Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Having accumulated nearly half a terabyte of, er, 'audiovisual' material
since Christmas, I'm running out of room fast (I need to stack a certain
amount on the HDD for editing before burning off to DVDR/RW) - at the risk
of appearing too idle to start the rounds myself, is anyone here 'au
courant' with the best online deals atm?

I'm looking at the best price/size combination at the 200-250 GB break and
also interested in what's available at bigger capacities (500 Gig?)

TIA

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"Keith G" wrote
Having accumulated nearly half a terabyte of, er, 'audiovisual' material
since Christmas, I'm running out of room fast (I need to stack a certain
amount on the HDD for editing before burning off to DVDR/RW) - at the risk
of appearing too idle to start the rounds myself, is anyone here 'au
courant' with the best online deals atm?

I'm looking at the best price/size combination at the 200-250 GB break and
also interested in what's available at bigger capacities (500 Gig?)

Well since your application is just storage, and you don't need ultra-
high-speed access, you can put up with 5400RPM, so how about 300GB for
200 quid? 300GB is the largest single hard drive I'm aware of at the
moment. or you can get 250GB (7200RPM) for 162. (All inc. VAT.)

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/Produ...ry=Hard+Drives



Martin
--
M.A.Poyser Tel.: 07967 110890
Manchester, U.K. http://www.fleetie.demon.co.uk

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sat, 17 Jan 2004 14:59:39 -0000, Keith G wrote:


Having accumulated nearly half a terabyte of, er, 'audiovisual' material
since Christmas, I'm running out of room fast (I need to stack a certain
amount on the HDD for editing before burning off to DVDR/RW) - at the
risk
of appearing too idle to start the rounds myself, is anyone here 'au
courant' with the best online deals atm?

I'm looking at the best price/size combination at the 200-250 GB break
and
also interested in what's available at bigger capacities (500 Gig?)

TIA

Serveral smaller drives should present better vfm, depending on the
controller.
The 160gig Samsung spinpoints are very fast and quiet.

Incidently, are we looking at uncompressed digital video to fill a
terabyte?

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Hi Keith,

In message , Keith G
writes

Having accumulated nearly half a terabyte of, er, 'audiovisual' material
since Christmas, I'm running out of room fast (I need to stack a certain
amount on the HDD for editing before burning off to DVDR/RW) - at the risk
of appearing too idle to start the rounds myself, is anyone here 'au
courant' with the best online deals atm?

I haven't checked since 'January sales fever' set in (or maybe it
didn't) but in November I bought a bunch of 160GB drives of various
flavours from ebuyer - they were doing the best prices I could find at
the time. Worth a look... www.ebuyer.com

Caveat - they are a 'pile it high, sell it cheap' merchant, so don't
expect retail packaging, bundled software etc. However, they have been
reliable IME.

--
Regards,
Glenn Booth

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10118



"Keith G" wrote in message
...

Having accumulated nearly half a terabyte of, er, 'audiovisual' material
since Christmas, I'm running out of room fast (I need to stack a certain
amount on the HDD for editing before burning off to DVDR/RW) - at the risk
of appearing too idle to start the rounds myself, is anyone here 'au
courant' with the best online deals atm?

I'm looking at the best price/size combination at the 200-250 GB break and
also interested in what's available at bigger capacities (500 Gig?)

TIA

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10118

4 250GB drives in a small, hot box.


Martin
--
M.A.Poyser Tel.: 07967 110890
Manchester, U.K. http://www.fleetie.demon.co.uk

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"Jim H" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 17 Jan 2004 14:59:39 -0000, Keith G wrote:


Having accumulated nearly half a terabyte of, er, 'audiovisual' material
since Christmas, I'm running out of room fast (I need to stack a certain
amount on the HDD for editing before burning off to DVDR/RW) - at the
risk
of appearing too idle to start the rounds myself, is anyone here 'au
courant' with the best online deals atm?

I'm looking at the best price/size combination at the 200-250 GB break
and
also interested in what's available at bigger capacities (500 Gig?)

TIA

Serveral smaller drives should present better vfm, depending on the
controller.
The 160gig Samsung spinpoints are very fast and quiet.



