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Hard disks roundup
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Hard disks roundup

by Jim Martin  on Sep 15, 2006
Tags: hard | drive | roundup
Stuck for storage space? Upgrade to one of the latest disks and you’ll benefit from better performance too
You can never have too much hard disk space. We store more of our music, videos and documents in digital format than ever before and, chances are, you’re constantly deleting files or burning them to DVD to free up space.

Since most PCs have room for two or three hard disks, you probably won’t have to throw away your current one in order to boost capacity. And with bigger capacities and falling prices, now is an ideal time to invest in a new hard disk.

We’ve reviewed the flagship model from every manufacturer, and there are choices from 250GB to 500GB and prices to suit every budget. As Western Digital’s Raptor X isn’t strictly comparable with other disks (it spins at 10,000rpm and has a viewing window), we’ve also included the firm’s latest mainstream performance disk – the 400GB Caviar SE16. All seven disks here have a SATA interface, but Ultra ATA versions are readily available for most models if your motherboard doesn’t have SATA ports.

Quite apart from capacity, another benefit of upgrading is performance. If your current disk is two or three years old, you’ll notice a significant improvement in transfer times – the best disks here are capable of well over
60MB/s compared to 45MB/s of older models. They’re not noisy either: opposite, you’ll see the results of our scientific testing, so if quietness is a priority, the choice is easy. But to find out which disk has the best combination of speed, quietness and value, read on.
This article appeared in the August 2006 issue of PC Authority.
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