Hard Drive Choices

[mrguitarguy]

I was curious what hard drives everone has been using. I am new to protools and am putting together a system (for Mbox). Western Digital ATA100 8mb buffer dives seem to be a favorite for most people. Anythoughts on other manufacturers? Seagate Barracuda? Maxfactor? Others? Thanks for your help in adding another to your clan of PT users.

[Riad]

I was curious what hard drives everone has been using. I am new to protools and am putting together a system (for Mbox). Western Digital ATA100 8mb buffer dives seem to be a favorite for most people. Anythoughts on other manufacturers? Seagate Barracuda? Maxfactor? Others? Thanks for your help in adding another to your clan of PT users.

Don't use Maxfactor drives, the lipstick tubes get jammed into the motherboard.

Otherwise I don't think you can go wrong with your choice.

[Captain_Pants]

Lipstick Tubes... hehe...

Ive been using Maxtors and Western Digitals with no errors for years...
First PT System was on WD's, Last system was on Maxtors, and the newe system is on SATA Maxtors...

[mrguitarguy]

Do any of you recommend the SATA stuff over the ATA 100? Is there really any noticeable difference?

[Captain_Pants]

The connectors on SATA are so nice!!!

And, you can, for a price, get the high-speed SATA, 10,000 RPMs with Seek times almost double what a regular hard drive is. But, they are pretty expensive, $200 for about 75 gigs.

Other than that, I would get the SATA stuff anyway if you computer can use them, just to avoid the stupid jumpers on the hard-drive(SATA removes them, and they plug into certain 'inputs' on the MB that decide slave/Master), I think its just an easier bet.

=-Ben

[Riad]

I'm using a SATA drive for my audio drive, zero problems. If all things are equal the cables, as Ben said, are sooooooo much nicer than IDE. Nice and clean... if you can drop a few extra bucks for the SATA I say go for it.

[Allen Hallada]

Do any of you recommend the SATA stuff over the ATA 100? Is there really any noticeable difference?

No difference in PTLE performance.

Allen

[Allen Hallada]

I was curious what hard drives everone has been using. I am new to protools and am putting together a system (for Mbox). Western Digital ATA100 8mb buffer dives seem to be a favorite for most people. Anythoughts on other manufacturers? Seagate Barracuda? Maxfactor? Others? Thanks for your help in adding another to your clan of PT users.

Western Digital 80GB 8MB cache drives are going for 29.00 now at Best Buy after rebates. They are the true champs!

Allen

[mrguitarguy]

Allen,
I called best buy today and they said they didn't have such a deal going on. Where are you located at? I'm in Columbus, OH. Maybe I should drive over there.


Thanks to everyone for the help. Especially Allen for the emails!

[idunno]

I'd recommend Seagates, especially the older Barracudas if you can find them. They are plenty fast for audio, reliable, and extremely quiet. Seagates now have a 5 year warranty! I have 2

I'm using a Samsung Spinpoint, and it's also very quiet. I've read they're the quietest SATA you can get right now. It's definitely not as quiet as the Barracuda IV's I have in my older computer, though. There's a bit more ticking w/ drive access, and with the case open, there's a very high pitched, very small whine.

If you're interested, check out this site for info on silent pc's.

Also look for 8 MB cache, and 7200 RPM. It's more standard these days, but there are still older drives that just have 2 MB.