And well priced at one of my 'usual' online stores - (Komplett, I think)



Incidently, are we looking at uncompressed digital video to fill a
terabyte?



No - DVD movies.....

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"Fleetie" wrote in message
...
http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10118

4 250GB drives in a small, hot box.


Interesting observation, but this gadget is way over my budget anyway. It
does raise the interesting possibility of a USB/Firewire 'standalone' mass
storage bank. (Which, in turn, raises the spectre of a gadget failing with a
TB's worth of blood, sweat and toil going doon the toobs.......)

Thanks to all who responded here - the links and suggestions are most
helpful. Apparently I've got to check that the motherboards on both/either
of my machines (both running XP) will actually 'see' 200-250 Gig disks and
not report them as having smaller capacities.....??

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 12:14:49 -0000, Keith G wrote:


"Jim H" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 17 Jan 2004 14:59:39 -0000, Keith G
wrote:


Having accumulated nearly half a terabyte of, er, 'audiovisual'
material
since Christmas, I'm running out of room fast (I need to stack a
certain
amount on the HDD for editing before burning off to DVDR/RW) - at the
risk
of appearing too idle to start the rounds myself, is anyone here 'au
courant' with the best online deals atm?

I'm looking at the best price/size combination at the 200-250 GB break
and
also interested in what's available at bigger capacities (500 Gig?)

TIA

Serveral smaller drives should present better vfm, depending on the
controller.
The 160gig Samsung spinpoints are very fast and quiet.



And well priced at one of my 'usual' online stores - (Komplett, I think)

I got one a few weeks ago, and am pretty happy with it - as quiet as my old
Seagate Baracuda IV (considered the quietest drive around)

The drive runs slightly hot, but still way under the specified max of 55
degrees. If you need a few a slow, quiet fan over them might be a good
idea.

Incidently, are we looking at uncompressed digital video to fill a
terabyte?

No - DVD movies.....

About 200 of them then!

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

4 250GB drives in a small, hot box.


Interesting observation, but this gadget is way over my budget anyway. It
does raise the interesting possibility of a USB/Firewire 'standalone' mass
storage bank. (Which, in turn, raises the spectre of a gadget failing with
a
TB's worth of blood, sweat and toil going doon the toobs.......)

Thanks to all who responded here - the links and suggestions are most
helpful. Apparently I've got to check that the motherboards on both/either
of my machines (both running XP) will actually 'see' 200-250 Gig disks and
not report them as having smaller capacities.....??

Over recent years my HD capacity has increased to a couple TB, buying
another disc every couple of months.

I've found cheap prices at Micro Direct (www.microdirect.co.uk) - a little
over 50p/GB for Maxtor 7200rpm with 8GB cache at 160GB/disc, and they're
local to me which is handy. I know it's easier to use larger discs, but if
you can keep the drives smaller and well organised, if you experience a
failure, you will find less material is lost and you know roughly what you
have to reaquire.

I haven't bothered with a custom box for it all (although I am thinking
about it) as I've found networked PCs quite easy to arrange and browse. A
Lian-Li P60 case, for instance, will hold up to 12 hard discs with ease and
yet is a normal-sized PC case. It looks good, has effecient and quiet
cooling and easier than many standard PC cases when adding/removing drives.
It's easy to add additional IDE channels with £20 PCI cards.

As for large disc support, go to www.maxtor.com and look for the "Enable
Large Disc Support Utility" (of something like that). It's a simple
executable which updates the Windows registry to recognise drives over
127GB - most of the solutions I found on Google when I first had this
problem were long and unneccessary - this is simple and works.

Then set up an FTP server and give me access!

Piece of pie!

(Me like pie).

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Hi Keith,

My eldest son Tom is 'into' computers more than me..so I showed him your
post. Here's his reply:

if you have the space in your PC case, it'd be worth considering a raid
card:
http://www.promise.com/product/produ...=94&familyId=2

And a few disks:
http://www.storagereview.com/article...5VLSA80_1.html

This put's all the drives together as a single volume (drive letter) and
different Raid levels give advantages of performance and redundancy,
depending on how it's set up.

