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Good Quality Hard Drive To Buy ?????
I need a *good* quality hard drive. I bought a West Dig. 120 Gig about a
year ago. Then I bought a 2nd W-D 120 Gig. The 2nd 120 Gig W-D 'croaked' the first day. So I was able to get W-D to replace it okay. My 2nd 120 Gig West. Dig. ALSO croaked! I called W-D and they say they can't honor the warantee, 'cuz I was unable to find my bill of sale (although I KNOW it was only about 6 months old)! So I DON'T WANT any more $@#*& Western Digital hard drives - for sure! In fact I have a 3rd Western Digital 160 Gig that I probably ALSO am going to replace - and SELL that thing *cheap* on e-Bay! Its either that or I'll wait (all puckered up) for the thing to crash & die. Does anybody know what brand of hard dirve is VERY good - that is RELIABLE ??? - Thanks (simon) |
#2
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On Sat, 14 Aug 2004 01:08:26 GMT, "Ruth Cory"
wrote: I need a *good* quality hard drive. I bought a West Dig. 120 Gig about a year ago. Then I bought a 2nd W-D 120 Gig. The 2nd 120 Gig W-D 'croaked' the first day. So I was able to get W-D to replace it okay. My 2nd 120 Gig West. Dig. ALSO croaked! I called W-D and they say they can't honor the warantee, 'cuz I was unable to find my bill of sale (although I KNOW it was only about 6 months old)! That sounds like abnormally bad luck, or potentially a heat, power supply, or rough/abusive handling problem somewhere between factory and installation. If it is, you may find that no make of drive is immune. On the other hand, the WD 120GB ball-bearing drives shouldn't be anyone's choice anymore, since their performance is bested by other makes and/or other WD drives, plus they're louder. Although, by this point perhaps stores have stock of the liquid-bearing version? IMHO, there's no reason to buy a ball-bearing drive today unless it's dirt-cheap. So I DON'T WANT any more $@#*& Western Digital hard drives - for sure! In fact I have a 3rd Western Digital 160 Gig that I probably ALSO am going to replace - and SELL that thing *cheap* on e-Bay! Its either that or I'll wait (all puckered up) for the thing to crash & die. Does anybody know what brand of hard dirve is VERY good - that is RELIABLE ??? - Thanks (simon) My WD drives are running fine, I would not hesitate to buy another if reliability were the only issue. However, it's certainly you choice, nothing wrong with choosing a different brand either. I like Maxtor too but many people have had their Maxtors fail, so essentially what it boils down to is a popularity contest, that no matter what brand you'll find someone reporting high failures, so whoever happens to be participating in any given forum on any given day will effect which drives seem most reliable. However, Seagate has recently switching to 5 year warranty on some of their drives (perhaps all?) and they're also nice and quiet, so the drive du jour is Seagate. An alternate approach might be looking in local newspaper and buying whichever offer lowest price, and buying a pair of drives so you have redundancy... not a bad idea since you seem to be having high failure rate for whatever the reason. |
#3
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On Sat, 14 Aug 2004 01:08:26 GMT, "Ruth Cory"
wrote: I need a *good* quality hard drive. I bought a West Dig. 120 Gig about a year ago. Then I bought a 2nd W-D 120 Gig. The 2nd 120 Gig W-D 'croaked' the first day. So I was able to get W-D to replace it okay. My 2nd 120 Gig West. Dig. ALSO croaked! I called W-D and they say they can't honor the warantee, 'cuz I was unable to find my bill of sale (although I KNOW it was only about 6 months old)! So I DON'T WANT any more $@#*& Western Digital hard drives - for sure! In fact I have a 3rd Western Digital 160 Gig that I probably ALSO am going to replace - and SELL that thing *cheap* on e-Bay! Its either that or I'll wait (all puckered up) for the thing to crash & die. Does anybody know what brand of hard dirve is VERY good - that is RELIABLE ??? - Thanks (simon) I have to wonder if it's maybe something in your system or the operating environment that's kind of hard on the drives. I've always used Maxtor and WD drives, until recently when everybody dropped their warranties down to a year except WD. No problems, I've got a 4 year old 40Gig Maxtor that's still running fine, along with a slightly newer 80Gig WD, and a fairly recent 120Gig WD hanging off of a 2nd