Seagate vs. Western Digital?

[Keebler Elf]

Are Seagate drives better than Western Digital drives? I noticed that the former have 5 years warranty whereas the latter only have 3.

I'm very familiar with Western Digital but I've never bought a Seagate.

 

[Twister]

Where I worked ,they had lots of defective seagates, we stopped buying seagate. I also returned a bunch of them back of my own, I even had to return what they returned to me

Its possible they are trying to get customers back by offering 5 years W., Hardrives usually last 3-4 years, it may be worth trying them, perhaps they have improved......I'm not suprised if you start seeing other companies offering 5 year warranty.

 

[WoodPeckr]

My buddy builds/sells custom PCs and uses Seagate exclusively because of the 5 yr warr.
He told me he very seldom gets a bad one.
Prior to that he used only Maxtor which he dumped due to high failure rates, then he moved to Seagate.
I bought two Seagate drives within last yr and have had no problems with Seagate.

Newegg rates Seagate highly and that's good enough for me.
Western Digital is an excellent HDD also but only gives a 3 yr warr, so I went with Seagate.

'Lifetimes' of HDDs vary.
They say they last 3-5 yrs but should last longer.
I still have and use a 10 yr old IBM HDD that still runs rock solid but a bit slower since it runs at 5400 RPM.

 

[wollensak]

Maxtor = Seagate

Seagate bought Maxtor and are relabelling Maxtor drives with Seagate serial
numbers. Local stores are selling the drives as Seagate on their websites, but when you look at the drive it says "maxtor". Then they tell you it's really a Segate because it has the ST Serial number.

I bought one of these new and it had bad sectors on the initial format!!

There are good Seagate drives, but not at the low-price end, apparently.

Interesting how you guys say the life of an EIDE or SATA drive is 3 to 4 years.
Servers run 24-7 and those drives last almost forever. But those are SCSI drives Apparently home users don't want to go there.

 

[Anynym]

Tom's Hardware doesn't seem to cite any particular complaints against either supplier; they do recommend checking the warranty details for the Seagate drives (e.g. will they replace with a newer or with the same model, if it fails). The attached discussion forum doesn't seem as favourable, though.

http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/harddrives/
http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/05/15/the_spring_hard_drive_guide/

 

[xix]

Ibm

My buddy builds/sells custom PCs and uses Seagate exclusively because of the 5 yr warr.
He told me he very seldom gets a bad one.


'Lifetimes' of HDDs vary.
They say they last 3-5 yrs but should last longer.
I still have and use a 10 yr old IBM HDD that still runs rock solid but a bit slower since it runs at 5400 RPM.

I still have an IBM 2gig $300 10 years go.
Now I have 2 80gig Seagates from year ago and each are running Linux / Windows. No problem yet.

But HD and any Computer part is all matter of luck. Also if the factory had a problem for a day or week and no one noticed at the assembly line until it was late, or they noticed but didn't shut down the assembly line simply because the bosses only cared about "meeting quote" that week then you are going to get screwed. It's cheaper for them to continue the line and give you a replacement thatn to stop the line.
If the factory is next to the ocean you will get screwed.

One guy at work told me his new HD in a new Computer he custom put together died after 4 days.

I need to buy another HD and I sticking to Seagate but always backing up everything just in case.

 

[Never Compromised]

I have 2 UW SCSI that I have been running since 99.

SCSI are rock solid, but expensive and low capacity. The 4.5 gig was "high end" when I first bought it.

I've personally never had a problem with a Seagate drive. The only time I've needed to replace is when I've wanted more room.

 

[Garrett]

Some interesting reading from Google:
http://209.85.163.132/papers/disk_failures.pdf

I believe WD is the current quiet champion for large drives (e.g. 500G). Seagates have lost their quiet edge. You can get good information here:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=7&sid=e033dc323da6da603ac3065d9469494d

One thing I do like about WD is they seem to run much cooler than other drives. Temperature can mean a lot for longevity in a cramped PC case.

 

[thirdtime]

Temperature can mean a lot for longevity in a cramped PC case.

I couldn't agree more. Years ago, when I was removing a hard drive from a case it was so hot I couldn't hold it in my hand for more than a second.

Ever since then, whenever I build a system I buy a case with good ventilation in the front of the case, that has a spot for a cooling fan in front of the drive bays. Drawing air in through the front of the case and blowing over the hard drive makes a dramatic difference in the drive's operating temperature.

 

[mumford]

What about 2.5" drives?

I've been noticing a trend with laptop drives failing at a high rate. I'm a mac and OpenBSD guy and have been noticing 2.5" sata drives are failing at a higher rate than my old ide ones. Not sure if its the bridge on the laptops themselves or the drives. Using both a thinkpad and macbook and both drives have failed on me after 4 or so months. No abuse here as they mostly sit at a desk.

Any thoughts?

 

[Horney_Senior]

Servers run 24-7 and those drives last almost forever. But those are SCSI drives Apparently home users don't want to go there.

While that's usually true, I've had almost new drive failures on a server as well. Fortunately, Raid 5 and a hot spare saved my day, and since the high-end Ultra SCSII drives are hot-pluggable there was no down time.

Wollensak is right about home users not wanting to go there. When you have to buy raid controllers and multiple drives that cost more than a new computer it's just not economically correct for home use.

 

[Keebler Elf]

I think I'm going to stick with my tried and true Western Digital brand. I've used Maxtor once or twice in the past and I was considering switching to Seagate, but WD's cooler temperatures and reliability (at least for me) have convinced me to stick with 'em.