Tom

"Keith G" wrote in message
...

Having accumulated nearly half a terabyte of, er, 'audiovisual' material
since Christmas, I'm running out of room fast (I need to stack a certain
amount on the HDD for editing before burning off to DVDR/RW) - at the risk
of appearing too idle to start the rounds myself, is anyone here 'au
courant' with the best online deals atm?

I'm looking at the best price/size combination at the 200-250 GB break and
also interested in what's available at bigger capacities (500 Gig?)

TIA

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 12:49:22 -0000, Keith G wrote:


"Fleetie" wrote in message
...
http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10118

4 250GB drives in a small, hot box.


Interesting observation, but this gadget is way over my budget anyway. It
does raise the interesting possibility of a USB/Firewire 'standalone'
mass
storage bank. (Which, in turn, raises the spectre of a gadget failing
with a
TB's worth of blood, sweat and toil going doon the toobs.......)

The more discs you have the more likely failure becomes, and the more sense
some redundancy makes. Some kind of RAID5 controller might be a good idea.
With n drives you'd get the same space as n-1, but if one fails you don't
loose any data.

Thanks to all who responded here - the links and suggestions are most
helpful. Apparently I've got to check that the motherboards on
both/either
of my machines (both running XP) will actually 'see' 200-250 Gig disks
and
not report them as having smaller capacities.....??

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"Mike Gilmour" wrote in message
...
Hi Keith,

My eldest son Tom is 'into' computers more than me..so I showed him your
post. Here's his reply:

if you have the space in your PC case, it'd be worth considering a raid
card:

http://www.promise.com/product/produ...=94&familyId=2

And a few disks:

http://www.storagereview.com/article...5VLSA80_1.html

This put's all the drives together as a single volume (drive letter) and
different Raid levels give advantages of performance and redundancy,
depending on how it's set up.



Hi Mike - thanks for this, I know a nice little 'RAID array' is the 'cool'
approach atm! This and the possibility of an external box are certainly
going under consideration for the near future, but right now I'm just
looking for a little extra space to 'lay over' rips and recordings for
editing purposes.

The truth is that there are far more interesting movies on the Freeview
channels these days than there are decent new releases. What I like to do is
record them them to disk using a Panasonic DVDR - a sluggish operator with
evil -R/RAM 'compatability' but an infallible producer of perfect digital
recordings and which has the *essential* Time Slip and Flexible Recording
modes.

I then copy them to hard disk and do the necessary tidying up - 'top and
tail' them (always pays to add a few minutes to the start and end times) and
remove any ads - *not* a chore when the black stuff is spinning close by!
They then get burned to an R or RW according to their 'keepability' atm -
the extra space will allow me to rack more of them up. (You are talking of
an average of two movies a day, I would say...!)

(We like to 'control time' when we watch a move - usually 'fridging' before
the opening credits have finished, pausing for various things - fag breaks,
make tea or coffee etc., pause and zoom those 'important little clues' and
then there's the inevitable *Run that back*....!!!)

When it comes to 'safety backup copies' of other movies there is often a
fair bit of buggering about to do like removing Icelandic subtitles and
other excess baggage to reduce the amount of compression required to best
fit the movie onto the 4.38 Gig real capacity of a blank disk.....

:-)

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 14:58:46 -0000
"Mike Gilmour" wrote:


And a few disks:
http://www.storagereview.com/article...5VLSA80_1.html

Oh dear god no. not IBM discs.


--
Spyros lair: http://www.mnementh.co.uk/ |||| Maintainer: arm26 linux

Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons, for you are tasty and good with ketchup.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"just me" wrote in message
...

4 250GB drives in a small, hot box.


Interesting observation, but this gadget is way over my budget anyway.
It
does raise the interesting possibility of a USB/Firewire 'standalone'
mass
storage bank. (Which, in turn, raises the spectre of a gadget failing
with
a
TB's worth of blood, sweat and toil going doon the toobs.......)

Thanks to all who responded here - the links and suggestions are most
helpful. Apparently I've got to check that the motherboards on
both/either
of my machines (both running XP) will actually 'see' 200-250 Gig disks
and
not report them as having smaller capacities.....??

