New WD Drive

[mcp6453]

I just bought a new Western Digital drive (250GB), 8MB Cache, 100 MB/s
transfer. It is labeled "WD Caviar SE * 7200 RPM." The drive is in a
different style package, and I have never seen the "SE" designation
before. The actual model number is WD2500JBRTL. Is there any reason to
be wary about this drive (that is, does SE mean Special Edition or cut
corners in manufacturing), or has WD just changed their packaging from
the annoying formed plastic back to cardboard boxes?

 

[Rod Speed]

I just bought a new Western Digital drive (250GB), 8MB Cache, 100 MB/s
transfer. It is labeled "WD Caviar SE * 7200 RPM." The drive is in a
different style package, and I have never seen the "SE" designation
before. The actual model number is WD2500JBRTL. Is there any reason to be
wary about this drive

No more than any other WD drive.

(that is, does SE mean Special Edition

It used to. WD now calls those Mainstream drives.
http://wdc.com/en/products/index.asp?cat=3

or cut corners in manufacturing),

Those are its Value drives, no SE letters.

or has WD just changed their packaging from the annoying formed plastic
back to cardboard boxes?

Dunno, I prefer Samsung drives myself.

 

[J. Clarke]

I just bought a new Western Digital drive (250GB), 8MB Cache, 100 MB/s
transfer. It is labeled "WD Caviar SE * 7200 RPM." The drive is in a
different style package, and I have never seen the "SE" designation
before. The actual model number is WD2500JBRTL. Is there any reason to
be wary about this drive (that is, does SE mean Special Edition or cut
corners in manufacturing), or has WD just changed their packaging from
the annoying formed plastic back to cardboard boxes?

WD makes "SE" drives that basically are broken if you use them with any of
several popular RAID controllers and "RE" drives that are the same hardware
but with the firmware patched so they don't break when used with those
particular RAID controllers. The reason for the difference is so that WD
can get a few extra bucks for "enterprise" drives. Basically just a way to
piss on the customers.

The local OfficeMax is having a going out of business sale. Was in there
today and the _only_ computer equipment left on the shelves was a bunch of
WD drives reduced to less than half price.

 

[mcp6453]

No more than any other WD drive.




It used to. WD now calls those Mainstream drives.
http://wdc.com/en/products/index.asp?cat=3




Those are its Value drives, no SE letters.




Dunno, I prefer Samsung drives myself.

I prefer Seagate, only because of experience. The WD was on sale, $89
for 250GB.

 

[mcp6453]

mcp6453 wrote:




WD makes "SE" drives that basically are broken if you use them with any of
several popular RAID controllers and "RE" drives that are the same hardware
but with the firmware patched so they don't break when used with those
particular RAID controllers. The reason for the difference is so that WD
can get a few extra bucks for "enterprise" drives. Basically just a way to
piss on the customers.

The local OfficeMax is having a going out of business sale. Was in there
today and the _only_ computer equipment left on the shelves was a bunch of
WD drives reduced to less than half price.

I may have a problem with this drive. After I formatted it and moved
everything from the old drive to the new one, I ran Error Checking
(Tools | Check Now). With no blocks checked the test completes fine.
With Check for File System Errors checked, it goes through Phases 1 and
2 quickly and hangs for a while on Phase 3. Then, it says something like
"Cannot Complete Test."

A file test from BootItNG passed just fine, and it is usually more
thorough than the Windows test. Now I am wondering what I need to do to
make sure that I don't have a flaky drive. Maybe I should run WD's
tools. Are there any other utilities? The OS is XPP.

 

[ohaya]

I may have a problem with this drive. After I formatted it and moved
everything from the old drive to the new one, I ran Error Checking
(Tools | Check Now). With no blocks checked the test completes fine.
With Check for File System Errors checked, it goes through Phases 1 and
2 quickly and hangs for a while on Phase 3. Then, it says something like
"Cannot Complete Test."

A file test from BootItNG passed just fine, and it is usually more
thorough than the Windows test. Now I am wondering what I need to do to
make sure that I don't have a flaky drive. Maybe I should run WD's
tools. Are there any other utilities? The OS is XPP.

Hi,

Which XP Pro Service Pack do you have installed? If it's not SP1 or
later, it doesn't support drivers > 137GB:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=303013

Jim

 

[Bob Davis]

I just bought a new Western Digital drive (250GB), 8MB Cache, 100 MB/s
transfer. It is labeled "WD Caviar SE * 7200 RPM." The drive is in a
different style package, and I have never seen the "SE" designation before.
The actual model number is WD2500JBRTL. Is there any reason to be wary
about this drive (that is, does SE mean Special Edition or cut corners in
manufacturing), or has WD just changed their packaging from the annoying
formed plastic back to cardboard boxes?

