Which SATA drive?

[cmitchellfly]

Im looking to replace one of my Maxtors (see sig) with a similar size (or possibly smaller) SATA drive. I am NOT interested in RAID. Obviously I would like raw SPEED, but also I treasure LOW dBs - I cannot hear my Maxtors and I would like to keep it that way IF possible! I am not looking to save $$ - I just want the best, fastest and quietest (dont we all!? )

Can someone steer me in the right direction? Thanks.

 

[cmitchellfly]

anyone?

 

[t_dub]

You didn't mention anything about storage space so I'll give you what I think are the three main options available right now.

WD Raptor Drive 74 or 36 gigs. This drive has been the kind of speed for a while, if you look at sigs most people are currently using them. It's fast because it's a 10000rpm drive. I'm not sure how much louder they are then a 7200...

Maxtor Diamondmax10 200-300gigs. New drive that came out recently. Arguably faster then the raptor and it offers more space. However it's only faster if you have NCQ which you don't. It should still be slightly faster then a regular drive because it boasts 16mb of chache instead of 8 like most other drives.

Seagate 7200.7 120-200gigs. If you want a regular drive go seagate, nice and quiet and they offer a 5yr warranty compared to everyone elses 3yr. Nothing special about the 7200.7 drives though.

Hope that helps!