Over recent years my HD capacity has increased to a couple TB, buying
another disc every couple of months.

I've found cheap prices at Micro Direct (www.microdirect.co.uk) - a little
over 50p/GB for Maxtor 7200rpm with 8GB cache at 160GB/disc, and they're
local to me which is handy. I know it's easier to use larger discs, but if
you can keep the drives smaller and well organised, if you experience a
failure, you will find less material is lost and you know roughly what you
have to reaquire.

I haven't bothered with a custom box for it all (although I am thinking
about it) as I've found networked PCs quite easy to arrange and browse. A
Lian-Li P60 case, for instance, will hold up to 12 hard discs with ease
and
yet is a normal-sized PC case. It looks good, has effecient and quiet
cooling and easier than many standard PC cases when adding/removing
drives.
It's easy to add additional IDE channels with £20 PCI cards.

As for large disc support, go to www.maxtor.com and look for the "Enable
Large Disc Support Utility" (of something like that). It's a simple
executable which updates the Windows registry to recognise drives over
127GB - most of the solutions I found on Google when I first had this
problem were long and unneccessary - this is simple and works.



Excellent - thanks for that. (Probably saved me a ton of dicking around!)


Then set up an FTP server and give me access!


No, bugger that for a 'jeu des soldats'......



Piece of pie!

(Me like pie).


........so do I.

Email me direct (with a real name) for a 'Pie List' (embryonic Office 97
..xls or a cut & paste therefrom) and a list of any 'pies' you have...... ;-)


(I think you've coined a global Internet phrase here.......!! ;-)

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 16:23:24 +0000, Ian Molton wrote:

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 14:58:46 -0000
"Mike Gilmour" wrote:


And a few disks:
http://www.storagereview.com/article...5VLSA80_1.html

Oh dear god no. not IBM discs.

You had problems with them? It's been a while admittedly, but I used
to favour them a few years back, mostly for being quiet and reliable.

As I'm about to build a modest array I'm interested in recent
experiences. For my application speed is not a big issue, but
reliability and noise is.


--
Tim Hobbs

Barcoding? http://www.bartec-systems.com
Land Rovers? http://www.seriesii.co.uk

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 16:43:16 +0000
Tim Hobbs wrote:


http://www.storagereview.com/article...DS722525VLSA80
_1.html

Oh dear god no. not IBM discs.

You had problems with them? It's been a while admittedly, but I used
to favour them a few years back, mostly for being quiet and reliable.

Lets just say its no co-incidence that IBM sold out to hitachi
immediately after sellign some of the least reliable drives in modern
times...


--
Spyros lair: http://www.mnementh.co.uk/ |||| Maintainer: arm26 linux

Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons, for you are tasty and good with
ketchup.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"Ian Molton" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 16:43:16 +0000
Tim Hobbs wrote:


http://www.storagereview.com/article...DS722525VLSA80
_1.html

Oh dear god no. not IBM discs.

You had problems with them? It's been a while admittedly, but I used
to favour them a few years back, mostly for being quiet and reliable.

Lets just say its no co-incidence that IBM sold out to hitachi
immediately after sellign some of the least reliable drives in modern
times...


--
Spyros lair: http://www.mnementh.co.uk/ |||| Maintainer: arm26 linux

Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons, for you are tasty and good with
ketchup.

What about now though under Hitachi Global Storage Technologies ..any
better??

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Hi,

In message , Ian Molton
writes

Lets just say its no co-incidence that IBM sold out to hitachi
immediately after sellign some of the least reliable drives in modern
times...

It's funny, I heard *lots* of first hand reports of failures and
problems with IBM drives (Deskstar 540x, around 60GB if memory serves,
but I could be wrong). I never actually saw one fail, despite using
quite a few. The worst drives I've personally ever used were Hitachi
SCSI units. I had three 1.4GB drives, back when that was huge by most
standards, and they all failed within weeks.

I got one back from a warranty claim with really bad hand-soldered mods
on it. I swore I'd never buy one again, and at the time I worked for
Hitachi and got a staff discount.