controller. As for the receipt situation, you can't really fault them for requiring a receipt. You must have known that when you bought it that you'd need it for warranty service. About the only thing these days that you wouldn't need a receipt for warranty work is a gun, and there's still quite a bit of paperwork involved there. If you can't find it, I'd suggest you go back to the store that you bought it from and see if they can issue you a copy of the receipt. Assuming you gave a real name when you bought it, they might be able to help you. The only other company that's offering 3 year warranties at the home user level that I can think of is Seagate. I can't comment about their quality one way or the other, as I've haven't used a Seagate drive in years. --------------------------------------------- MCheu |
#4
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kony wrote:
On Sat, 14 Aug 2004 01:08:26 GMT, "Ruth Cory" wrote: I need a *good* quality hard drive. I bought a West Dig. 120 Gig about a year ago. Then I bought a 2nd W-D 120 Gig. The 2nd 120 Gig W-D 'croaked' the first day. So I was able to get W-D to replace it okay. My 2nd 120 Gig West. Dig. ALSO croaked! I called W-D and they say they can't honor the warantee, 'cuz I was unable to find my bill of sale (although I KNOW it was only about 6 months old)! That sounds like abnormally bad luck, or potentially a heat, power supply, or rough/abusive handling problem somewhere between factory and installation. If it is, you may find that no make of drive is immune. On the other hand, the WD 120GB ball-bearing drives shouldn't be anyone's choice anymore, since their performance is bested by other makes and/or other WD drives, plus they're louder. Although, by this point perhaps stores have stock of the liquid-bearing version? IMHO, there's no reason to buy a ball-bearing drive today unless it's dirt-cheap. So I DON'T WANT any more $@#*& Western Digital hard drives - for sure! In fact I have a 3rd Western Digital 160 Gig that I probably ALSO am going to replace - and SELL that thing *cheap* on e-Bay! Its either that or I'll wait (all puckered up) for the thing to crash & die. Does anybody know what brand of hard dirve is VERY good - that is RELIABLE ??? - Thanks (simon) My WD drives are running fine, I would not hesitate to buy another if reliability were the only issue. However, it's certainly you choice, nothing wrong with choosing a different brand either. I like Maxtor too but many people have had their Maxtors fail, so essentially what it boils down to is a popularity contest, that no matter what brand you'll find someone reporting high failures, so whoever happens to be participating in any given forum on any given day will effect which drives seem most reliable. However, Seagate has recently switching to 5 year warranty on some of their drives (perhaps all?) and they're also nice and quiet, so the drive du jour is Seagate. An alternate approach might be looking in local newspaper and buying whichever offer lowest price, and buying a pair of drives so you have redundancy... not a bad idea since you seem to be having high failure rate for whatever the reason. I, like Kony, use both WD and Seagate hard drives. The newer 2004 versions of the WD 800JB and WD1200JB are quiet and perform well. The Seagate Barracuda IV,V and 7200.7 Plus series are among the most quiet hard drives available. With Seagate raising theor warranty to 5 years effective late July, 2004, I'm even more likely to keep buying them. Either you've had really bad luck with WD products or your power supply is hosing them. Give strong consideration to swapping it out before installing any new hardware. |
#5
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"MCheu" wrote in message ... On Sat, 14 Aug 2004 01:08:26 GMT, "Ruth Cory" wrote: I need a *good* quality hard drive. I bought a West Dig. 120 Gig about a year ago. Then I bought a 2nd W-D 120 Gig. The 2nd 120 Gig W-D 'croaked' the first day. So I was able to get W-D to replace it okay. My 2nd 120 Gig West. Dig. ALSO croaked! I called W-D and they say they can't honor the warantee, 'cuz I was unable to find my bill of sale (although I KNOW it was only about 6 months old)! Is there a build date stamped on the drive? They can't claim it's too old if it was built less than the warranty length. Also, how did you RMA the first drive without the reciept... and tell them you didn't buy the drive, it was a warranty replacement so there is no receipt. |
