WD to release 320GB platter drives

metalchaos · Post by **metalchaos** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 5:28 am

What about WD3201ABYS?
It's a new model so it should be 320 platter right?
I don't know if I can find WD3200AAKS-00B3A0.

Mech0z · Post by **Mech0z** » Wed Feb 20, 2008 7:04 am

That access time seems too high for it to be a good OS drive :S

roadie · Post by **roadie** » Thu Feb 21, 2008 2:43 am

As Samsung has been so slovenly in releasing its single platter 320Gb drive, I may go for this WD3200AAKS-00B3A0 if I can find one available in the UK. This will be for a games drive, as I will format my current games drive (a 74Gb 8Mb Raptor) to be the OS drive (currently a slow 80Gb Maxtor).

I think this will give my computer even better everyday performance. Does everyone think this will be a good plan? I am assuming that relatively high access rates won't be a problem for the games drive...

QuietOC · Post by **QuietOC** » Fri Feb 22, 2008 11:46 am

Review up at Anantech.

Sounds like a winner, but maybe these high densities are causing access time to increase.

MiKeLezZ · Post by **MiKeLezZ** » Fri Feb 22, 2008 2:53 pm

QuietOC wrote:Review up at Anantech.

Sounds like a winner, but maybe these high densities are causing access time to increase.

I think it is AAM related. Since higher densities comes with higher performance, manufacturers begin to think it would be a nice trade-off to reduce also noise by slowing down the hard disk heads.

roadie wrote:As Samsung has been so slovenly in releasing its single platter 320Gb drive, I may go for this WD3200AAKS-00B3A0 if I can find one available in the UK. This will be for a games drive, as I will format my current games drive (a 74Gb 8Mb Raptor) to be the OS drive (currently a slow 80Gb Maxtor).

I think this will give my computer even better everyday performance. Does everyone think this will be a good plan? I am assuming that relatively high access rates won't be a problem for the games drive...

Yes. Remember to create some partitions, and to use the first. This would give you another nice performance boost.

metalchaos wrote:What about WD3201ABYS?
It's a new model so it should be 320 platter right?
I don't know if I can find WD3200AAKS-00B3A0.

Is it really newer?

zavaras · Post by **zavaras** » Sat Feb 23, 2008 5:16 am

QuietOC wrote:Review up at Anantech.

Sounds like a winner, but maybe these high densities are causing access time to increase.

WD3200AAKS-00B3A0

Acoustics - idle: 24.6 db
Acoustics - load: 32.1db

Western Digital Caviar GP 1TB

Acoustics - idle: 26.1 db
Acoustics - load: 35.1db

It seems it's even quieter than the GP line.

Edwood · Post by **Edwood** » Sat Feb 23, 2008 9:04 pm

Just got two WD3200AAKS-00B3A0 drives.

About to fire them up.

They are noticeably lighter in weight due to the single platter.

-Ed

Edwood · Post by **Edwood** » Sat Feb 23, 2008 9:36 pm

I haven't used Western Digital drives in some time. Sad to see that the legacy four pin molex power connector is no longer there, so the WDSC50RCW SecureConnect SATA connector won't work with it.

I just powered up one of the drives. WOW. Absolutely the quietest 3.5" hard drive I've ever used. Idle noise is quieter than all of my Seagates, even my old Cuda IV.

I have it suspended right now, I'll have to torture the drive some more to see how a flurry of seek noises sounds like. Right now I have it outside the case, so it's amazingly quiet in the open air. Wow.

-Ed

kurtg · Post by **kurtg** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 1:12 am

Do you have an idea about the vibration level of the WD320 drive ?

Edwood · Post by **Edwood** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 7:13 am

kurtg wrote:Do you have an idea about the vibration level of the WD320 drive ?

Very little in idle. Nearly as little as a faster laptop drive.

DragonOptical · Post by **DragonOptical** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 12:48 pm

I'm going to wait for Anandtech's review of the new Samsung before I buy a new drive.
But the new WD seems interesting for someone who needs a quiet drive that performs well.

