I need to choose between SEAGATE 7200.12 and WD6400AKS

Wich one is faster Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB ST3500418AS (1 500 GB platter)I can get it for 60Euros
OR
Western digital WD6400AKS (2 320 GB platters) 72 euros

Wich one is faster?

The 7200.12 is faster.

The 7200.11s have an atrocious failure rate. The jury is still out on the 7200.12s. The 6400AAKS is a known good drive with an average read speed of about 90MB/sec., which is no slouch.

I have a WD 80 Gb IDE drive that'd been running for than 3 years already.
I have never lost a single byte of data until now, It's a little noisy since a couple of months but other than that it's in perfect condition.
Download, delete, defrag, format, install/uninstall. He's a good boy =)

Yetyhunnter - I think you will be happy with your choise.

+1 to Zorg, I have been thinking of getting a new pair of hardrives and although I have been very pleased with Segate - I ruled out the Dot11's due to high DOAs.

I was/I'm seriously considering the WD black 640 w/32 M Cache. I like the performance gain of Segate's .12 Nice jump over .11's. Would like to see a comparison of the WD 640 w/32 Meg Cache and the Segate ST3750528SA (750 Gig .12 w/32 Meg cache.

Newegg does not have that model in stock yet,

Other comments: DOA's (1 and 2 eggs) for the 500 Gig .12 are still higher (16%) than the WD (9%) BUT about half of the .11's; However sample # is still low 69 vs 227 for WD. (Note: A large % of DOA's are probably a result of handling and poor pakaging at Newegg - BUT is the same for both drives and a lower DOA for one would probable be to "ruggedness/quality of model.

Not sure of the performance gain of going from a 16Meg cache to a 32 Meg cache.
Specifically, the cost diff between segate's 500G w/16 Meg cache ($65) and 750 Gig w/32Meg Cache (Approx $110) (If size is ajusted only $15 diff between the two.

Have to go to work.

Seagate's 7200.12 is faster due to faster random access time and better read and write times but its really the random access time that put's the performance at a noticeable difference. Seagate's 7200.11 was faster for the same reason but had a high falure rate or something.

imo doesn't matter too much if you are planning to use ACHI instead of IDE emulated for your sata set up

In terms of 7200rpm models seagate's is usually faster and WD is usually more reliable. I only have 2 WD 1tb green HDD's because they are slient and for storage so speed isn't nessary and 1 Seagate for os and everything else.

How the hell does that even happen? That is either some piss poor shipping, like guys using your HDD as skaes or you tried to plug in a sata connection backwards and wouldn't give up.

Here's a review of the -12 comparing it to the -11 (Tom's hardrive list does not include the -12), But by looking at the performance of the -11, then add the performance increase will give a good idea.

As Zorg said the jury is still out, but it looks promising.

www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/Reviews/S [...] leId=24888
added:
The test drive was the 500Gig/16 Meg Cache and I think it's a single plater. The 750Gig model, ST3750528AS, (not readably avail - Found at 2 places for approx $110) has 32 Gig cache and probably 2 platters

I got the seagate.The difference is HUGE.Windows starts up faster,games load up faster,file coping,pasting is faster;Everything is much more responsive.I will post benchmarks soon.

[img=http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/2328/hdtune.th.jpg]

I think the burst rate is not right.Only 119?? Any ideas to fix it?
What is the latest/best firmware?
I have CC33

So I made the good choice my hdd is faster?
For the CPU usage I have an E8400@3600 mhz.
I can't belive how quiet it is.I can't hear it at all.I only hear the fans.

Because of the problems seagate has had with firmware scrapping hard drives, id buy WD ,

Havent seen any WD drives die for more than 4 years now (Last one was a used 40 go)

You should look at review on google to assure yourself that the seagate drive is good and has goos firmware

Zorg
I think the avg access time is due to the two platter vs the single platter for the Seagate drive. Believe the 750 Gig version has 2 platers and increase the cashe to 32 Gigs. This would improve the Random Acess time and improve the Burst Rate, although burst rate probably isn't that important.

www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/Reviews/S [...] 8&PageId=3

Not at newegg yet. Google show 3 place @ Approx $110 give or take $10

RetiredChief, we'll have to wait and see how it performs, and how reliable it is.

yetyhunter, that is a bit odd, but I wouldn't worry about it.

I can only offer this comment about the Seagate 7200.12. I read two reviews, Maximum PC and CPU. Both loved the drive and felt they were far better then the previous .11 series. Also, the speed of the drive nears that of the Velociraptor. Not in all ways of course, the
Raptors are still top of the heap but if you want to get a drive that is fast and packs far more room to work I would not hesitate to go with the Seagate.

Personally, i have two WD Black 1tb 32mb drives but when it came to the operating systems i am going with the Seagate. One because it is faster by far than the WD and i want that for the OS. But two because I can put two operating systems on the same drive partitioned and get far better performance. WD is great but they will never win a spped contest.

Hope this helps. I know I have been going nuts trying to decide because i really wanted a new Velocraptor 300gb but when comparing what you get the Raptor is cheapest at a79.00 I saw on Ebay but the average is about $220.00. The Seagate can be had for very close to $100.00. That did it for me.

Latest stats from Newegg, Not looking to promising. Hard to judge if DOA's are seagate's fault and what % are do to "Handling" Looks like Newegg is doing a very poor job of packing HDD's - Seems to show up as a comment on all HDD manuf.

Review Summary (120 reviews):
Excellent 86 reviewsExcellent 71%
Good 8 reviewsGood 7%
Average 2 reviewsAverage 2%
Poor 5 reviewsPoor 4%
Very poor 19 reviewsVery poor 16%

Well thanks a lot.

I was a proponent of this drive then heard all the complaints that suddenly popped up and said, OK I guess the Western Digital Black.
Now I know what the problem is so now what? I was about to post to and back off on my original statement now I'm back to the Seagate again. Being a yo yo can hurt. All those ups and downs. Hope your satisfied. Yuk! Seriously though, you make my decision to go with this more appealing. Now I have to make up my mind.

Yep! That's me in the corner all curled up in a ball making the decision. Thank you so much for your information and my confirmation that I was right and so was Maximum PC that recommend this drive for the reasons you stated but i don't think they mentioned the tweaks.


Thank you for the great information. I will now curl up in a ball and shake. I hate making decisions.

I have a 3 month old 7200.12 1Tb which just failed. BIOS recognises the fact the drive has critically failed. I've contacted Seagate to see if it's a similar issue to the failures of the 7200.11 (in the vain hope they can save my data).

Most annoying thing is I'd just ordered 2 more of the drives. So we'll see how they go

The 7200.10 drives are rock solid (I have 8, counting those in external enclosures, and including 6 in various RAID arrays), and did not have a reliability problem. The 7200.11 had issues though, and is best avoided.

The .12 does not have the problems that plagued the .11 series, and although there will be failures with any drive, the .12 does not have an abnormal number of failures compared to any other normal 7200rpm drive.

Unfortunately I beg to differ on the 7200.12 drives (ST3500418AS). These are not reliable if used in a RAID configuration. I have 50% dropout rate, luckly was simply running two seperate RAID 1 (mirrored) configurations on an ARECA 1110 controller.

For WD drives have had good luck with the 'Y' drives (Cavier black) which should work in a RAID configuration. I did see a post that mentioned firmware upgrades but do know our supplier for our Supermicro boxes is using WD SATA drives. These are the typical $80 SATA drive, nothing exotic. Sorry don't have access to check the drive part# for the WD's.

Anyone know if there is a 7200.12 firmware patch for the Seagate drives?