily scan, but make sure you scan all disks completely once every 2-3 weeks. Again, you need to have a steady backup of all your data and that is why desii and I both advice people to get 2x500. But to date I haven't heard of anyone's WD Green failing, so I'm not worried. But anyways, be careful about your data as I lost quite some important data due to carelessness of not scanning my disks regularly.


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## MetalheadGautham (Sep 20, 2009)

desiibond said:


> ^^it's not just reliability. WD Black gives transfer speeds of 2x WD green and Blue.
> 
> here are the benchmarks:
> 
> *www.tomshardware.com/charts/3.5-hard-drive-charts/compare,658.html?prod[2057]=on&prod[2239]=on


Not 2x. The difference matches the price IMO. I mean, Green scores 75 and Black 85. Diff does not seem much considering price difference.


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## The Sorcerer (Sep 20, 2009)

If this is the secondary hard drive or for a dump- WD green or if its primary/single drive then WD black editions.


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## MetalheadGautham (Sep 20, 2009)

The Sorcerer said:


> If this is the secondary hard drive or for a dump- WD green or if its primary/single drive then WD black editions.


Yeah option 1. Its the secondary HDD for data storage. NO execution in here.

So now can someone suggest me good places to look for in SP Road where this can be had for a good bargain ?


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## Krow (Sep 20, 2009)

*desiibond* would suggest Ankit or Golcha IT.  Sorry desii, stole your post.


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## harishgayatri (Sep 25, 2009)

Hey got the Hitachi HDD 1TB on 22nd Sept(Monday)

Works like a Charm.

Thanks to Techalomanic for his comments on Hitachi.

The HDD runs pretty cool

Thanks to all others too
harishgayatri


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## Krow (Sep 25, 2009)

^Pls scan your drive with disc checking utility from Hitachi website or use Seatools for windows from seagate website. If HDD has no bad sectors, then you can rejoice. I recommend doing this once a month as HDD's are pretty much a jackpot these days.


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## kalpik (Oct 2, 2009)

Hmm.. I'm confused between the WD Caviar Black and Seagate 7200.12.. Not considering WD Green cause of spindle speed (also, the Seagate 7200.12 is the same price as the Green and offers performance which is similar to the WD Black).

How is the reliability of the 7200.12 series? That is my only concern with Seagate.


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## Krow (Oct 2, 2009)

I am using the 7200.12 series and its pretty good although I had got via RMA of the 7200.11, which fried. One 7200.12 had bad sectors, while the second one (again RMA) is just fine.  You can go ahead and buy the cheapest one. If you are looking for good storage, get the WD Green as it has low power consumption too. Performance matters only if you are going to be using the HDD all the time. If you are going to be moving files to and fro many many times and transfer speed absolutely matters to you, then Seagate is a great option.

Look for a few cool deals IMO. Someone in the forum got the 1TB Seagate External with external power source for 3.9k


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## kalpik (Oct 2, 2009)

Dont want an external HDD.. Want an internal one.. So you are saying that Seagate 7200.12 is reliable? WD Green is tooo slow.. Very bad performance numbers and it's a 5200 RPM drive 

If you guys say that Seagate is unreliable, i guess my only option would be WD Black.. Which is ~1.5k more expensive than WD Green or Seagate


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## Krow (Oct 2, 2009)

Seagate is pretty reliable with the 7200.12 series. Get it and keep scanning for bad sectors and use HDD health softwares to monitor drive health so that you can backup all important data in case the drive is defective. Don't trust any HDD, Seagate or WD.

The WD Green is a 5400RPM drive and its performance is not as bad as you are saying it is. My friend has it and he has no complaints and gets about 25-30 MB/s in Vista while copying 50+GB at once. Can't get too much better than that, can it? Its meant to be a green drive, that is, a low power consumption drive.


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## kalpik (Oct 3, 2009)

Hmm.. The seek times on the Seagate 7200.12 are quite erratic.. Doesn't seem to be much quality control these days at Seagate :-/ Anyway, I'm heading to nehru place today. 99% chance that I'm going with the WD Black


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## Power_user_EX (Oct 4, 2009)

Seagate's 1TB Hdds were having some firmware problem months back and many ppl lost their data permanently which made news on internet forums. Don't know if the prob is solved now. But WD Green (2nd generation) is currenlt best choice due to its huge power saving and performance. I Just bought a new WD green 1TB.


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## mayanksharma (Oct 4, 2009)

kalpik said:


> Hmm.. The seek times on the Seagate 7200.12 are quite erratic.. Doesn't seem to be much quality control these days at Seagate :-/ Anyway, I'm heading to nehru place today. 99% chance that I'm going with the WD Black


So, what did you go for?  


Power_user_EX said:


> Seagate's 1TB Hdds were having some firmware problem months back and many ppl lost their data permanently which made news on internet forums. Don't know if the prob is solved now. But WD Green (2nd generation) is currenlt best choice due to its huge power saving and performance. I Just bought a new WD green 1TB.


WD Green is the best choice, considering the price tag and performance figures.


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## Krow (Oct 5, 2009)

^He got the WD Green


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## kalpik (Oct 5, 2009)

^^ Hehe.. He knows.. Mayank was with me when i bought the HDD


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## Krow (Oct 5, 2009)

^^^


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## Power_user_EX (Oct 6, 2009)

Techalomaniac said:


> Seagate is pretty reliable with the 7200.12 series. Get it and keep scanning for bad sectors and use HDD health softwares to monitor drive health so that you can backup all important data in case the drive is defective. Don't trust any HDD, Seagate or WD.
> 
> The WD Green is a 5400RPM drive and its performance is not as bad as you are saying it is. My friend has it and he has no complaints and gets about 25-30 MB/s in Vista while copying 50+GB at once. Can't get too much better than that, can it? Its meant to be a green drive, that is, a low power consumption drive.



WD Green WD10EADS (2nd gen) has variable speed - 5400 to 7200 rpm.


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## kalpik (Oct 6, 2009)

Naah.. Nothing variable about it.. It's a plain 5400RPM drive


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## static_x (Oct 6, 2009)

Numerous sites have speculated that the Caviar Green essentially runs at 5,400RPM, and now even Western Digital has changed its tune. Sort of. The drive's latest spec sheet lists the Green's rotational speed as "*IntelliPower*," which WD defines as "A fine-tuned balance of spin speed, transfer rate and caching algorithms designed to deliver both significant power savings and solid performance." So much for clarification.

Western Digital obviously doesn't want customers making assumptions about the Caviar Green's performance based on rotational speed alone, but the decision to obfuscate it behind blatant marketingspeak is entirely unnecessary and evasive. After all, the market isn't short on examples of drives with slower spindle speeds outperforming faster ones. Some websites even cite the benchmarks showing Western Digital's own 5,400-RPM Scorpio Blue beating Seagate's 7,200-RPM Momentus in some tests. Consumers deserve a little more credit. Those nerdy enough to dig through data sheets or online reviews to find a drive's spindle speed are going to know that it's not the only factor that dictates performance. 



Obviously, the Caviar Green is a poor choice if you're looking for a lightning-quick storage solution. It may be fast enough for basic desktop tasks, but it's much slower than the fastest terabyte drives on the market. The Green is really designed for applications that favor low power consumption and silent operation over raw performance. In its domain, it excels. If you're building a power-efficient home theater PC or closet file server, or even if you're looking to add secondary storage to an existing desktop, this latest Caviar Green should be at the top of your list.


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