Hitachi 250G sata @ $133?

Bullitt

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Linkage Part 1

Linkage Part 2

What are the general opinions on this particular model? The 'egg seems to have 2 of the hitachi's, 1 @ $133 and the 2nd @ $140. I'm comfortable buying the brand, but whats the difference (besides $7)? I've checked the hitachi site, but they're real sparse on details about the part number differences. I assume one is newer, but why is it newer, any problems with this model?

Any feedback from users with any of these 2 drives?
 
I can't see any difference either, but the prices are now lower. :)
 
If you look closely the first link has a bulk purchase discount option, the other one does not.
 
seem to be identical. At first I got excited that it was the new T7k250 but alas, both seem to be regular 7k250s
 
Just know that if your Hitachi HDD fails, there is no advance replacement policy like Western Digital, Seagate or Maxtor. You get to send the drive in and wait for another, however long it takes. I'm not willing to deal with that knowing that I build systems for others, not just myself. The last time I had to do that with a Deskstar (admittedly awhile back as I don't use them any more) it took me over a month to get a replacement drive.

Just had the final Deskstar I ever used in a system fail 28 days after the 3-year warranty expired (and it isn't one of the class-action models); I wrangled with Hitachi for a replacement, but no dice (I didn't expect one, but it would have given me a more positive impression of them). I don't plan on going back. Deskstars were good drives up until the 40GB and later, IMO, but I'm not willing to deal with them now.
 
Well, there was also a time long ago when Seagate drives were considered sub-par. Things change. Todays deskstars are a far cry from the 60 and 75 GXPs which were prone to failure. I guess the paranoia and bitterness from those days still lingers. I've used Hitachi 7k250s exclusively on all the systems I've built, including my own since they were released and have no reports of failure.
 
I had two 7k250s, one of them failed but I believe due to overheating (freak heatwave, no AC)
 
ya, it's gunna be many years until I buy another IBM/hitachi drive....
 
Pulsar said:
Well, there was also a time long ago when Seagate drives were considered sub-par. Things change. Todays deskstars are a far cry from the 60 and 75 GXPs which were prone to failure. I guess the paranoia and bitterness from those days still lingers. I've used Hitachi 7k250s exclusively on all the systems I've built, including my own since they were released and have no reports of failure.

That may be true. However, if I can't get an advance replacement drive, I won't buy from that company. Simple as that. I can't afford to have two weeks of system downtime if a drive fails while I ship the drive out, they inspect it, and then ship one to me, and I can't afford to just keep spare drives lying around. And if they're out of stock on my replacement model, I could be in limbo until they've got it. Advance replacement means about 3 days of system downtime tops, and I can Ghost the failing drive to the new one or at least perform a data copy easily. It comes down to service and Hitachi's statement to me of "We're working on implementing that" two days ago was the same thing IBM's tech support said to me two years ago. It didn't fly then, and it doesn't fly now.

P.S. Slightly OT, but I've never known Seagate drives to be sub-par as long as you chose their performance drives, and I've owned their drives back as far as 106GB IDE (back when that was a big drive). Still, until recently, I switched completely to Western Digital for reliability and service. I have to say though that the brand new Barracudas in my system have been excellent so far.
 
Does anyone know where (in the USA) we can buy the new Hitachi SATA-II based T7K250 drives?

-Robert
 
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