[Mulderator]

I have a Raptor 74Gig, 10,000 RPM that I couldn't get to boot past the Windows Logo. I through it in my other machine and chkdsk ran a check on it and repaired some sectors and I could read it find as a slave--through it back in the original computer as the master boot disc again and on startup my bios says its bad and to replace it. So I tried a Windows reinstall and it gave me an internal setup error. So then I run recovery console and try to run chkdsk and it say the "volume apears to contain one or more unrecoverable problems." Point is I might be able to get this drive to boot again, but I've been thinking of replacing it anyway because its only 74 Gig and its getting filled up.

So the question is what drive? I could get another Raptor 150 for $189 after rebate, but someone once said that an NCQ drive is just as good, but I don't see any for a reasonable price (under $100) except with an 8 Meg cache. I figure I'm better off with 16 megs than 8 with NCQ.

Anyway, I bought this drive a few times for lesser machines:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822144701

WD 3.0 gb Caviar, 250 Gig, 16 meg cache for $79, but no NCQ.

So my question is what drive should I get?

 

[Mulderator]

Ran a diagnostics from WD and got this:

 

[crjdriver]

Mulder fwiw I benched a sata1 drive against a sata2 drive with ncq [the controller supported sata2 and ncq] There was no real difference in speed, access time, etc. Somewhere I have a screenshot of the benchmark. IMO you would probably get slightly better performance from the raptor drive, however I doubt you would notice anything in real world use.

 

[JohnWill]

NCQ will only be really noticable with multi-tasking and a number of applications running.

 

[Mulderator]

So then what drive do you guys recommend?

 

[Mulderator]

BTW--you guys never told me what that error meant--I assume that's no repairable?

 

[Triple6]

Raptor's have a 5 year warranty, get the drive replaced.

 

[crjdriver]

If you cannot get the drive replaced, then this Seagate will work well for you.

 

[Mulderator]

Raptor's have a 5 year warranty, get the drive replaced.

I don't want to replace it though--I want to increase the size from 74 Gigs. Would they allow me to upgrade to a better drive?

 

[Mulderator]

If you cannot get the drive replaced, then this Seagate will work well for you.

I'm kind of partial to WD--this is the first drive I've ever had problems with.

 

[Mulderator]

Raptor's have a 5 year warranty, get the drive replaced.

I thought that's what I'd have to do, but what does that mean--i.e., what is that error saying?

 

[Rich-M]

Raw read error rate "This attribute value depends of read errors, disk surface condition and indicates the rate of hardware read errors that occurred when reading data from a disk surface. Lower values indicate that there is a problem with either disk surface or read/write heads."

and replace the Raptor, that is the fastest drive out and 16 meg cache on 7200 drive is the old "smoke" trick!

 

[Mulderator]

Raw read error rate "This attribute value depends of read errors, disk surface condition and indicates the rate of hardware read errors that occurred when reading data from a disk surface. Lower values indicate that there is a problem with either disk surface or read/write heads."

and replace the Raptor, that is the fastest drive out and 16 meg cache on 7200 drive is the old "smoke" trick!

Problem is though that I want a bigger drive. Unbelievably--I call WD and they quote me over $300 for their 150 Gig Raptor and NewEgg has it on sale for $189 after $30 rebate. So all I can do is RMA the 74 Gig Raptor at this point---kind of stupid!

Is the 150 Gig really that much faster than the Seagate that crj linked to?

 

[Mulderator]

The other thing is I bought this drive for the computer upstairs awhile ago on sale:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822144397

A SATA 150 320 Gig. I could change that one to the one downstairs and put the Raptor upstairs. I just don't want to do it if its going to make a signfiicant difference in speed.

 

[JohnWill]

The Raptor will be noticeably faster than a 7200 RPM drive, but there's no certainty that any speed bottleneck in the system is the disk. If the drive is still in production, I doubt they'll upgrade you for free. I once got a 160gig for a 100gig replacement from Maxtor, but that was some time ago. The 160gig died too, but then it was out of warranty.

 

[Mulderator]

The Raptor will be noticeably faster than a 7200 RPM drive, but there's no certainty that any speed bottleneck in the system is the disk. If the drive is still in production, I doubt they'll upgrade you for free. I once got a 160gig for a 100gig replacement from Maxtor, but that was some time ago. The 160gig died too, but then it was out of warranty.

So then is it worth it to just get the $189 150 Gig Raptor? I could always sell the new one on E-bay I guess--probably get $100 for it.

 

[rexgrant]

So then is it worth it to just get the $189 150 Gig Raptor? I could always sell the new one on E-bay I guess--probably get $100 for it.

Hi Mulder
Before you do anymore Download Weston Digital Diagnostic tool and run that,But also contact Weston digital as you may find they will replace it.
Regards
Rex

 

[Mulderator]

Hey Johnwill, crjdriver, Triple--give me some fricken answers here--you guys are just giving me more questions--I don't want to make this deicision--I expect you gurus to make it for me--what good are having moderators who just cause you to have more questions? When I was a moderator--I answered people's questions straight out!

 

[Mulderator]

Hi Mulder
Before you do anymore Download Weston Digital Diagnostic tool and run that,But also contact Weston digital as you may find they will replace it.
Regards
Rex

I did run their diagnostics--the drive is bad--at least as a bootable drive--I can read it fine as a slave. And Western Digital IS replacing it, but I want to upgrade to a bigger drive. Read post #13

 

[Rich-M]

Good plan to sell return on eBay and buy what you want, I do it all the time.