Western Digital Caviar® Special Edition WD800JB 80 GB ATA-100 Hard Drive (Retail Version)

Pros: One of the fastest IDE hard drives available. Good quality
Cons: Not a Serial ATA Drive. Not as future proof as newer drives coming out

The sad fact of marketing of PCs today is that processor speed gets all of the attention. While it is easy for the average consumer to get caught up in hype over processor speed, the fact is that processor speed is only one component of overall system...

Pros: Fast and quiet, very easy to install, utilities CD and impressive tech support.
Cons: One-year warranty (previously a 3 yr)

I turn on my computer, it sounds like something is trapped in the tower trying to scratch its way out. The black boot screen frozen during drive detection, an unresponsive, dead keyboard. Little did I know that the small bout of clicking during a ...

Pros: Speed, Speed, Speed!
Cons: None that I have come across yet.

When it became overly apparent that my Maxtor 40GB 5400 RPM hard drive just wasn't cutting it in the performance department, I decided to look for a drive with a bit more punch. I did loads of research, looked at at least 20 hard drives, but the Caviar...

Pros: Plenty of space at 80Gb, Good software, GREAT PERFORMANCE!!!
Cons: They didn't list A solution in the manual, had to find it on my own.

In 2000 I built my first real computer higher than a 486, and discovered hard drives over 120Mb. I had a 3.4Gb hard drive. Well, after 3 years of loyal, reliable service I recently decided I had to upgrade. I was running out of space for all my...

Pros: Low cost, Great install software, great performer, nice utilities included.
Cons: Included Software renders "Windows System Restore" inoperable. This can be easily fixed.

I recently purchased my WD800JB, since my old C: drive (20 G) was about full. The local computer store had some for $49. I ordered one online for store pickup for $53 out the door. This is a standard IDE drive (PATA), not one of the new SATA drives. This ...

Pros: fast, great rebate offers, online diagnostic, comprehendable customer service and replacement site.
Cons: defective drive, could not reach customer service by phone or email.

Why did I buy this harddrive? The main reason I chose this particular drive was price.I purchased it at Circuit City where they had an in-store rebate, as well as a manufacturer's rebate. They only had two drives in this price range. Both had ...

Pros: Fast and quiet
Cons: Had to run scan disk and defrag to get the drive to run as advertised

I installed this drive as a slave to hold video, music and picture files. The WD Data Lifeguard Tool ...

Pros: All out speed
Cons: Heat can be a slight issue if you want to touch it, lol

This Hard Drive is easily one of the best hard drives out on the market. It can rival SCSI drives in certain applications, but not in cost.

You can find this 80 gig 8 meg cache drive for around $130 or so now, as of Sept 2002.

It...

Pros: Fast and plenty of space. You can ask for nothing more
Cons: Nothing

Dollar for dollar, this is the best drive available. It is available in different sizes as well, but I personally chose the 80GB. With the 8MB cache, spinning at 7200 rpm, it is without a doubt a speed demon. I replaced my older ATA66 40GB 5400RPM with...

Pros: Western Digital Reliability
Cons: becoming dated?

I've had 3 of these drives. They're all still working, and I used them HARD - pro audio editing, moving around very large files (50 megs+) a lot.

I've never had a problem with Western Digital drives before, but I did discover that they had...

Pros: Super fast hdd, 8MB buffer, great price
Cons: Not 200GB

This hard drive will do wonders for your computer.

6 months ago: I had an old 9GB IBM (8MB buffer) Deskstar hdd with my PIII-450 (overclocked to 558mhz) and 256MB of ram. But it crawled so bad when i upgraded to WinXP pro that i had to revert...

Pros: Data retrieval companies love them!
Cons: Of course they only give a 1 year warranty. Expect a crash on day 366.

I have been using computers since the days of olde and thankfully just twice in my life I've had to suffer a hard drive crash. Each time it came when simply restarting my computer under normal use and each time it's been a Western Digital Caviar drive that's crapped out. Once in a MAC about nine years ago and again a few days ago in my Dell. Never again!

Pros: When it's working, it's pretty fast. It was inexpensive
Cons: Three of these broke in 4 months. The drive they sent back failed.

I've had three of these drives die on me in the past 4 months. The first one died, taking all my files with it. The drive they sent to replace it- see if you can guess- died within the first week. It was a "reconditioned" drive. I'm thinking that WD just takes RMA'd drives, mixes them all up, and ships them back out, because the drive I got as a replacement was not the same model I bought. It wasn't as good. The replacement for this drive lasted maybe 3 months, and now it's dying too. I just ordered a replacement from Maxtor and I hope to god it treats me better than this piece of crap.

Pros: Free even exchange, shipped to you free.
Cons: Upgrade to a newer, better hard drive prices no deal

After 1 year of service, my hard drive was sounding a little noisy. I called the 800 number and after a very short wait I was connected to a rep who would send me a new drive first, so I could transfer my files. Unfortunately, the "Upgrade to a bigger, better drive." deals were no deals at all, and listed at above retail rates so I settled for even exchange of hard drives. It was shipped the next day. The exchange is free, I just have to pay shipping back to the company. They take your credit card number for security and you have 30 days to send it back before you are charged.

Pros: Reliable, Inexpensive, Quality, Long Lasting, Well Known Brand
Cons: None

I bought 2 of these at different times in 2003. One I bought in April of 2003 and the other was in the second of of 2003.

Both drives comes with a 3 year warranty.

Rotational Speed: 7200 RPM
Buffer Size: 8 MB
Average Latency: 4.20 ms
Average Read Seek Time: 8.9 ms
Average Write Seek Time: 10.9 ms
Buffer to Disk: 602 Mbits/s
Cylinders: 16,383
No. of Heads: 16 Logical 4 Physical
Sectors Per Track: 63
Formatted Capacity: 80,026 MB
Interface: 40-pin EIDE
Actuator Type: Rotary Voice Coil
No. of Platters: 2
Bytes per Sector: 512
User Sectors per Drive: 156,301,488
Weight: 1.32 lb
Component Design Life: 5 years

I have other hard drives by this maker.
Another drive is an 80 GB 7200 RPM 2 MB Buffer and has a 1 yr. warranty.
I have a 1.6 GB 5200 RPM 128 KB Buffer and has a 3 yr. warranty.
I have a 6.4 GB 5400 RPM 512 KB Buffer and has a 1 yr. warranty. The Component Design Life is 5 years.

Both the 1.6 GB and the 6.4 GB lasted me more than 7 years.