Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD7500AAKS 750GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Hard Drive -Bare Drive

Pros: 40,000 Power On Hours according to a smart test today, not a single reallocated sector or hiccup.

Cons: Can't justify replacing it with an SSD.

Pros: Had to write this up: purchased in 2009 and still going strong today as a hefty secondary storage with OS loaded on SSD.

Cons: Has worked each and every boot, no issues whatsoever in four years of regular use.

Pros: Pretty good drive, no errors so far, had it about a year and a half, still going, sometimes takes a second for drive to wake up, but it's not a problem. Got the drive through rma after returning a caviar blue 640gb

Cons: access speed is slower then my old caviar blue that it replaced.

Other Thoughts: will be buying several caviar blacks soon.

Pros: It formats perfectly straight out of the box...good speed...

Cons: I've had nothing but problems with this drive...and the ONLY drive that WD put out that i EVER had problems with... All right...it goes down rather quick...but perhaps not as quickly as my title states... It's still a major concern for this drive when you have four and you encounter the same problem on three different computers...

Other Thoughts: Even after this rare misfire...I'll still buy WD drives exclusively...

Pros: Bought this model drive November 07. Fired right up formatted with no problem and has been a solid silent performer for 14months and growing. I have 4 other PCs with smaller WD 60g and WD 120g versions that are at least 8 years old and to this day run flawlessly. WD 4 Life. My experiences have been nothing but positive with WD. Currently bought a WD1001FALS 1tb drive that is loud by comparison but how can I resist for $119.00 after such a great experience with this last drive. This drive is worth every penny (especially since it was 149.00 when I bought mine). Those with bad experiences most likely received a drive that was damaged in transit or some other fluke because this drive is a Solid silent dependable performer. You WILL NOT BE SORRY.

Cons: None

Other Thoughts: Vista Business SP1 (32bit)
Q6600 2.4 @ 3.44ghz (430X8)
P35-DS3P v2.0 @1740fsb
4gb OCZ DDR2 1066
GTX285 SC 1gb
WD 16mb 750g/WD Black 32mb 1TB
CoolerMaster Pro 750
Antec900/Tuniq120

Pros: Pros are purely theoretical since I never saw the drives really do anything.

Cons: 2 of 3 drives died within a week. Reliability seems to be terrible, but hard to say if the problem is limited to these drives since so many get bad reviews these days for this reason

Other Thoughts: Hard drive quality control seems to be nonexistent these days. Apparently to save costs, manufacturers expect end users to do all the final production testing - so make sure you do. Install them, close case, format and run 24/7 for several days before trusting them with your data! I installed a 3 disk raid5 and lost everything on the raid within a week of installation of these drives. First drive failed with seek error (click of death) on first day, a week later second drive became inaccessible (no clicks, just dead). Sent back, hoping I can have more faith in another model drive.

Pros: Quiet, speedy, inexpensive for the size.

Cons: Bought 2 at same time. one worked great, other died after about a month. Second drive was pretty inconsistant on when it wanted to work. Refused to be formatted, wouldn't be recognized by OS (Bios saw it correctly), caused Raid to lock up on raid detection, a whole host of problems. Unfortunately, it was outside of the Newegg replacement period, so it had to be sent back to WD. Thankfully WD has a great warranty. Returned with zero hassle, and relatively quick turnaround time to get a new product shipped out (5 days).

Other Thoughts: Would be giving this product 5 stars if it hadn't been for the dead drive. If WD's warranty service hadn't been as stellar as it was, would have given three stars.

Pros: Very reliable! I have had nothing but good luck. my seek time is very fast for a 7200rpm. I have had no problems using it for almost a year now. Good price too.

Cons: None. It takes a while to format as it should, it is a large drive.

Pros: Cost / Size / Sata 2
I have always found WD drives to be reliable over the last decade.

Cons: 1 of the 5 came DOA.
So it looses a Star. The rest are great.
It can be hit or miss - test the drive(s) out right away.
Sending the one back to WD.

Other Thoughts: The Story:
I setup a raid 5 controller with 4 disks and a 5th for hot swap / emergency purposes.

Showing a friend the reliability of the raid and the rebuild capabilities i replaced an active drive with my 'backup' that i had in reserve.

I have always loved/trusted WD for the past decade.

It seems these either work or do not. The drive doesn't even power up. I have tested with my usb coolmax universal HDD to make certain.

If you buy, make sure you test right away so you are covered by New Egg, or you will be dealing with the Manufacturer.

Pros: Two of these have been running solid for more than a year in a media server with no problems. They were in a RAID0 configuration. They have since been repurposed in a RAID1 container as dedicated drives for a VM that has above average drive load without fail.

I fully expect many more years of service to come.

Cons: None. They have performed as expected.

Other Thoughts: A year ago, these were the sweet spot for price per gig. Today's 1TB fit that space now.