multimedia hard drive

[The QuietMan]

What is the best multimedia hard drive for watching movies etc recorded onto computer. What is best make. size, value for money etc

[vehelpfulguy]

Spin speed is important.

Most hard drives that fit inside dekstop PCs (3.5") spin at 7,200 rpm.

There are some that spin at 10,000 rpm but they tend to be more expensive.

Cache is also important, the more the better.

It starts at the low end with 2Mb, then goes up to 4Mb, 8Mb, 16Mb and 32Mb (maybe higher but 32Mb tends to be the normal top limit)

Noise is also immportant, so you want a quiet hard drive if you are going to watch movies.

Just as an example, here is a 750Gb drive that spins at 7200 rpm with 32mb cache for �61.

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/139739

Not saying it is the best, but it gives you a starting point.

[vehelpfulguy]

This web site here is for people who want to built quiet PCs.

http://www.quietpc.com/gb-en-gbp/home

I notice they do sell hard drives.

I notice they also have forums, one dedicated to hard drives, so maybe you could ask the experts on there.

[vehelpfulguy]

I forgot seek time.

In my list above of things to look for on a hard disk I forgot seek time.

This is the time it takes to get the data on or off the hard disk. It is measured in milliseconds. like 15ms or 8ms.

The lower the better.

[vehelpfulguy]

PC Pro magazine June 2008 issue had an article on building PCs.

For their "quiet" PC they chose a Western Digital drive 750Gb WD7500AACS. They say it adjusts its spin speed to keep the disk quiet.

I notice the QuietPC web site also sell this and they call it the quietest hard disk currently available,

ebuyer have it for �87.

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/136042

[fo3nix]

"Multimedia hard drive"

A hard drive is a hard drive is a hard drive.

Go for a Maxtor, Seagate, Western Digital (WD) or Lacie one. You can't go far wrong.

Go somewhere like amazon.co.uk or ebuyer.com, and buy the one with most storage (500GB or whatever) that you can afford.

[ChuckFickens]

I think the OP might mean on of the hard drive based multimedia players you can connect to your TV such as

http://www.lacie.com/uk/products/product.htm?p id=11002