WD Launches the 640GB Caviar SE16 3.5-inch Hard Drives

[malware]

WD announced today that it is now shipping in volume its WD Caviar SE16 640 GB 3.5-inch hard drives based on 320 GB-per-platter technology -- a platform that it has been shipping since January 2008 and is serving as the foundation of all of the company's 3.5-inch drive families. Ideal for data-intensive applications, high-performance computing and multimedia systems, the WD Caviar SE16 640 GB drives deliver high performance with their extreme areal density, 3 Gb/s transfer rate, and Native Command Queuing (NCQ). Its two-platter design promotes cool, quiet operation in a high-capacity drive.




"The 640 GB capacity point will be an important one for our desktop customers, and WD is leading high-volume shipments to the channel and OEM customers," said Don Bennett, general manager and vice president of WD's desktop business unit. "Two-platter hard drives have always been the perfect balance of value, capacity and performance for many of our customers. Today's common two-platter drives are limited to 500 GB, but we are expanding capacity by 28 percent on the same design with WD's leading technology heads and disks."

The 320 GB-per-platter technology is being deployed across WD's desktop, enterprise, consumer electronics and external hard drive product lines, including additional capacity points, throughout this calendar year.

The WD Caviar family of 3.5-inch desktop hard drives delivers high performance with 3 Gb/s transfer rate, Native Command Queuing (NCQ), and cool operating temperatures and quiet operation, enabling customers to integrate WD products in the most demanding desktop and external storage environments.

Price and Availability
WD Caviar SE16 640 GB (model WD6400AAKS) hard drives may be ordered on the company's online store and through select distributors and resellers. Manufacturer's Suggest Retail Price (MSRP) for the WD Caviar SE16 640 GB is $139.99 USD. More information about WD Caviar desktop drives may be found on the company's Web site here.

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[Cold Storm]

mmm, sounds like a pretty good deal to me! Have to think about getting a hdd soon!!

 

[Nicksterr]

These are great drives, relatively cheap and faster than Raptors in every aspect except for access time (seek time).

 

[AsphyxiA]

why not just get a terabyte hd? hard drives are so cheap now, I'd rather just get that.
::edit:: oh ok theyre faster than raptors nvm

 

[Nicksterr]

why not just get a terabyte hd? hard drives are so cheap now, I'd rather just get that.

This particular WD 320GB platter line doesn't come in the near ~ 1TB range yet. I know that they have both 320gb and 640gb models, both on Newegg.

 

[AsphyxiA]

ya, i guess i didnt realize the performance benefits iwth these drives. wasn't really looking at the specs.

 

[thoughtdisorder]

Slightly less than .22 cents per gb, not too shabby!

 

[farlex85]

These have been on newegg for $130 for about 2 weeks now. I'm gonna pick one up pretty soon. Most terabyte drives are overpriced compared to this. You can get two of these for $260, slap em in raid 0, and you got yourself more than a terabyte at much faster speeds costing less than most terabyte drives. Sweet.


Now I'm looking on newegg and it looks like they don't have em on there anymore. Odd. But I'm sure they will be back, probably $140.:shadedshu

 

[regan1985]

looks like a good drive but pritty average to me! ive had an old version of this range 250gb raid edition and had both fail on me maybe a bad batch or maybe wd are just as reliable as other brands!

 

[WarEagleAU]

Oh oh oh, looks like I need to visit the egg again and upgrade my hdd

 

[Cold Storm]

Then wareagle, going to send me the one you take out!? lol.. That hdd is some great piece of property right there!

 

[Sasqui]

Just bought a 500GB SE16 and intalled today! WD500AAKS - $99.99 OEM on Newegg. It rocks - though hotter to the touch than it's 250 GB cousin.

 

[farlex85]

Just bought a 500GB SE16 and intalled today! WD500AAKS - $99.99 OEM on Newegg. It rocks - though hotter to the touch than it's 250 GB cousin.

Aw you should've gone w/ this 640gb drive. I keep trying to recommend it to people and nobody seems to want it. Its faster than the 500gb, and bigger, for not much more money. Oh well.

 

[Dangle]

drives delivers high performance with 3 Gb/s transfer rate

So deceiving!!!:shadedshu That's the transfer rate of the SATA port. The Drive won't be able to read or write at anywhere near that speed.

 

[Wile E]

So deceiving!!!:shadedshu That's the transfer rate of the SATA port. The Drive won't be able to read or write at anywhere near that speed.

That's the way marketing goes. All the drive manufacturers claim that, not just WD.

 

[DanishDevil]

I concur. Just like 64-bit processors. Almost nothing today truly takes advantage of 64-bit processing compared to the hype that 64-bit processors made. All processors now are 64-bit, and soon all hard drives will be 3GB/s SATA. It's simply a marketing hype until it's utilized.

 

[Mussels]

these drives arent faster than a raptor - they come close, but they arent FASTER. (they are definately better value for money, however)

The main point is that having only two platters is good for noise and power consumption - the 320GB was so popular because its got only the one platter, making it even quiter/cooler.

 

[DanishDevil]

My Seagate 7200.11 750GB drive has a read transfer rate of about 75MB/s versus my 74GB Raptor at 54MB/s. The Raptor however has an 8ms seek time, while my Seagate is 13. I'm dumping my Raptor for the Seagate, because it's quieter, and it is noticably faster on bootup.

 

[Wile E]

My Seagate 7200.11 750GB drive has a read transfer rate of about 75MB/s versus my 74GB Raptor at 54MB/s. The Raptor however has an 8ms seek time, while my Seagate is 13. I'm dumping my Raptor for the Seagate, because it's quieter, and it is noticably faster on bootup.

Then there's something amiss with your Raptor. Most get 75MB/s+.

 

[DanishDevil]

It is the 8mb Cache version. And the drive's in the 90's % health.

 

[Wile E]

It is the 8mb Cache version. And the drive's in the 90's % health.

Still, something is up. Even the 8MB cache 36GB Raptors are faster than that.

 

[DanishDevil]

Maybe I'll start a thread. I'm selling it anyway, though. Too loud for my liking now that I've got such a quiet 750GB drive.

 

[Mussels]

indeed the raptors are loud - i should go test my raptor and see what it can do. Any benchies people want to see?

(its updating to SP1 atm, i'll just do this for comparison to danish)

 

[DanishDevil]

Avg. Read & Write, Min. Read & Write, Latency (all from Everest), and XP Bootup (from PCMark) please

 

[Makaveli]

My 74GB 8MB cache raptor does 64 mb/sec so something is wrong there.

My WD3200KS does about 56 mb/sec & WD7500AAKS does about 80mb/sec

I find my Raptor to feel slightly quicker than the other drives in Windows XP.

However, I dual boot and in Vista with the Caching and Readyboost running the raptor doesn't feel faster there.