Blew money on a Maxtor Diamond 10 help me pick a 2nd try.

[Hokers]

Bought a Maxtor Diamondmax 10 - 6 days of good use and then no better than the power up screen. Just saw a thread where these drives are not recomended, going to give it another shot.

2 questions:

Can I put the non funtioning HD in my computer, want to have some use for it.

Are there any other brands/models to avoid, I have already blown $100 on this.


p.s. At the moment I am leaning towards a Seagate so any advce on thier line is most wanted.

[LastPlace]

Hi -

As you know from my post in another thread, I am no expert but appear to be in the same situation as you (worked for a week and now it doesn't). My drive was a Maxtor Ultra 16. I'm going to return it tonight before my 14 day return period expires and am trying to figure out if there's anything at CompUSA would be a good choice.

I thought you may be interested in this information I copied from the Weaknees website...

Maxtor QuickView Hard Drives - Built for your DVR, PVR and Consumer Electronics Devices



Maxtor QuickView hard drives are drives specifically manufactured for the PVR market. Originally Quantum QuickView drives, these drives have shipped in 70% PVRs to date, and in most TiVos shipped to date. QuickView drives are not available in retail stores, and can only be purchased through authorized Maxtor VIP resellers, such as WeaKnees.com.

QuickView drives have a few key differences from normal desktop drives that make them far superior to desktop drives for PVR usage:

Thermal Control: On board sensors monitor temperature and adjust characteristics as necessary to keep the temperature optimal.
Durability: These drives run at 7200 RPM - more than fast enough for every PVR (providing about three times the necessary peak throughput) but not fast enough to wear out sooner.
Acoustic Management: Maxtor QuickView drives are specially tuned to run as quietly as possible.
A/V Streaming: QuickView drives have been optimized and tuned to provide consistent data to the PVR processor. Standard desktop drives can hang while retrying drive reads - QuickView drives know to move ahead and provide more data to keep video smooth.
Error Recovery: Desktop drives retry on errors to make sure that your Excel spreadsheet is exactly right - it's imperative. But when watching video, if one block of data is bad, you may not even notice a dark spot on one frame for 1/30th of a second. So these drives are tuned to move past errors faster, putting the stream of data as top priority. Where desktop drives often cause stutters, these drives run smooth.
More information about Maxtor QuickView drives is in this PDF.

[LastPlace]

Now that I have the HD out of the TiVo - I see that it's a DiamondMax, too

[Hokers]

Thanks for the information. I am planning on buying online this time since the local stores have little selection. This is an interesting possibility.

[funtoupgrade]

Maxtors have the worst warranty in the business and Seagates the best (5 years). Western Digital, Hitachi, and Samsung all have 3 years. In my opinion the Quickviews are highly overrated by Weaknees.

[blindlemon]

At the moment I am leaning towards a Seagate so any advce on thier line is most wanted.Go for a Seagate 7200.8 series or a Samsung HA250JC :up:

The Seagate 7200.9 series are also good (and slightly quieter than the 7200.8s) but pull more power at startup which can lead to problems if you are trying to use them in pairs.

The Samsung HA250JC is the quietest and coolest 250gb drive around at the moment, IMHO. Not sure how easily available it is in the US though - although it's readily available here in the UK :)

[Dkerr24]

I've had good luck so far with my new Samsung 300gb drive. Paid $99 for it at CompUSA (no hassles with rebates, either). Very quiet and plenty of space... 265 hours of recording time on my DTivo.

[kschauwe]

Be the first to try a Seagate 750GB, 7200.10 in a Tivo!

[Hokers]

Too much a coward to try the new model. Went with the Weaknees blank 250, certainly overpriced, but if I have to explain to the GF that I lost another Amazing Race, I may not live through it.

[LastPlace]

Hi All -

Thank you for all the advice that's been offered. Have I found the actual type suggested? This pricing looks great (no rebate!) at PCConnection.com:

SEAGATE
300GB Barracuda 7200.9 PATA Internal Hard Drive - Special Price Drop, Ends 5 12 2006!! In Stock
Ships: Today $99.95

Seagate Technology
Item#: 6480640
Mfr#: ST3300622A
Ship Weight: 1.94 lbs.

This way I'd have to pay for shipping but it's $110 for a 160GB this week at CompUSA and the best I'll do there is waiting out for a rebate to be offered and then wait 'til that money comes...

[TydalForce]

Hi All -

Thank you for all the advice that's been offered. Have I found the actual type suggested? This pricing looks great (no rebate!) at PCConnection.com:

SEAGATE
300GB Barracuda 7200.9 PATA Internal Hard Drive - Special Price Drop, Ends 5 12 2006!! In Stock
Ships: Today $99.95

Seagate Technology
Item#: 6480640
Mfr#: ST3300622A
Ship Weight: 1.94 lbs.

This way I'd have to pay for shipping but it's $110 for a 160GB this week at CompUSA and the best I'll do there is waiting out for a rebate to be offered and then wait 'til that money comes...

That's the drive I just put in my Humax a couple weeks ago. Works fine; no complaints at all. Definitely overkill but seemed a good value.

I tend to go for performance in HDs even if I don't need it - I figure, this drive will probably be replaced with something bigger someday and then I'll use this one in a computer somewhere. Might as well get the performance drive now so it'll be halfway decent tomorrow ;-}