I'll probably steer clear, now that the two makers I trust least have
joined forces!
--
Regards,
Glenn Booth

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"Glenn Booth" wrote in message
...
Hi,

In message , Ian Molton
writes

Lets just say its no co-incidence that IBM sold out to hitachi
immediately after sellign some of the least reliable drives in modern
times...

It's funny, I heard *lots* of first hand reports of failures and
problems with IBM drives (Deskstar 540x, around 60GB if memory serves,
but I could be wrong).



Now that you mention it, I've had 2 hard disks fail on a leased Dell (at the
rate of about one per year) - replaced without question (as was the
motherboard on one occasion - unnecessarily as it turned out). I reckon
these were both IBM Deskstars.......

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Some general tips for preventing Hard Disc failu

Turn the disc over every few months. This prevents uneven wear on the
bearing (apparantly!)
Keep it cool - good airflow inside your computer and around your drives is
important.
Perform a full format on new discs (rather than a quick format) and a
thorough surface scan to ensure no inherent problems waiting to creep up on
you.
Don't perform loads of unnecessary scans etc unless you have a specific
problem that may be cured by such a scan.
Back up your data. This prevents Murphy's Law from being imposed.

Touch wood I've only experienced one HD failure in 10 years and many discs.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Hi,

In message , Keith G
writes

Now that you mention it, I've had 2 hard disks fail on a leased Dell (at the
rate of about one per year) - replaced without question (as was the
motherboard on one occasion - unnecessarily as it turned out). I reckon
these were both IBM Deskstars.......

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/22446.html

....just one of many such stories that I remember hitting the media at
around that time. They weren't too hot about admitting the problem.
Hoping it would just go away, I suppose.

--
Regards,
Glenn Booth

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 20:29:18 -0000, just me wrote:


Keep it cool - good airflow inside your computer and around your drives
is important.

Is there evidence to support this? My drives are hotter than usual because
they're decoupled from the case. 40 degrees or so is hot but the the
manufacturers' max temperatures are 55 and 65

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 22:33:05 -0000
Jim H wrote:

40 degrees or so is hot but the the
manufacturers' max temperatures are 55 and 65

if you measure 40 degrees some parts could be much hotter internally.


--
Spyros lair: http://www.mnementh.co.uk/ |||| Maintainer: arm26 linux

Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons, for you are tasty and good with ketchup.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Keep it cool - good airflow inside your computer and around your drives
is important.

Is there evidence to support this? My drives are hotter than usual because
they're decoupled from the case. 40 degrees or so is hot but the the
manufacturers' max temperatures are 55 and 65

A good aluminium case will act like a heatsink to a modest degree, however
if you have several drives mounted one atop the other, the heat from each
one rises up to the next. Without adequate cooling, the drives (particularly
those on top) will get toastier and that has the potential to shorten their
lives. Most case airflows run from the bottom front to the top back, pulling
in cool air near the ground, passing over the CPU and MB and out near the
top. Often this airflow doesn't serve HDs well (excepting cases where HDs
are mounted at the bottom). This problem can be exacerbated by using wide,
flat, non-aerodynamic IDE cables which block efficient airflow. You can swap
these for rounded cables or fold the existing cables in two twice over and
strap them in the folded shape, or you can switch to Serial ATA.

There are many arguments about what temps are acceptable. Usually there's a
trade-off between cooling noise and acceptable temps, but there are many
solid cases and low noise fans about. Personally I've found 40 degrees to be
quite acceptable for a HD temp (also for a CPU temp too), although the
ambient case temperature should be much lower!

Like much else, these things will *contribute* to a healthier PC and to a
longer component life.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 23:06:44 +0000, Ian Molton wrote:

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 22:33:05 -0000
Jim H wrote:

40 degrees or so is hot but the the
manufacturers' max temperatures are 55 and 65

if you measure 40 degrees some parts could be much hotter internally.

I'm relying on the drive mesuring itself, which is well known to be
inacurate, but IIRC the manufacturers build allowances for the
probe into their max temperature specs.

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 23:17:43 -0000, just me wrote:

Keep it cool - good airflow inside your computer and around your
drives
is important.