The original "SE" drives were the first with 8mb-buffers offered several
years ago. This designation later changed to "JB" (as on the end of your
model number), "JD" is the SATA counterpart, and "BB" indicated PATA drives
with 2mb buffers. The "RTL" designates "retail," compared to OEM, I
believe. I've had a number of these drives over the years from 80-120gb and
none have failed, all still in use.

 

[Bob Davis]

Which XP Pro Service Pack do you have installed? If it's not SP1 or
later, it doesn't support drivers > 137GB:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=303013

It will with the "big drive" registry hack and/or driver available from by
all drive manufacturers. I installed a Maxtor version about three years ago
before SP1 and it has worked ever since.

My old Win98SE machine had two 100gb IDE drives in RAID0 (Highpoint
controller) that saw all 200gb of that volume. I still haven't figured out
how.

 

[mcp6453]

I just bought a new Western Digital drive (250GB), 8MB Cache, 100 MB/s
transfer. It is labeled "WD Caviar SE * 7200 RPM." The drive is in a
different style package, and I have never seen the "SE" designation
before. The actual model number is WD2500JBRTL. Is there any reason to
be wary about this drive (that is, does SE mean Special Edition or cut
corners in manufacturing), or has WD just changed their packaging from
the annoying formed plastic back to cardboard boxes?

While snooping around on the Western Digital site, I noticed a tech note
that said that if you are using a Promise controller card with a drive
larger than 137GB on XP, a new driver had to be installed. The card in
my computer is an Ultra 100. The driver was for an Ultra 100 TX2, but I
tried it any way. XP identified the driver as being the correct one for
the card and installed. When I rebooted the computer, the test ran
perfectly, so I assume the problem is solved. Who would have thought?
The driver is dated 2002. It would seem that the resident Windows driver
would have been updated. (The computer was purchased used, so I don't
know why it even has a controller card. The IDE ports may be bad or
slower, so I left it alone.)

 

[ohaya]

While snooping around on the Western Digital site, I noticed a tech note
that said that if you are using a Promise controller card with a drive
larger than 137GB on XP, a new driver had to be installed. The card in
my computer is an Ultra 100. The driver was for an Ultra 100 TX2, but I
tried it any way. XP identified the driver as being the correct one for
the card and installed. When I rebooted the computer, the test ran
perfectly, so I assume the problem is solved. Who would have thought?
The driver is dated 2002. It would seem that the resident Windows driver
would have been updated. (The computer was purchased used, so I don't
know why it even has a controller card. The IDE ports may be bad or
slower, so I left it alone.)

mcp,

I don't think you mentioned that this was on a controller card? Anyway,
thanks for posting back on what you found!

Jim

 

[J. Clarke]

I may have a problem with this drive. After I formatted it and moved
everything from the old drive to the new one, I ran Error Checking
(Tools | Check Now). With no blocks checked the test completes fine.
With Check for File System Errors checked, it goes through Phases 1 and
2 quickly and hangs for a while on Phase 3. Then, it says something like
"Cannot Complete Test."

A file test from BootItNG passed just fine, and it is usually more
thorough than the Windows test. Now I am wondering what I need to do to
make sure that I don't have a flaky drive. Maybe I should run WD's
tools. Are there any other utilities? The OS is XPP.

Run the WD diags--they work at a low level and check information recorded by
the firmware on the drive, that includes all sorts of statistics. If they
show a problem though, before I blamed the drive I would check the power
supply voltages with a meter (not the motherboard sensors--they are always
suspect until their readings have been confirmed against a known-good
meter) just to make sure that it was actually a drive problem and not a
power problem to which the new drive is more sensitive than the old.

 

[Rod Speed]

It will with the "big drive" registry hack and/or driver available
from by all drive manufacturers. I installed a Maxtor version about
three years ago before SP1 and it has worked ever since.

My old Win98SE machine had two 100gb IDE drives in RAID0 (Highpoint
controller) that saw all 200gb of that volume. I still haven't figured
out how.

That config doesnt need 48 bit LBA because that applys to
the physical drive, not the virtual drive you get in your config.
In other words the commands over the ribbon cable dont
have LBA numbers high enough to be a problem. They're
just 100G drives at the ATA command level.

 

[Bob Davis]

That config doesnt need 48 bit LBA because that applys to
the physical drive, not the virtual drive you get in your config.
In other words the commands over the ribbon cable dont
have LBA numbers high enough to be a problem. They're
just 100G drives at the ATA command level.

Don't quite catch that, but don't doubt the logic. I thought the controller
was reporting the size from heads, sectors, etc. and the OS would then see
it as a 200gb drive as if it was a single drive setup.

 

[Rod Speed]

Don't quite catch that,

The commands over the ribbon cable are just those for a 100G drive.

The size of the ARRAY doesnt involve the ATA commands over the cable.

but don't doubt the logic. I thought the controller was reporting the
size from heads, sectors, etc. and the OS would then see it as a 200gb
drive as if it was a single drive setup.

Thats not the commands over the ribbon cable.

And no, the controller doesnt operate at the CHS level either.