[mdlug] Power supply & hard drive

[Paul]

Raj KANNAN <rk111810 at gmail.com>, on Sat  2011.05.21 said:
> Hello,
> 
> I am planning on collecting components to be used to build a media desktop
> (mythubuntu possibly). I would like your opinion (good / bad) on power
> supply & hard drive deals I found.
> 
> http://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=PS-IM400W&title=iMicro-IM400W-400W-ATX12V-Power-Supply&c=CJ
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822152245&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-na-_-na-_-na&AID=10446076&PID=361116&SID=FW9vfa2b
> 
>  The hard drive is only 5400 rpm. Any disadvantages with not going for 7200
> rpm.
> 
	Hi;

	I have both a WD and Samsung 2tb drive. The problem with
the WD green one (WD20EARS), is that it has a very aggressive
power management behaviour that you cannot change via normal
means. (ie. hdparm) The result, is that it wants to park the
heads after a few seconds, and a Linux system using it will tend
to wake it up in short order, so you will see the
Load_Cycle_Count rapidly increasing. I dont know how bad this
*actually* is, but I didnt care for it. Unfortunately, the only
way to stop it was to download a DOS program called wdiddle.exe
from WD, and run that on the drive to either increase its
timeout, or turn it off.
	The Samsung HD204UI was shipped with a firmware bug that
could cause data loss if you do an inquiry during a write. (eg.
smartctl -a /dev/sdX) This has been fixed with newer drives, but
you couldn't distinguish the good from the bad firmware, as it didnt
change the version number. So, if you get one of these drives it
would probably be best to update the firmware to the latest.
	(Both of these problems are easily googled for more
detailed information)

	As far as speed goes, neither is a fast drive; they are both
*cheap massive storage* blocks, but they are very quiet, cool running,
and power efficient. And they should be fine for DVR use.

	As far a brands go, you can read in any give set of
reviews people who claim that brand X is total crap, but they
love brand Y, and the complete opposite in the next review. These
sentiments are generally based upon a bad experience in the past.
The trouble is that there has been a lot of consolidation in the
drive manufacture space, so who exactly makes brand X can have
changed, in addition to the fact that real reliability problems
tend to track actual model and manufacturing runs vs. brands.
Modern drives are simply very reliable, espeically after they
started using fluid dynamic bearings.
	The best you can do there is do some web searching on your
particular drive and take its warrenty into account, along with the
return policy of the reseller and manufacturer's RMA.
	
Paul
set at pobox.com