Recommended Hard Drives and DVD Burners

[endlesszeal]

okay guys, this fucking piece of shit computer my brother built is cursed.. first the P.U. burnt, then chassis fans, then cpu fan, and now the burner AND, i think, the hard drive is about to be toasted.
the hard drive is making a really really loud humming-high pitched noise. my brother said it might be that the needle is worn out. who knows. do i need to replace it??? if i do, which brand do you guys suggest out of these? i got on new egg and here are my chocies:

1) Seagate 7200RPM 1 year warranty $67.50
2) Hitachi 7200RPM 1 year warranty $68
3) Western Digital S.E. 7200RPM 3 year warranty $68
4)Hitachi 7200RPM 1 year warranty $69 (has a gold/copper disc, dont know the difference)


Also what DVD Burner would you guys suggest??? i want something that would last, at a reasonable price. im really tight on budget. thanks a lot guys.

ps thats calesta for helping me out with all the problems mentioned above

 

[posol]

out of those four, i'd take the WD, but maxtor gets my pick.

Lite-On makes some real good cd/dvd things for cheap.

and if you haven't been there yet, go to newegg.com

 

[mikesphat]

and if you haven't been there yet, go to newegg.com

 

[Slo86GT]

I've got a WD SE 80 gig in my rig at home, and it rocks balls. Super quiet, too.

I've got Sony 16x DVD and 52x CDRW. I got the HDD a while back for $80, and the drives were pretty inexpensive. 35 for the DVD with software, and 45 for the CDRW with the software bundle as well.

All three work spectacularly.

I use www.zipzoomfly.com (formerly www.googlegear.com) for my parts. Free shipping, or VERY cheap shipping on 90% of their parts.

 

[CRX-YEM]

I'm with B. on the Maxtor products, I have had too many WD drives shit the bed in a short period of time.

as for DVD burners , I say don't be cheap buy a quality drive either a Plextor or Sony.

 

[DarkHand]

Maxtor is good but I think my favorite is Seagate. The 540MB Seagate hard drive that came with my Packard Bell 486-DX2 66mhz system is still running at this very moment in my router at home. Can't beat that.

 

[phunky.buddha]

IBM was my favorite for hard drives until Hitachi bought out their storage division... they're still damn solid products though.

Out of those 4, definitely the WD SE. I really don't know about Maxtor- but they have gotten quite a bit better over the years.

Cheap burners- Newegg has an NEC DVD burner now for just a hair under $100. Lite-On is good and cheap, but make sure your burns WORK before trashing the data on your hard drive. Make sure they work in something other than the burner, because Lite-On drives have a habit of burning stuff that can't be read after the burn is complete. My pick for burners in general though is either Plextor or Yamaha. Nothing but the best, and they're really not that expensive anymore either.

 

[endlesszeal]

thanks a lot for all the info guys.. i checked out the maxtor and seagate in particular and the maxtor is $75 with a rating of 4 out 5 starts from 49 votes from users. the seagate is $67.50 and got a rating of 5 out of 5 from users... the seagate seems like a better deal, however is the maxtor worth the price? i really want it to last and not ever replace it anytime soon.
oh yeah what about NEC and Optorite for dvdrs?
thanks again

 

[phunky.buddha]

Plextor =
Yamaha =
NEC =
Optorite =

All the major brand hard drives are pretty good these days- stay with the big names like the ones you listed and really, any one of them would last you quite a long time.

If you want to look at benchmarks to see which hard drives out of your choices performs the best, go check out:

www.storagereview.com

They have a pretty extensive database with all the hard drive specs, and you can compare them all side by side. Just make sure you have the real manufacturer's model number and not just the name of the drive when you go to compare.

 

[SolReaver]

For dvd writers, check out staples- they are having a great deal on pacific digital 8x write speed burners, 90 bucks after rebate...

Hard drives are the same way, check out best buy for an 80 gb western digital hd for 50 after rebates, its possible to get stuff for even cheaper too, browse this site http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/categories.php?catid=18

 

[endlesszeal]

okay i just bought a Maxtor 80gb with average seek time 9.3 seconds. Rotational speed at 7200RPM and a 2MB buffer for 75 bucks. Is that good? if not, too bad i bought it already = )... also, i got a NEC that write at 8x for dvd for like 95. if anyone has any comments please reply. oh yeah whats good media? ive been reading that some cds only burn but cant be read except on a computer.

 

[Slo86GT]

Originally posted by endlesszeal@Mar 15 2004, 11:57 PM
okay i just bought a Maxtor 80gb with average seek time 9.3 seconds. Rotational speed at 7200RPM and a 2MB buffer for 75 bucks. Is that good? if not, too bad i bought it already = )... also, i got a NEC that write at 8x for dvd for like 95. if anyone has any comments please reply. oh yeah whats good media? ive been reading that some cds only burn but cant be read except on a computer.

Damn... 9.3 second seek time? Must take a few hours to load your PrOn at that rate.

 

[posol]

lol

i thnk they had 9.3 sec seek time drives in 1962

 

[reckedracing]

not sure if you guys know, or care for that matter

but www.pricewatch.com is a site that online computer stores advertise on, they all post their lowest prices with shipping and everything, so if you're looking for something i would check there before buying

just a heads up...
not a member or seller on their so take it for what its worth...

anyone read about toshiba's 0.85 inch 4 gig HD?
damn...
0.85 inch 4G HD

 

[endlesszeal]

so im guessing 9.3secs for seek time sucks ass? will it still be okay?

 

[endlesszeal]

fucking shit.. okay guys i got the shit and i installed everything.. everything was working great until today.. i cant burn shit with NEC burner.. last few weeks ive been copying, burning music, dvd, and all that jazz, but today it said i had a "calibration error" and session fixation.. wtf isthat?? i looked it up and everyone said bad media bad media.. it worked great with the walmart crap before.. so i got some sony's, fuji, maxell, and tdk and shit didnt work.. wtf is wrong? is it nero? or is it my burner is toasted already??

 

[MaaseyRacer]

I am not a fan of Western Digital at all, I have had 4 die on me, within months of purchase. I have bought many Maxtor drives, and none of them have even failed or done anything like that at all. One of my computers is on 24 hours a day, and restarted every 2 weeks, and it has been running a Maxtor drive flawlessly for the last 3 months, and the drive was in another computer for about a year prior. As far as DVD burners go, I would look into panasonic or plextor. I have a panasonic in my G5 and I love it. I believe it is the 106/A06 model and now they have the 107 and A07 out now. Plextor has always made good drives, I had an external SCSI plextor on an older computer and it never made a coster.

 

[phunky.buddha]

Plextor =

I won't buy anything other than Plextor... well, Yamaha is every bit as good, but I'm a Plextor whore.

 

[endlesszeal]

damn it.. i rebooted my computer and it still doesnt work..
can i get a refund from newegg? i bought it about 14-20 days ago and it said 30 day thing.. shit i hope i dont get stuck with a bummed out burner..

 

[driverunknown]

its milliseconds not seconds. Did you get an oem drive without any software? maybe you should try to find the drivers from nec. You might need to purchase some other type of software to watch movies.