Western Digital Scorpio Black WD7500BPKT 750GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 2.5″ Internal Notebook Hard Drive Bare Drive

Pros: Fast, quiet, and trouble-free

Cons: None

Overall Review: You know what you’re getting in terms of capacity, so hard drive reviews are all about reliability, speed and noise. I had no problems with any of this. It was successfully installed into a 2008 Macbook Pro.

Pros: This drive is paired with a primary 256GB Crucial M4 SSD in my HTPC/Gaming PC. The WD drive works well. Read/write speeds are typical for a 3GB/sec drive, and it is pretty quiet to boot. 7200 RPM speed certainly helps as opposed to the 5400 RPM version. Recommended!

Cons: None

Pros: Fast and quiet. Not too hot. Tons of space

Cons: Not 7mm height

Overall Review: I got this for my wife’s laptop and it’s worked without any problems. We leave the laptop on most of the time and it runs quiet fast and reasonably cool.

Pros: Fast 7200 RPM, large capacity, great price, and best of all no bad sectors. I performed a complete surface scan with WD Diagnostics prior to install and drive cloning (since I have been burned before by using a bad drive before testing it). Used this to replace a 3 year old WD320 Gb that was going bad. Really pleased with the performance.

Cons: This drive is Advanced Format, meaning it has 4096 byte sectors instead of the older 512 byte sectors. Not a con in the true sense, just wanted to point out that if you clone a Win Vista partition from a non-AF drive to an AF drive you will need to install a MS hotfix. However, you cannot patch your system AFTER it has been cloned (the people at MS can be real smart sometimes).

Overall Review: if you are migrating a Windows system from a non-AF to an AF drive then apply this hotfix PRIOR to cloning (search kb2470478 on Microsoft support site):

Article ID: 2470478 – Last Review: March 15, 2011 – Revision: 2.0
Applications that are built on ESENT and that run on a Windows Vista-based or Windows Server 2008-based computer may not work correctly after the reported physical sector size of the storage device changes

Pros: Worked out of the box perfectly for a PS3 install.
Formatted to right around 700GB.
Snappy response times.
Lots of space for a good price.

Cons: None yet.

Overall Review: I had been looking for a drive upgrade for my PS3 (backward-compatible model) for a while, and had been weighing options between SSD, SSD hybrid, and normal HD. I read a number of reviews about this drive, including some from other PS3 owners that reported good results installing this drive. I also had a terrifically easy time.

For others looking to upgrade their PS3 drive:
My 80GB PS3 drive was 73GB full, and the hardest part of the upgrade was formatting a 160GB external drive as FAT32 to do the system backup. I used Easus Partition Manager – Home Edition on a Win7x64 box.

Backup from the PS3 took approximately 5 hours. Faster external drives might improve the speed. Mine is old.

You’ll need a small phillips screwdriver to loosen the screws on the PS3 and drive cage. Secure the new drive in the cage, reinstall it in the PS3, power it up.

Start the restore (reformatting the drive), and wait about 90 minutes. One more reboot, and voila, approx. 700GB of usable PS3 space.

Pros: -Relatively fast
-Doesn’t destroy battery life
-Very high capacity
-Long warranty

Cons: -Noticeable impact on battery life
-Hotter and louder (though by no means loud)

Overall Review: The Scorpio can run circles around my Macbook Pro’s old 5400rpm Hitachi drive. The mix of SATA 3gb/s, 7200rpm, and double the cache has given my laptop noticeable pep in its step. So far it has run without a hitch, and the 5-year warranty should cover any problems that may arise. One of my few qualms is that the audible clicking sound my Hitachi drive made when the drive spindle locked into a safe position doesn’t happen anymore, and there’s no observable indication that the hard drive engages in any free-fall protection. That doesn’t mean it isn’t happening, though, so it’s really a non-issue. The drive does run a bit warmer than my previous drive, though it hasn’t gotten hot enough to be uncomfortable. Also, while I can’t feel any vibration, the drive does emit enough noise to be noticed in quiet environments. Overall I’m very pleased.

Pros: Bought this drive to upgrade my 80GB PS3. Zero issues with upgrade. Immediately added another 20GB of downloads from the PSN today after the backup and restore process was entirely finished.

Cons: Didn’t run the drive through any type of tests

Overall Review: For the nonretail packaging it was pretty good. Was shipped inside anti-static bag wrapped in 3 – 4 layers of bubble wrap, enclosed in a tight fitting box. Was then packed into another box with 2 other boxes for items i purchased and all free space in the overall box was stuffed firmly with packing paper.

Pros: With this drive, my laptop feels almost as fast as my desktop, with lots more storage space than the average laptop.

Cons: Nothing to report. Move along, please.

Overall Review: It is an Advanced Format Drive (4k sector size instead of 512 bytes), so make sure you use a current OS that can handle it, and not 10-year old Windows XP.