Is there evidence to support this? My drives are hotter than usual
because
they're decoupled from the case. 40 degrees or so is hot but the the
manufacturers' max temperatures are 55 and 65

A good aluminium case will act like a heatsink to a modest degree,
however
if you have several drives mounted one atop the other, the heat from each
one rises up to the next. Without adequate cooling, the drives
(particularly
those on top) will get toastier and that has the potential to shorten
their
lives. Most case airflows run from the bottom front to the top back,
pulling
in cool air near the ground, passing over the CPU and MB and out near the
top. Often this airflow doesn't serve HDs well (excepting cases where HDs
are mounted at the bottom). This problem can be exacerbated by using
wide,
flat, non-aerodynamic IDE cables which block efficient airflow. You can
swap
these for rounded cables or fold the existing cables in two twice over
and
strap them in the folded shape, or you can switch to Serial ATA.

There are many arguments about what temps are acceptable. Usually
there's a
trade-off between cooling noise and acceptable temps, but there are many
solid cases and low noise fans about. Personally I've found 40 degrees
to be
quite acceptable for a HD temp (also for a CPU temp too), although the
ambient case temperature should be much lower!

Like much else, these things will *contribute* to a healthier PC and to a
longer component life.

I have the drives at bottom front, but on foam, not screwed in to reduce
noise.
CPU is way up in the 70s, but I've not had a system in 18 months so I'm
fine
with that.

On a hot day the Baracuda might touch 48, but it's speced for 65 so,
again, I'm
not worried.

Has anyone ever actually done a study showing hot drive fail sooner?

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Keep it cool - good airflow inside your computer and around your
drives
is important.

Is there evidence to support this? My drives are hotter than usual
because
they're decoupled from the case. 40 degrees or so is hot but the the
manufacturers' max temperatures are 55 and 65

A good aluminium case will act like a heatsink to a modest degree,
however
if you have several drives mounted one atop the other, the heat from
each
one rises up to the next. Without adequate cooling, the drives
(particularly
those on top) will get toastier and that has the potential to shorten
their
lives. Most case airflows run from the bottom front to the top back,
pulling
in cool air near the ground, passing over the CPU and MB and out near
the
top. Often this airflow doesn't serve HDs well (excepting cases where
HDs
are mounted at the bottom). This problem can be exacerbated by using
wide,
flat, non-aerodynamic IDE cables which block efficient airflow. You can
swap
these for rounded cables or fold the existing cables in two twice over
and
strap them in the folded shape, or you can switch to Serial ATA.

There are many arguments about what temps are acceptable. Usually
there's a
trade-off between cooling noise and acceptable temps, but there are many
solid cases and low noise fans about. Personally I've found 40 degrees
to be
quite acceptable for a HD temp (also for a CPU temp too), although the
ambient case temperature should be much lower!

Like much else, these things will *contribute* to a healthier PC and to
a
longer component life.

I have the drives at bottom front, but on foam, not screwed in to reduce
noise.
CPU is way up in the 70s, but I've not had a system in 18 months so I'm
fine
with that.

On a hot day the Baracuda might touch 48, but it's speced for 65 so,
again, I'm
not worried.

Has anyone ever actually done a study showing hot drive fail sooner?

Not read any studies myself, but there is logic behind this. The tolerance
of any electronic and mechanical device isn't infinite. Pushing that
tolerance envelope will eventually have an impact on performance. I for one
would not wish to risk the data on a HD to find out what isn't tolerable
when simple common-sense techniques can prevent temperature extremes.
Speaking of which, 70 degrees for a CPU is hot. Are you using CPU intensive
applications? Even gamers and silent PC modders worry about 70 degrees! What
tool is giving that measurement? What CPU and what cooling are you using?

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 00:46:40 -0000
Jim H wrote:

I'm relying on the drive mesuring itself, which is well known to be
inacurate, but IIRC the manufacturers build allowances for the
probe into their max temperature specs.

Indeed, however the sensor is only in one place, and airflow can dramatically alter how hot things get - its entirely possible to have a drive 40 degrees at one end and 60 at the other...

