The Logic Off Topic list

> I get strange behavior from my main harddrive ... so I fear it'll break
soon and I'll have to replace it.
> I was thinking to get either an IBM Deskstar 120GXP 120GB or a
> Western Digital Caviar WD1200JB (also 120GB). They go for roughly the
> same price.
> Any experiences from people on the list? Any other recommendations?


Maxtor drives are very good quality in my experience (I set up an IDE RAID
system in our office with them being used five and more days a week all day
for two years with no data loss) and the price is good. The DimanondMax PLus
D740X series have spindle speeds of 7200rpm, 2MB cache, UDMA133 and seek
times of 8.5 ms (I have a catalogue open in front of me before anyone asks
:) ). I will be upgrading my system this year and will be purchasing some of
these drives myself, so I suppose in that way I can stand by my
recommendation :)

To my mind I think it is unwise to go over the 40 Gig limit with drives. I
always feel they are less sturdy due to higher data concentration and more
platters, mor prone to breakage/damage. Plus with bigger drives the tendency
to 'hang on' to things is too great.

I dont think IBM is the way to go with their 333 hours per month
recommendation, although they are probably just being over cautious with a
class-action lawsuit hanging over them. Plus I heard they are moving out of
the small drive market all together soon.

Hope this helps
--
Mark Lennox
Technical Consultant
ENDUSER
Suite 40
Guinness Enterprise Centre
Taylors Lane
Dublin 8
Ireland
Tel: +353 1 4100 665
Fax: +353 1 4100 985
web: http://www.enduser.com
--

> I get strange behavior from my main harddrive (40GB) in my Mac G4 DP
> 500, so I fear it'll break soon and I'll have to replace it.

Sorry, I menat to add that you should really have two drives if you do a lot
of audio recording/playback. One for system and the other for your audio
data. SO in short I would recommend a smaller, maybe slower (certainly
cheaper!!) drive for your system drive and the larger faster (ie. costly!!)
drive for your data.

Incidentally I did a test a while back with my lowly three year old Maxtor
drive and I could record and then playback 32+ tracks at the same time!!
(most of them silence) The drive sounded under duress so I decided I should
not continue, but all has been fine since.

This has been covered ad nauseum in this list somewhere, you might check the
archives (I cant access them at the moment as I lost my YahooID again...),
plus unfortunately I know jack about Macs having never used one - dont know
what I'm missing, but then again <flamebait on> I dont know the problems I
might have to deal with either ;) </flamebait off>

regards
--
Mark Lennox
Technical Consultant
ENDUSER
Suite 40
Guinness Enterprise Centre
Taylors Lane
Dublin 8
Ireland
Tel: +353 1 4100 665
Fax: +353 1 4100 985
web: http://www.enduser.com
--