Pros & Cons

Pros

• Fast performance (7200 RPM, ATA/100)
• Advanced 3D Defense system for increased reliability
• Affordable price
• Good for IDE RAID

Cons

• Gets really hot (could be a problem for a poorly ventilated case)

Conclusion

Seagate definitely has a winner on their hands here. Fast 7200 RPM spindle speed, ATA/100 interface, fast internal transfer rate, large capacity, and virtually silent operation make this drive a contender in the high performance market. SCSI drives will always be faster, but this Barracuda is much more affordable. The only complaint I have is the heat problem, which is not much of a big deal. If you're familiar with SCSI drives, those run pretty hot themselves. All it takes is an extra fan or two to offset the extra heat. If you get multiple drives for a RAID array, you might want to think about better cooling solutions. I've always been an IBM drive fan, so testing this Seagate drive opened my eyes a bit. I'm seriously going to consider Seagate drives for my next big hard drive upgrade. For those of you looking for a good IDE solution, you should definitely consider this drive. It won't beat out SCSI solutions out there of course, but it won't break your wallet either. You can get the 60 GB model for around $120, which is definitely a bargain compared to a few months ago. Now building an IDE RAID 0 array isn't so out of reach. It's ideal for the performance hungry gamer, small-business, or graphics designer. That's about all I can say about this drive.

SLRating: 9.5/10

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Article Navigation Introduction/Features And Specifications First Impression And Installation/Test Setup Winbench 99/CliBench MK III SMP 0.7.15 ATTO Disk Benchmark/Sisoft Sandra/Results Pros & Cons/Conclusion

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