Not all WD6400AAKS' are created equal...

[MACMAC]

So I just received my long awaited WD6400AAKS.

It has a manufacture date of May 9th 2008, thus fresh off the boat.

First thing that caught my eye was the firmware, 75A7B vs. 00A7B for every other WD6400AAKS that I've seen.

No big deal I thought, off to the races...



...average transfer rate is slightly lower than expected, but the access time is horrible. Obviously WD got a little crazy with the Automatic Acoustic Management (AAM), but we can fix that



That's slightly better! Sub-12ms


Access time aside, I'm not yet impressed since my (also just received) Seagate 7200.11 500GB appears to be slightly faster.


This was done on a GB 965P-DS3 v3.3, which uses the ICH8.

[tiro_uspsss]

soo.. u updated the hdd firmware? how u do that?

[One_Hertz]

they might have started using lower quality parts? You know, show off to the public that the drive is good and then gimp it? Would be interesting to test this.

[ic3m4n2005]

i think he just changed AAM, cause same firmware is shown in both pictures.
Sometimes firmware updates are given by the manufacturer, flashing is the same as with your mobo bios in dos.

[MACMAC]

Actually, all I did was reduce the AAM.

I really can't complain about the access time anymore, but I wish the average transfer rate was in 88-89MB/s range since I'm getting 86MB/s with this new 7200.11 500GB.

[Vryada]

What a coincidence: I bought the same HDD’s (one WD 6400AAKS and one Seagate 7200.11 500 gb). The WD died within hours of use. I hope you don’t experience the same.

[MACMAC]

It's the Seagate that I'm currently worried about, because it's making a click-crunch sound every hour or so.

I'm going to fill it up to the max, format, and repeat a few times to stress it.

[Vryada]

Download the SeaTools and try running all the tests. Easier than filling the drive up and formatting ad eternum.

[Gogeta]

Actually, all I did was reduce the AAM..

Please forgive me, but... how did you do this?

[MACMAC]

Please forgive me, but... how did you do this?

With WinAAM, click here to download it.

[Talonman]

I tried the program. It reported no ATA drives with Acoustic AAM found.

Rats!

[XtremeTiramisu]

I tried the program. It reported no ATA drives with Acoustic AAM found.

Rats!

http://translate.google.com/translat...om.microsoft:*


Try to understand what it means after google translated the page from German. I still don't get it though, hopefully you or someone else can tell us how.

[XtremeTiramisu]

Download HD Tune Pro 3.0 Trial
There is an option for AAM
The default setting of my WD5000AAKS was set to low noise (128) which is the slowest. I changed this setting all the way up to high performance (254)
Access seek time went down by 0.3
It seems this software changed is permanent and now my drive's benchmark's access seeks time is always 0.3 faster than before.

[Talonman]

Thanks for the info. I actually baught HD Tune Pro 3.0.

I will look into that for sure.

I have been thinking...
The way I am currently using my system is running (2) 2 disk RAID arrays, that are being backed up onto 1 non-RAID HD.

I might be better off to pick up 2 more 150 GB Raptors, and run a single 4 disk RAID 0 array, and back that up to my 750 BG Caviar.

It would have faster access, and still be backed up to HD.

[NapalmV5]

75A7B vs. 00A7B

not the firmware.. just model extension

my 4 x 6400 are 00A7B w/ 1.03 firmware

what firmware @ 75A7B ?

[Buckeye]

I might be better off to pick up 2 more 150 GB Raptors, and run a single 4 disk RAID 0 array, and back that up to my 750 BG Caviar.

It would have faster access, and still be backed up to HD.

Yes ! I like what you are thinking there.
Make it an 8x Raptor Raid 0 and now your talking

[Talonman]

My precious 2 disk Raptor RAID array space is going quick!


The question is do I wan't 2 medium fast 2 disk arrays being backed up onto a standard Caviar, or rather a single 4 disk Raptor array, backed up onto a Caviar.

I find myself keep thinking about a 4 disk array of Raptor 150's in RAID 0. Dump all my games, OS, and my few pictures on it, and just be done. Forget about my second 2 disk Samsung array, and enjoy 4 disk RAID speed.

Tough call... The way I use my system, I think 4 Raptors would be better for me?

Sorry for the thread jack!

[Buckeye]

The way I use my system, I think 4 Raptors would be better for me?

There you go !

[Talonman]

3GB/sec just sounds better than 1.5GB/sec!

Medium Xtreme disk I/O anyway...

[Buckeye]

Actually you have 2 HD cages, each has 3 spaces in it ? Gah I have one also, silly me...

Go 5 Raptors in Raid 0 and the back up HD. Now your talking. Use up every HD slot hehehe

[Talonman]

I am working with 6 SATA ports, and 1 is for CD ROM, and 1 for the Caviar for backups.

I can't go for the RAID controller yet. 2 ports down, and only 4 up for grabs.

4 Raptor 150's would be my current limit. (I still got to have $$ for my GPU step up too!)

[Buckeye]

I know they just don't put enough SATA ports on these mobo's.

[Talonman]

8 would be just right!

[MadMan007]

Blah. I got my 6400AAKS from Newegg today , ran an error scan and had no problems, ran HDTach and HDTune and got 15.5+ms access time! Not very happy and I was reminded of when I got some Seagate 500GB drives with later, crappier firmware. I found this thread and am hoping to improve the seek times. My model # ends in -65A7B0 and my firmware as read by WD Diagnostics is 01.03B01

With WinAAM, click here to download it.

I tried the program. It reported no ATA drives with Acoustic AAM found.

Rats!

I got the same thing, from what I can gather you have to use Windows basic drivers not Intel chipset drivers? I will try that soon here...

http://translate.google.com/translat...om.microsoft:*


Try to understand what it means after google translated the page from German. I still don't get it though, hopefully you or someone else can tell us how.

Download HD Tune Pro 3.0 Trial
There is an option for AAM
The default setting of my WD5000AAKS was set to low noise (128) which is the slowest. I changed this setting all the way up to high performance (254)
Access seek time went down by 0.3
It seems this software changed is permanent and now my drive's benchmark's access seeks time is always 0.3 faster than before.

This didn't work for me. Access times are still roughly the same ~15.5ms. For a drive that is already performing properly shaving off a few tenths of a ms might be possible but these 15+ms access times aren't right in the first place. It clearly is not getting down to <13ms like it should be, I suspect this batch was from an OEM who specified low noise.

And WD level 2 tech support was useless, the tech understood what I meant, sort of, but was trying to bs me about 'benchmarks will show different information' and 'the seek time is *average* depending upon the type of file and use' as if that applies to a low-level measurement He ended the call by suggesting a Velociraptor, der, thanks buddy. If this isn't just part of an OEM-spec'd quiet batch I suspect WD of either hosing products after early reviews which pisses me off royally, it's the reason I overlook Seagate now, otherwise if all drives start shipping like this it may be a push toward the 'black caviar' line since the 6400AAKs is part of the 'blue caviar' line. In any case I am irritated to no end because this is the second time in a year I've gotten drives that aren't living up to reviews.

[MadMan007]

Fixed this problem by using Hitachi's Feature tool: http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm I burned the .iso, booted it, changed it - it's pretty easy to figure out the utility - and voila!

Now I get 12.2ms seek time with the highest numerical AAM setting. Seeks are definitely more noticable though but I don't mind HD seeks, I suppose I could mess around with it a bit and find a better noise/performance balance but I'm not going to bother right now. It also seems to 'stick' after reboots and power downs. I just hope this doesn't somehow damage the drive :p I know it shouldn't because it's not running out of spec or anything but it almost feels like overclocking the HD versus how it was before