01-06-2010, 04:36 PM

Hi

Since a few hard drive issues I've had, I am super paranoid about hard drives now, they haunt my dreams at night!

I'm thinking of getting the Seagate Barracuda 320Gb (ST3320620AS) Serial ATA 7200 for my 2009 unibody Macbook Pro.

I know this drive will fit and work, but does anyone have first hand experience of this drive in terms of reliability, noise level, whether it has any issues, do the heads over park etc.

Any insight would be great.

Thanks

01-06-2010, 04:40 PM

Are there no reviews on the website you're purchasing from?
I know the 500gb Seagate notebook drives have noise issues that many people have complained about. I'm looking at a Hitachi right now on newegg.com. No noise complaints.

01-06-2010, 05:18 PM

No reviews where I was looking, there's a mixed bag of reviews on Amazon. I should have bought a bigger drive when I got my Mac. Lots of people have spoken highly of Western Digital drive, but I had a nightmare with one and have ditched it.

I will look at Hitachi and see, thanks for the idea.

01-06-2010, 05:39 PM

I have that drive in my machine right now. No noise, no vibrations, no excess heat. Just pure computing bliss. ^-^"

01-06-2010, 06:08 PM

Originally Posted by CrimsonRequiem

I have that drive in my machine right now. No noise, no vibrations, no excess heat. Just pure computing bliss. ^-^"

Can I ask you if you know what your hard drive load cycles are like on that drive? I'm becoming obsessed with it!!! It's worrying me now, not sure what normal is!!

01-06-2010, 07:33 PM

Keep in mind that I have had this drive for a little over a year. >_>"

01-06-2010, 09:03 PM

Thanks for that Crimson, that's really useful to see. I've been getting myself in a twist with all this over the last few days. I should probably learn to chill out. But I like things to be right and I've spent more money than I should have on my Macbook, so I worry about it!!!

a crude calculation tells me that your drive is doing a load cycle about 32 times an hour, a similar calculation tells me that mine is currently doing a 55 an hour with my Apple stock Seagate 160GB drive in. The WD one I ditched was managing 200 an hour!!! Although the more I read about this load cycling the less I understand since I've read that the high numbers can be totally irrelevant in notebook drive which park for fun without any real wear to the drive but excellent safety for the drive.... I will end up in an asylum at this rate! LOL!

Thank you very much for posting that for me, it demonstrates decent results with that drive, so it could well be the one I'm going to get.

I'll let you know!

01-07-2010, 02:42 PM

Hold on, just looked at the Barracuda drive in more detail, I don't think it's a 2.5!!!??? Maybe I meant to look at the Momentus from Seagate?

01-07-2010, 04:46 PM

I have 2 Seagate 7200.4 AS 500GB drives, one in FW800 external and one in my MBP and both are working beautifully.

01-07-2010, 05:36 PM

I had one in my MacBook Pro, but it was the "G" version (with a G for G-shock protection tacked onto the model number). Solid drive, reliable, silent and vibration free. The only issue is that it seemed slow in a number of tests, particularly boot-up. I swapped it out for a Western Digital drive of the exact same spec and found that the performance was much better. The only difference is that the Western Digital has a very tangible level of vibration. You definitely know when the platters are spinning, and can certainly hear it in a quiet room, whereas with the Seagate, it was almost never noticeable.

01-07-2010, 07:11 PM

Interesting. There seem to be varying ideas about using 7200RPM drives in 13" Macbook Pros, Apple (apparently) don't advise due to the heat, but in the 15" and 17" you can buy the machine with an Apple stock 7200RPM. Not sure if it's worth the risk, don't want to lose any warranty??

I've been looking at the Seagate Momentus 5400 320GB drive.

Thanks for the insight.