--
Spyros lair: http://www.mnementh.co.uk/ |||| Maintainer: arm26 linux

Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons, for you are tasty and good with ketchup.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 01:53:12 -0000
"just me" wrote:

Speaking of which, 70 degrees for a CPU is hot.

Agreed, its too hot. I found that athlons and durons willrn at this temperature, but their lifespans are greatly reduced (I have had 2 failures inside 3 years).

--
Spyros lair: http://www.mnementh.co.uk/ |||| Maintainer: arm26 linux

Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons, for you are tasty and good with ketchup.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"Mike Gilmour" wrote in message

"Ian Molton" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 16:43:16 +0000
Tim Hobbs wrote:


http://www.storagereview.com/article...DS722525VLSA80
_1.html

Oh dear god no. not IBM discs.

You had problems with them? It's been a while admittedly, but I
used to favour them a few years back, mostly for being quiet and
reliable.

Lets just say its no co-incidence that IBM sold out to hitachi
immediately after sellign some of the least reliable drives in modern
times...

I buy over 100 hard drives a year. For one reason or the other they are
fairly equally divided between WD, IBM/Hitachi, and Maxtor. IME they all
fail at similar rates, which is to say way too frequently.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Speaking of which, 70 degrees for a CPU is hot.

Agreed, its too hot. I found that athlons and durons willrn at this
temperature, but their lifespans are greatly reduced (I have had 2 failures
inside 3 years).

In fact I've stopped using AMD processors - just find I can achieve cooler
temperatures & quieter operation with Intel Pentiums.
The AMDs do indeed run hot and are remarkably fragile. Foolishly forgot to
place a heatsink & fan on an AMD CPU once and it burnt up within 60 seconds
of power up! Also suffered another CPU failure in the same setup.
Touch-wood, never had a Pentium fail.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"just me" wrote
In fact I've stopped using AMD processors - just find I can achieve cooler
temperatures & quieter operation with Intel Pentiums.
The AMDs do indeed run hot and are remarkably fragile. Foolishly forgot to
place a heatsink & fan on an AMD CPU once and it burnt up within 60
seconds
of power up! Also suffered another CPU failure in the same setup.
Touch-wood, never had a Pentium fail.

Many CPUs can shut-down if they reach critical temperature.

I unplugged a CPU fan for about 60s and it shut down the PC.
Very happy person as I'd only just bought the chip.

Athlon 1700xp (1.47GHz) runs at around 51'C
(24/7)

--
Charlie

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 01:53:12 -0000, just me wrote:

Not read any studies myself, but there is logic behind this. The
tolerance
of any electronic and mechanical device isn't infinite. Pushing that
tolerance envelope will eventually have an impact on performance. I for
one
would not wish to risk the data on a HD to find out what isn't tolerable
when simple common-sense techniques can prevent temperature extremes.
Speaking of which, 70 degrees for a CPU is hot. Are you using CPU
intensive
applications? Even gamers and silent PC modders worry about 70 degrees!
What
tool is giving that measurement? What CPU and what cooling are you using?

Zalman 'flower' cooler on slightly less than minimum setting. I know from
trying
with overclocking my mobo is very good at turning itself off when it gets
too hot.

This particular Athlon is a t'bread 2100, fastest of a run of particuarly
heat inefficient CPUS. IIRC They are specced to 90 or so.

I suppose 70 is the high end. I tend to have a lot of background crunching
going on
though. The cpu has been running pretty much non stop for over a year like
this and
I tend to upgrade quite a bit so I'm not too bothered if it lasts 3 years
instead of
10.

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 15:29:33 -0000
"just me" wrote:


In fact I've stopped using AMD processors - just find I can achieve cooler
temperatures & quieter operation with Intel Pentiums.

My current one (dying, due to lightening damage) runs at a happy 42 degrees. I'll let you know how its replacement does in the same machine.

Never had a problem cooling amds and I dont expect my heatsink will just 'fall off' so I dont really buy into the alarmist thing on THG ;-)

Intels are slightly better engineered thermally, but I still go for 'bangs per buck'.

