Seagate vs Western Digital

[jamesbond007]

I'm expanding my video storage with another set of drives in RAID1. I currently have two Seagate 160GB SATA drives in RAID1 and have been totally pleased with their performance and reliability. I have been a long-time Seagate fan since 1998 when I bought my first drive from the company. Since then, I'd estimate I've owned over 30 drives by Seagate and have not really 'trusted' my data on any other brand of drive.

Lately, it seems Seagate's quality is declining, or that is what I'm noticing. There are many reports of the terrible noise that sinks your heart - the click of death! Personally, I've always attributed the noticable clicking sounds to be signs of a dying drive. Thus far, my presumptions have not lead me wrong. Here in the AT forums, some people are saying that it is a normal sound to hear from the latest Seagates. WTH!?

On to the drives I'm looking at! I'm trying to decide between a pair of these Western Digital drives or a pair of these Seagate drives. I've been told that the WD's bigger drives are quite nice and reliable, but of course, I have no first-hand experience. I do like the fact that both companies offer a long 5-year warranty. Just out of curiosity, is the 320GB WD drive I linked to the 'black-top' ones? I've heard good things about them from various websites.

I'm ordering a pair of either brand drives today, so please give me your input!

Thanks!

[EDIT] After reading this page on WD's website, I'm pretty sure I'm going the Western Digital route! ...unless any of you can convince me otherwise. [/EDIT]

 

[Ike0069]

I can only go on what I've read on the forums, but it does seem that I have read quite a few thread about Seagates dying lately. Enough so that I will not buy one right now. I'll only buy WD for right now.

Now while no drive manufacturer is perfect, it's all about minimizing the odds of failure; and right now I personally think WD makes the best drives.

 

[spikespiegal]

Just avoid Maxtor.

 

[Tostada]

Well, I think Seagate's popularity really shot up in the past couple years, so of course you're going to get more reports of them dying when they're the most popular drive.

Still, I do think that WD's quality has gone up a bit lately, as I've seen many less complaints about them, so I don't think you can say that Seagate is significantly more reliable than WD -- and I'd rather get WD since they're faster.

I certainly don't understand why Seagate drives are so slow. Even when Seagate has a platter density advantage and a sequential transfer advantage, they're usually slower in actual benchmarks.

I avoid Maxtor and Hitachi because their customer service and RMA policies are terrible. You really can't go wrong with Seagate or WD, but in most cases I think WD is the drive to get.

 

[alimoalem]

i totally agree with Tostada

 

[jamesbond007]

Sweet! Thanks for the replies. Especially reading the information about the RE series, I've been pumped to hit the CHECKOUT button on my NewEgg order.

Maybe Seagate is using up the excess Maxtor parts in the factories they bought, thus the reason for the high failure rates for the new Seagate drives. :laugh:

 

[PurdueRy]

my Seagate died on me after 1 month of use. Got a replacement(Customer service not the greatest). Works fine.

My next drive will likely be either Western Digital or another seagate. right now I own one of each and neither has amazed me.

 

[orangat]

Originally posted by: Tostada
.......
I certainly don't understand why Seagate drives are so slow. Even when Seagate has a platter density advantage and a sequential transfer advantage, they're usually slower in actual benchmarks.

I avoid Maxtor and Hitachi because their customer service and RMA policies are terrible. You really can't go wrong with Seagate or WD, but in most cases I think WD is the drive to get.

Thats is because there is a difference between platter density and linear density.

 

[Oyeve]

I dont know, but a 3yr old 200gb Seagate HD just bought the farm yesterday. So I hate seagate now.

 

[jamesbond007]

Originally posted by: Oyeve
I dont know, but a 3yr old 200gb Seagate HD just bought the farm yesterday. So I hate seagate now.

3 years isn't so bad! A lot of people are reporting DOA Seagates and drives that die within a few days, particularly of the 7200.9 series. What really spooked me is that a client of mine called me last week to tell me his external drive (Seagate PATA 160GB in an external enclosure) is dying/dead! =/ It's not showing up in My Computer and he can't access it. I'm driving out there tomorrow to take a look at the problem and hopefully recover the data from it.

Dying harddisks scare me, particularly because the new ones are so much bigger. Back in the day, if a drive died, you'd lose maybe 10-30GB. Now, you lose 300+GB of data! Running today's drives without RAID1 or better seems like you're just asking for a big problem.

 

[Dewey]

I bought 4 WD 200GB SATA drives in 11/2003 and put them in RAID 5. Each one died within a year so I have replaced them all under warranty. Since then I'm doing alright

 

[jamesbond007]

Originally posted by: Dewey
I bought 4 WD 200GB SATA drives in 11/2003 and put them in RAID 5. Each one died within a year so I have replaced them all under warranty. Since then I'm doing alright

Yikes! LOL, well as long as both of mine don't die at the same time, I'll be OK. (should one actually die, though, I plan to turn it off until a replacement comes)

 

[foodfightr]

Ok, I've been a seagate guy since day one. I've used them in all shapes and sizes, including my previous system where I had two of them in a raid configuration. I never thought I'd buy anything but seagate because of thier superior quality and performance.

The tables have turned! The WD4000YR is AMAZING. They almost called it the 7200RPM Raptor because it comes from the same design, less the rotation speed. The best part? It is only $175! If you check storage review it completely obliterates even the 500GB seagate when it comes to performance.

