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Lunch » Tags » Electronics » Reviews » Seagate Barracuda 500 GB 7200RPM SATA NCQ 16 MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Desktop Hard Drive ST3500641AS-RK-Retail Kit

Seagate Barracuda 500 GB 7200RPM SATA NCQ 16 MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Desktop Hard Drive ST3500641AS-RK-Retail Kit

1 rating: 5.0

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The Seagate Barracuda 7200.9 with SATA 3Gb/s and Native Command Queuing(NCQ)adheres to the SATA 2.5 rev. specification and is the industry's most comprehensive family of 3.5-inch drives, providing leading technology targeted at SATA servers, mainstream … see full wiki

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1 review about Seagate Barracuda 500 GB 7200RPM SATA NCQ...

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1.5 Years and Still Going Strong

Jun 6, 2009

by caffiend

Rating:

I can certainly empathize with the failed hard drive woes a number of people have experienced with this Seagate Barracuda 500GB SATA Internal Hard Drive but I've had this hard drive for a year and a half and I've had no problems with it. I got it to replace the hard drive on my Dell Dimension E521 and I've been very satisfied with it.

Fast and Quiet
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Read/Write access on this hard drive is fast. Programs load up quickly with minimal "grind" noise as the hard drive is accessed.

Installation
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I installed this drive without a hitch on my Dell Dimension E521. "Installation" simply involves cracking open my computer case, removing the data and power cables from my old hard drive, and plugging these cables into their respective connectors on the Seagate Hard Drive. That's it. Windows (XP) recognized and formatted the hard drive with no problems.

Hard Drive Capacity Discrepancies
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When I installed XP on the new drive, Windows (XP) reports the total capacity of the hard drive in My Computer under the "Total Size" column as 465 GB. However, if you right-click on the hard drive icon and select Properties on the pop-up menu, Windows brings up a dialog box which shows the full capacity of the hard drive as 500,096,991,232 bytes (465 GB).

The discrepancy between 500,096,991,232 bytes (~500 GB) and 465 GB is the result of the use of "SI Prefix" system of units and the "Binary Prefix" system of units.

The "SI Prefix" system of units is based on the metric system where 1KB is 1000 bytes, 1MB is 1000,000 bytes, and 1GB is 1000,000,000 bytes - very straight forward. Thus, 500,096,991,232 bytes converted to GB by is done by: 500,096,991,232 bytes / 1000,000,000 bytes per GB = 500.096991232 GB.

The "Binary Prefix" system of units is a little different. In industry speak, 1KB isn't 1000 bytes but 1024 bytes. Here's how it works:

1 KB is 2^10 = 1024 bytes
1 MB is 2^20 = 1,048,576 bytes
1 GB is 2^30 = 1,073,741,824 bytes

As a result, when 500,096,991,232 bytes is converted to GB in the "Binary Prefix" system of units, the result is: 500,096,991,232 bytes / 1,073,741,824 bytes / GB = 465.7516174.

This explains why Windows reports the capacity of the hard drive under My Computer as 465 GB, not 500 GB.

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The Seagate SATA Internal Hard Drive is fast, ultra quiet, dependable, and provides plenty of storage space. Windows (XP) recognizes and formats it with no problems. If I needed another hard drive, I would get a Seagate again!

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