March Hard Drive Price Guide - Page 4

Serial ATA Hard Drive Value

Just as in the previous PATA chart, we are also taking a close look at our Serial ATA drives and determining exactly which models and capacities offer the best overall value. We do this through the tried-and-true method of determining hard drive value, or "price per GB", which is then used as a sorting criteria to ensure the best $/GB deals rise to the top. Of course, no method is foolproof, and other factors like performance or features certainly come into play, but it does give us a different view on which brands, speeds and capacities offer the best bang for the buck.

The Serial ATA value chart follows a slightly different trend than we saw in the PATA listings, and the upward movement of higher-capacity 400GB and 500GB SATA drives continued in March. The Western Digital Caviar SE16 400GB actually takes the top value spot this month, and although the Western Digital Caviar SE16 500GB, Samsung SpinPoint T166 500GB and Samsung SpinPoint T133 400GB drives are mathematically ranked lower (we use several decimal places when sorting), these are all effectively tied for second place at 27-cents/GB. The five Western Digital Raptor models are at their customary position at the bottom of the chart, as this line of high-end 10K RPM drives has always been concerned with pure performance and reliability, not value.

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Page 1 March Hard Drive Price Guide Page 2 Serial ATA Hard Drive Price List Page 3 Parallel ATA Hard Drives Sorted by $/GB Page 4 Serial ATA Hard Drives Sorted by $/GB Page 5 Parallel and Serial ATA Hard Drives Sorted by Price Change Page 6 Parallel and Serial ATA Hard Drives Sorted by Price

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