Fred · Post by **Fred** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 1:05 pm

So, how big is the difference between WD3200AAKS and WD3201ABYS? The latter one is under the enterprise category on WD's webpage.
Does it also use a single 320 GB platter?
Which one is newer? And is it possible to directly point out one of them and say "this one is the better one!"?

MiKeLezZ · Post by **MiKeLezZ** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 1:14 pm

Fred wrote:So, how big is the difference between WD3200AAKS and WD3201ABYS? The latter one is under the enterprise category on WD's webpage.
Does it also use a single 320 GB platter?
Which one is newer? And is it possible to directly point out one of them and say "this one is the better one!"?

WD3201ABYS it is not a new versione. It is the "RAID version".
Differences versus WD3200AAKS:
1,2 MTBF vs 0,6 MTBF
TLER ON vs TLER OFF

Fred · Post by **Fred** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 3:44 pm

MiKeLezZ wrote:WD3201ABYS it is not a new versione.

Well, that wasn't quite what i asked - i just asked which one of them that was newer.

Edit: Found the WD6400AAKS, i will probably be getting that one, so no need to answer that question anymore.
Is this version sure to be with 2x320GB platters? Saw a post about in this thread, but I ask just to be sure.

DrCR · Post by **DrCR** » Tue Mar 04, 2008 3:01 pm

KenAF wrote:I got them from this ebay seller.

Thanks for the link. I just ordered a couple B3s from these guys (at a hefty premium over general WD3200AAKS pricing unfortunately). Well see how it goes.

Edwood · Post by **Edwood** » Tue Mar 04, 2008 3:14 pm

WD6400AAKS just arrived. Going to install it soon.

-Ed

DrCR · Post by **DrCR** » Thu Mar 20, 2008 9:18 pm

I'm actually disappointed with the drive, or at least my two samples anyway. There's a high frequency aspect that I just don't like about it, even when foamed up reasonably well. Certainly not a 2.5" rival.

I guess it's just that for this build the loudest item is a Slipstream @ 700rpm, and since I work in the evenings, my ambient is low even by SPCR standards. Perhaps I should have gone with a Scorpio or Momentus, but I'll probably just go the extra mile on how I setup the HD.

DrCR

toki_c · Post by **toki_c** » Fri Mar 21, 2008 4:17 am

DrCR wrote:I guess it's just that for this build the loudest item is a Slipstream @ 700rpm, and since I work in the evenings, my ambient is low even by SPCR standards. Perhaps I should have gone with a Scorpio or Momentus, but I'll probably just go the extra mile on how I setup the HD.
DrCR

Well, I can only say a thing. If the noise level was your main concern, you should obviously have gotten a WD GP series hard drive. The performance of those are not at second level at all (you can check out an article on AnandTech). For more details you can of course check out SPCR's articles (750GB, 1TB) if not done.

NOTE: the 320GB simpgle platter and the 640GB dual platters are on sale in europe... Here is a link for the single platter for only 67â‚¬.

Goldmember · Post by **Goldmember** » Wed May 21, 2008 7:37 am

Ok, it looks like WD has updated the 1TB GreenPower with 333GB or 334GB platters. The model number is WD10EACS-D6B0. Looks like they used the same model number again.

http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/akiba/ho ... tml?i#d6b0

JazzJackRabbit · Post by **JazzJackRabbit** » Wed May 21, 2008 7:54 pm

Goldmember wrote:Ok, it looks like WD has updated the 1TB GreenPower with 333GB or 334GB platters. The model number is WD10EACS-D6B0. Looks like they used the same model number again.

http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/akiba/ho ... tml?i#d6b0

Nice find Goldmember, although this is probably worth its own thread. I have to wonder if WD is going to release 1.33TB GP drive or if it's going to limit GP series to 1TB for now.

Anyway, I hope this new version will not sell at too much premium compared to the old one in the states.