Price Guides July 2004: Optical and Magnetic Storage
by Kristopher Kubicki & Larry Barber on July 16, 2004 12:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Guides
Introduction
Welcome back for this week's Price Guide. Not too much has changed in storage within the last few weeks, but prices are still going down, which makes now a good time to think about your data storage, as well as backup solutions. Read on to find the best deals on hard drives and on DVD burners to back up your all-important files, documents, and data.As usual, be sure to check out our RealTime Pricing Engine for the latest prices and deltas.
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KristopherKubicki - Saturday, July 17, 2004 - link
MadAd,I agree with you. right now the tables are hard coded into the website so they dynamically update even as the page gets older. We have the capabilities to do as you ask, its just taking some time. Moving the price guide engine from PHP over to .NET is taking us a little while - but dont worry we hear your thoughts.
XRaider,
That link should be fixed now, the backend had a hiccup.
TrogdorJW,
More drives added.
Kristopher
MadAd - Saturday, July 17, 2004 - link
when o when will you add in a $ per MB column for the drives?I mean look at the layout, youve got a shipping cost column that hardly gets used on some pages.
Why not trash the shipping column, as well as the total column, just put the total price in the price column and colour code it. Black for no shipping (0:00) and say, blue? or bold? to denote that some shipping is included in the price figure.
That way you can free up 2 columns, still alert people when shipping is included (without having to display a shipping price) and have a free column to put in $ per MB stats :)
(infact since theres 2 columns freed up, you could still put delivery price, just include it in the final price and save having 2 price columns.
Anyway, its your website, i dont care how you squeeze it in, just please, the most useful reference statistic you can have for hdds is simply missing right now - buying it and caring about shipping costs comes way later in the decision chain.
Thanks guys
XRaider - Saturday, July 17, 2004 - link
I noticed that the SATA Raptor 74 Gig drive is wrong when you click on the link to Mwave. It brings up the old WD 36GB 360GD Hard Drive. What the deal? :(PrinceGaz - Friday, July 16, 2004 - link
No one knows about DL compatibility as there isn't enough DL media available yet.The ND-2510A is physically identical to the ND-2500A in every way, so theres no reason not to get an ND-2510A if you want DL capability and arguably the best DVD burn quality available. Or you could get an ND-2500A if you don't mind flashing it with firmware for the ND-2510A as all reports so far suggest flashed ND-2500A's are every bit as good at DL burning.
Given that the ND-2500A is roughly the same price as the NuTech drive, has arguably the better DVD writing quality, and is (unofficially) DL capable, its hard not to recommend it as the top choice. Alternatively if you want manufacturer supported DL capability then pay a little more for the ND-2510A. I'd recommand either before the NuTech DDW-082.
TrogdorJW - Friday, July 16, 2004 - link
One other comment: your list of SATA hard drives seems rather limited. I know Samsung provides 160 GB SATA drives for a relatively low price. I'm using two of them in my home system, in fact. They're just as quiet as the Seagates, and come with a 3 year manufacturer warranty. I'm quite happy with my Samsung drives... they might be slightly slower than other drives, but I can't tell any difference between these drives and my old WD1200JB, other than the lack of noise.TrogdorJW - Friday, July 16, 2004 - link
You know, I would agree that dual layer isn't really that important on the media side, but we all know prices on the media will eventually drop. If the cost isn't much greater, wouldn't you want a DL capable DVD burner? Sure you would! Which is why I question the choice of the Sony DRU-700A as the alternative for dual-layer support. $172!? Why on earth would anyone want to spend that much on a DVD burner, when a little further down your price list is the $83 NEC ND-2510A. Maybe it doesn't have the same level of compatibility? Anyway, according to Newegg, it is 2.4X DVD+R9 capable (or whatever the official name of dual-layer DVD+R is called). http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProductdesc.asp?desc...Is there a problem with that NEC drive? Any reason to *not* get it? I figure for the $20 price premium over the NuTech, I get future support for DL media if/when the price comes down. I'm *seriously* thinking of buying the drive, and would appreciate any input you can give.
KnightOwl - Friday, July 16, 2004 - link
Something's wrong with the price for the Hitachi 160 GB SATA drive. ZipZoomFly has it in Stock for $96 with free shipping, about $15 less than your indicated price. And ZipZoomFly doesn't even show up in the list when you check prices.araczynski - Friday, July 16, 2004 - link
dangit, i am shocked and appalled at the lack of a NVidia/ATI chipset comparisons in this article, haven't they been sending you guys enough glossy brochures?!?!?!;) extremely slow day at work...