--
Spyros lair: http://www.mnementh.co.uk/ |||| Maintainer: arm26 linux

Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons, for you are tasty and good with ketchup.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 15:29:33 -0000, just me wrote:

Speaking of which, 70 degrees for a CPU is hot.

Agreed, its too hot. I found that athlons and durons willrn at this
temperature, but their lifespans are greatly reduced (I have had 2
failures
inside 3 years).

In fact I've stopped using AMD processors - just find I can achieve
cooler
temperatures & quieter operation with Intel Pentiums.
The AMDs do indeed run hot and are remarkably fragile. Foolishly forgot
to
place a heatsink & fan on an AMD CPU once and it burnt up within 60
seconds
of power up! Also suffered another CPU failure in the same setup.
Touch-wood, never had a Pentium fail.

Pentiums are very good at working in less than optimal thermal conditions
because they underclock themsleves if they get too hot. Great feature for
stability, problem is that there's no easy way to know if the cpu's working
at full speed.

I've seen a recent p4 have the heatsink pulled off in the middle of a game
of
quake, the games slowed to a crawl but the system never crashed! a few
seconds
later when it was put back on everything was fine.

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 21:32:08 -0000, Jim H
wrote:

Pentiums are very good at working in less than optimal thermal conditions
because they underclock themsleves if they get too hot. Great feature for
stability, problem is that there's no easy way to know if the cpu's working
at full speed.

I've seen a recent p4 have the heatsink pulled off in the middle of a game
of
quake, the games slowed to a crawl but the system never crashed! a few
seconds
later when it was put back on everything was fine.


Yeah. Reputedly, an Athlon would melt :-)

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

"Jim H" wrote


The 160gig Samsung spinpoints are very fast and quiet.



And well priced at one of my 'usual' online stores - (Komplett, I think)

I got one a few weeks ago, and am pretty happy with it - as quiet as my
old
Seagate Baracuda IV (considered the quietest drive around)

The drive runs slightly hot, but still way under the specified max of 55
degrees. If you need a few a slow, quiet fan over them might be a good
idea.


Yes, I'm thinking just to grab a smaller disk for the moment to fill an
empty bay and fancy one of these Samsungs myself. From what has been said
here, it looks like an array of multiple drives needs some careful thought
from the heat build-up POV. (No rush on that yet...)



Incidently, are we looking at uncompressed digital video to fill a
terabyte?

No - DVD movies.....

About 200 of them then!



Well, just over half that atm.... ;-)

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

Bitstring , from the
wonderful person Laurence Payne
said
On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 21:32:08 -0000, Jim H
wrote:

Pentiums are very good at working in less than optimal thermal conditions
because they underclock themsleves if they get too hot. Great feature for
stability, problem is that there's no easy way to know if the cpu's working
at full speed.

I've seen a recent p4 have the heatsink pulled off in the middle of a game
of
quake, the games slowed to a crawl but the system never crashed! a few
seconds
later when it was put back on everything was fine.


Yeah. Reputedly, an Athlon would melt :-)

A 'mark 1' Athlon in an old motherboard might. Anything produced in the
last 2 years, in a decent motherboard, would do pretty much what the P4
does - slow down, and if that doesn't help enough (which it probably
won't with no HS at all) then switch off.

--
GSV Three Minds in a Can
Outgoing Msgs are Turing Tested,and indistinguishable from human typing.

Best Hard Disk Deals
 

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 23:34:35 +0000, GSV Three Minds in a Can
wrote:

A 'mark 1' Athlon in an old motherboard might. Anything produced in the
last 2 years, in a decent motherboard, would do pretty much what the P4
does - slow down, and if that doesn't help enough (which it probably
won't with no HS at all) then switch off.

That's interesting. In another forum, a P4 laptop is being
criticised for thermal throttling cutting in, sabotaging multitrack
audio recording and playback. Allegedly. An Athlon, apparently
would never do that! (I guess he'd rather it carried on, despite
inadequate cooling in the confines of a laptop, until it melted;
triumphantly playing his music the while :-)

Current Athlons run rather cooler than the early ones, and have
thermal protection then? I suppose it would be odd if they didn't
:-)