I've also switched to the new 150GB raptor. WD, they are the way to go right now.

check the leader board: http://www.storagereview.com/articles/leaderboard.html
check the comparison: http://www.storagereview.com/php/benchm...ves=1&devID_0=288&devID_1=295&devCnt=2

 

[PurdueRy]

Originally posted by: foodfightr
Ok, I've been a seagate guy since day one. I've used them in all shapes and sizes, including my previous system where I had two of them in a raid configuration. I never thought I'd buy anything but seagate because of thier superior quality and performance.

The tables have turned! The WD4000YR is AMAZING. They almost called it the 7200RPM Raptor because it comes from the same design, less the rotation speed. The best part? It is only $175! If you check storage review it completely obliterates even the 500GB seagate when it comes to performance.

I've also switched to the new 150GB raptor. WD, they are the way to go right now.

check the leader board: http://www.storagereview.com/articles/leaderboard.html
check the comparison: http://www.storagereview.com/php/benchm...ves=1&devID_0=288&devID_1=295&devCnt=2

Dear god,

I nominate thee for worst sig on AT

 

[Oyeve]

Originally posted by: jamesbond007

Dying harddisks scare me, particularly because the new ones are so much bigger. Back in the day, if a drive died, you'd lose maybe 10-30GB. Now, you lose 300+GB of data! Running today's drives without RAID1 or better seems like you're just asking for a big problem.

Tell me about it! I have over 1.6TBs on my main PC and backup is a biatch! If it werent for pre-emptive HD diagnostics I would have been screwed.

 

[n7]

I prefer WD's advanced RMA, & they certainly do seem to have the upper hand in terms of price/performance/quality right now.

 

[MrUniq]

I don't buy large drives either unless I have to. Although I can't go with WD because I've lost about 3 of their drives and I have a 4th that is clicking. Maxtor...I've lost 1 and bad sector on another...currently using 2 Max's. Years ago I lost a seagate. So I don't recommend WD, xcept for their superior speeds. Next drive if I have to get one...MAY be a seagate..i'm more inclined to try other brands at this point. HD's have become rather unstable as years pass it seems, I remember old 100mb etc drives lasting for years. It seems they are very sensitive to heat/power dips...which I believe was the demise of many of mine. Lessons learned indeed.

 

[Ike0069]

Originally posted by: Tostada
Well, I think Seagate's popularity really shot up in the past couple years, so of course you're going to get more reports of them dying when they're the most popular drive.

That argument is made about every popular product that has problems. But the fact is I'll bet that I've read about more Seagate drives dying in the last year or so (especially the last 6 months) than every other brand combined x2.

Now I'm not saying that Seagate sucks or anything, but they definitely have been having some QC issues of late.

 

[Oyeve]

Hard drives are like Jeans. one year Levis are the in jean, and Wranglers could be bought for 12 bucks. Then one year Wrangler is in and cost 40 bucks and Levis are cheap. Its more marketing IMO. But in some cases, like the IBM "Deathstar" issue a few years ago, drives manufacturers sell crap. Seagate made a really bad line a little while ago (I forget but I think it was the 7200.8 line). And Maxtor came out with the Maxline III which is actually a decent drive for the $$$ and a 5 year warranty. It all depends on the models of each manufacturer. You are gonna get some bad ones and some good ones. About 3 years ago, I bought a Maxtor SATA 250gb at Compusa, it was on sale and after rebates it came out to be like 180 (good price back then) So even though I hated Maxtor I bought one knowing it only had a 1 yr warranty, and it is still the main boot drive in one of my systems and its 3yrs old. Its all a crap shoot. My best advice.....back up all the time. You never know when the crap is gonna hit the fan.

 

[MrUniq]

Hard drives...wish there was an alternative to them. Anything mechanical like that is bound to fail. Seems like flash drives would be better...but they don't work to well...if at all.

 

[Gamingphreek]

WD has always been arguably the most consistent and solid HDD manf. Sometimes they just lack some of the niceties that Seagate and others have (ie: Didn't used to have Fluid Bearings...)

-Kevin

 

[jamesbond007]

I agree it is a crapshoot! I was thinking about investing in a nice tape backup system, but the tapes that hold a lot of space cost as much or more than the harddisk! Despite the slowness of tapes, it'd be cheaper for me to buy two disks, make a copy of my stuff on it, then turn it off to preserve the life.

 

[Varun]

No love for Samsung?

I have several of them, and they are quiet and reliable for me. Performance is pretty good too.

 

[Oyeve]

Originally posted by: Varun
No love for Samsung?

I have several of them, and they are quiet and reliable for me. Performance is pretty good too.

Dude, you just reminded me, I have a 4gb samsing running on an old Linux server for like 8 yrs now! I bet if I shut it down it will never come up again!

 

[RaiderJ]

I was under the impression that Seagate's 7200.7/8 series had a higher rate of failure. My 300GB 7200.8 ran really hot.

I'm currently using 4x400GB Hitachi drives with great results (so far). I'd be happy with either more of those or Western Digital.

Had several WD drives over the years, never had one fail. Was given a busted 4GB MANY years ago, turned it in for warranty, and got a 6.4GB in return! Doesn't mean much now I guess, but it was a good experience then for me.