#6
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On Sat, 14 Aug 2004 01:08:26 GMT, Ruth Cory wrote:
I need a *good* quality hard drive. This is practically religious war territory... :-) Everybody has a different opinion. And the "good" maufacturer changes over time. Back in '95-'96, I remember Western Digital was the drive to get. Then, they started to turn out crap. Seagates and Quantums had their turn in the barrel. IBMs were the disk for a while, until they had some spectacular problems. I started using Maxtors in '00 or '01 after the San Diego Supercomputing Center chose them for a bunch of new machines... I read the paper where they talked about their criteria and test results. I'm still partial to Maxtors, as I've had good luck with them. But, within the past couple of years or so, Western Digital was "the" disk to get again. In the grand scheme of things, I really don't think it makes much difference, as long as there isn't a known issue with a line of disks (like the IBM situation). Seagate offers a 5 year warranty on their disks now. Is that because they're that much more confident in their quality, or because they figure the apparent boost in confidence will result in more sales than people who will RMA bad disks? I don't know. I'm buying a new system that was quoted with a Seagate disk next week, and will probably go with the vendors recommendation. -- * John Oliver http://www.john-oliver.net/ * * California gun owners - protect your rights and join the CRPA today! * * http://www.crpa.org/ Free 3 month trial membership available * * San Diego shooters come to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sdshooting/ * |
#7
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On Sat, 14 Aug 2004 02:25:22 GMT, kony wrote:
However, Seagate has recently switching to 5 year warranty on some of their drives (perhaps all?) and they're also nice and quiet, so the drive du jour is Seagate. Yes, Seagate make very good drives now. |
#8
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"Noozer" wrote in message Is there a build date stamped on the drive? They can't claim it's too old if it was built less than the warranty length. Also, how did you RMA the first drive without the reciept... and tell them you didn't buy the drive, it was a warranty replacement so there is no receipt. Yep, there WAS a build date on that drive. It was Jan of 2003 as I recollect. So that meant I *couldn't* insist that my drive WASN'T over a year old 'cuz of the build date. As to that first bad hard drive (also 120 Gig) I'd waited about 2 months to even try using the thing. So at that time I'd *had* the sense to keep my bill-of-sale where I could locate it! Thus it was no problemo for me to prove the thinng *wasn't* past the warrantee period. Also the FIRST bad hard drive (both were 120 gigs) was a THREE YEAR warrantee job! So the W-D *$#@ guys could NOT tell me my drive was "out of warantee pal". By the by, I just ordered a Seagate 80 Gig drive romNewegg for about $83, and I'm pretty pleaesed about THAT - for sure. As one of the other guys (here) informed me, the SEAGATE company puts a 5 YEAR warrantee on *their* drives, which is AOK! Thanks to ALL of you Food Guys - for giving me decent advice, so I could buy a new drive. Last thing I 'need' is have an 'important' drive crap-out & be forced to go downtown to grab the first "bargain" crap-ola drive I come across! - bob |
#9
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Ruth Cory wrote:
As to that first bad hard drive (also 120 Gig) I'd waited about 2 months to even try using the thing. So at that time I'd *had* the sense to keep my bill-of-sale where I could locate it! Thus it was no problemo for me to prove the thinng *wasn't* past the warrantee period. Also the FIRST bad hard drive (both were 120 gigs) was a THREE YEAR warrantee job! So the W-D *$#@ guys could NOT tell me my drive was "out of warantee pal". By the by, I just ordered a Seagate 80 Gig drive romNewegg for about $83, and I'm pretty pleaesed about THAT - for sure. As one of the other guys (here) informed me, the SEAGATE company puts a 5 YEAR warrantee on *their* drives, which is AOK! Even if the hard drive had a 25 year warranty, you should be doing regular backups to CD or DVD. Assume every hard drive will die, at a very bad time, which they usually do. Keeping this in mind, creating regular backups becomes a habit. |
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