OLD systems need new hard drives...

[rogerdugans]

I have never really kept up to snuff on hard drive stuff, so I thought I would ask those of you who are-

My brother-in-law has a couple of old computers (AMD K62-450 and Dual PII 400) that need increased hard drive space:
60 to 80 gigs is wanted for use in software development/ archiving.

From a look through Newegg I see the WD WESTERN DIGITAL "SPECIAL EDITION" 80GB 7200RPM EIDE HARD DRIVE MODEL # WD800JB - OEM, DRIVE ONLY (cut'n'paste).

I believe that is the good one, right? 8 meg cache and all..
My question is to how well it will work in these old systems:
ATA 33 ide controllers onboard of course. :)

I do NOT need the full speed of the drives, the only thing I want to be sure of is that the drives will function and be reliable long-term.

If these drives are not suitable how about pointers to drives that are better for these old machines?

Thanks!

[repo man11]

Yes, I have had no problem using new drives on older ATA33 motherboards.


Depending on the motherboard, you may have a problem with BIOS support for the larger drives. Check their sites first of course.

In my sticky on socket 7 motherboards, I have a link to a site that has modified BIOS for many motherboards that include support for 128 gigabyte drives.

Of course a controller such as a Promise would get full speed, and avoid any possible BIOS issues. But I would only go that route if you have to.