Western Digital 500 GB Caviar Blue PATA 7200 RPM 16 MB Cache Bulk/OEM Desktop Hard Drive WD5000AAKB
March 1, 2010- Ships in Certified Frustration-Free Packaging
- Speed: 7200 RPM
- Capacity: 500 GB
- 500 GB capacity holds up to 100,000 digital photos, 125,000 MP3 files, and 60 hours of HD video.
Product Description
WD Caviar Blue hard drives are available with either SATA or EIDE interface in a variety of cache sizes with a multitude of available features to deliver rock solid performance and ultra-cool and quiet operation. Pick the drive that suits your needs with the confidence in knowing that all WD Caviar Blue drives are built to the highest standards of quality and reliability. With capacities ranging from 40 GB to 640 GB, these drives are the perfect solution for family …
For some reason the “Caviar Blue” series of WD drives will not work with the Alesis HD24 HD recorder (you will get a HD reset error when attempting to mount the drive). I believe this is the only flavor of Western Digital drive that doesn’t work in the HD24–the other “Caviar” series drives work great, just not “Caviar Blue.” FYI.
Rating: 1 / 5
Put two of these in an older Pentium 4 computer. Great drives. I love Western Digital.
Rating: 5 / 5
I use it solely for storing TV shows recorded from DishNetwork. I used to have a 160GB hard disk for this purpose. But with my wife and I both recording TV shows to that hard disk, I find that we will run out of disk space in one week if we don’t keep up watching and deleting the recorded shows — this is despite the fact that we are only recording in DVD or lower quality (not recording HDTV to my PC yet). With this 500GB hard disk, I don’t need to worry about this any more, and I can take my time watching the recorded shows instead of forcing myself to watch the shows just to delete them to make room.
When the time comes and I need to start recording HDTV into my PC, I am sure I will get a 1-TB hard disk. Hopefully, by then 1-TB hard disk will price the same as a 500GB hard disk now.
Rating: 5 / 5
Installation was a breeze. It’s quiet and fast. Very satisfied with it. I used to be a big Seagate fan, but have been disappointed with my last couple of Seagates. I now put Western Digital as my personal favorite.
Rating: 5 / 5
This is an excellect drive; probably about as good as it gets on the EIDE/ATA interface. Big and fast.
But NOTE; this is a BARE DRIVE. You will have to go to the Western Digital website to get the utilities, diagnostics and instructions. And I found the utitlites and instructions weak. Too much reliance on wizards but, if they don’t solve your particular problem, no help in doing things “by hand.”
Second caveat: If you want to use this drive with a version of Windows before XP-SP1 (or intend to install a pre-SP1 version and then update), you will run up against the “137GB barrier.” This should have been noted in the product discription. The Western Digital utilities are supposed to include a solution, but I could not verify that because something was incompatible with the Windows XP “product restore” disks that came with my IBM NetVista (Not a Windows disk, but an image of the boot hard drive as shipped).
Recommended without qualification for XP-SP1 and later.
Rating: 4 / 5