SATA (Serial ATA) Desktop Hard Drives

  Seagate recently restructured their SATA desktop hard drive lineup adding some low power consumption LP "green" drives including the new LP 2 Terabyte 5900 RPM drive. We're currently only shipping the 2TB version of this drive family since the resounding majority of our customers require the performance benefits of the 7200.12 generation drive. Even though it operates at a lower RPM, the 2TB drive offers performance in the 100+ MB/s range due to the higher platter density of todays drives. This drive offers the largest storage volume possible with excellent performance and is perfect for large built in databases.

  The Seagate 7200.11 generation drive has been the best performing drive we have seen, until now. Since their release in early 2009 the 7200.12 drives have offered the highest possible performance and reliability available. These 7200.12 drives are available in the 500, 750 and 1TB sizes with larger sizes to follow. The RETAIL version 12th Generation Seagate drive series are capable of nearly 160 MB/s. Higher density platters make the performance increases possible leaving the competition in the dust.

  The drives we're now shipping have the 1.5GB/s jumper removed enabling SATAII 3.0 Gb/s operation. If you wish to attach the drive internally on a SATAI only bus such as some of the early Mac G5's please let us know and we'll install the jumper to limit the drive to SATAI specifications. The 2TB drive is the largest size that will natively be recognized by the 32 bit Windows Operating Systems.

  Beware the OEM drive! The hard drive market is currently flooded with OEM drives being sold at huge discounts. These drives usually have unknown or proprietary firmware and quite often offer no manufacturers warranty. These drives tend to cause a lot of compatibility problems and decreased performance. We recommend that you stick with RETAIL version drives for the best performance and reliability.

As of January 3, 2009 Seagate will no longer issue 5 year warranties on their desktop drives. The standard warranty will be 3 years, similar to the warranties of other drive manufacturers. We have found that both Seagate and Hitachi do a wonderful job, with very few exceptions, satisfying end user warranty replacement needs. They are very quick and responsive, even preshipping replacement drives when required by circumstances. Warranty in all cases is first determined by serial number on the drive. The only time a purchase receipt is required for warranty coverage is if a failure occurs after the three year from manufacture (based on serial number) date BUT before the three year from purchased date.

Don't forget to order your spare Burly Drive Trays to go with your new drives.