In reference to the thread that I started a week or so ago regarding which hard drive to buy for the 2nd slot of my Rev. B Power Mac G5 (https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/106432/), I thought that I should follow up and let everyknow how the new hard drive turned out (I think it's useful information for many).
I ordered the Seagate 160GB hard drive from OWC it came a few days later. I installed it right away into my G5 2.0 Rev. B, a process which was extremely simple, as those who have done this know. The most confusing part was when, upon start-up, I was asked to initialize the new hard drive, upon which Disk Utility opened and I was very confused because there was no "initialize" option, as there had been in previous Mac OS incarnations. Instead I decided to choose "erase," which I assumed was the same thing (but still am not sure).
I have had no problems with the Seagate, other than the fact that it is a bit noisier than I expected (but I am a bit obsessive about noise, especially since the G5 is so quiet). I can clearly tell when it is spinning because of a very high pitched - yet not very audible - whine, which I never noticed from the factory-installed hard drive (which is incidentally a Maxtor 160GB). However, because the "sleep hard disk" option is enabled in the preferences, the disk spins down after about 8 min. of inactivity and is then essentially non-existent.
Another (minor) issue is the fact that - although it is a "160GB" HD, there is only 149GB of space available. The factory-installed "160GB" Maxtor has 152.5GB available. (Not a big difference, I know, but perhaps significant to some people.)
This and the high-pitched whine is essentially the only complaint about the hard drive (and, again, the whine really is not loud at all, but since Seagates have such a reputation for quietness, I was a little disappointed). I have had no problems with it so far (knock on - or touch - wood) and I certainly can't complain about the 5 year warranty that it came with. 🙂
I ordered the Seagate 160GB hard drive from OWC it came a few days later. I installed it right away into my G5 2.0 Rev. B, a process which was extremely simple, as those who have done this know. The most confusing part was when, upon start-up, I was asked to initialize the new hard drive, upon which Disk Utility opened and I was very confused because there was no "initialize" option, as there had been in previous Mac OS incarnations. Instead I decided to choose "erase," which I assumed was the same thing (but still am not sure).
I have had no problems with the Seagate, other than the fact that it is a bit noisier than I expected (but I am a bit obsessive about noise, especially since the G5 is so quiet). I can clearly tell when it is spinning because of a very high pitched - yet not very audible - whine, which I never noticed from the factory-installed hard drive (which is incidentally a Maxtor 160GB). However, because the "sleep hard disk" option is enabled in the preferences, the disk spins down after about 8 min. of inactivity and is then essentially non-existent.
Another (minor) issue is the fact that - although it is a "160GB" HD, there is only 149GB of space available. The factory-installed "160GB" Maxtor has 152.5GB available. (Not a big difference, I know, but perhaps significant to some people.)
This and the high-pitched whine is essentially the only complaint about the hard drive (and, again, the whine really is not loud at all, but since Seagates have such a reputation for quietness, I was a little disappointed). I have had no problems with it so far (knock on - or touch - wood) and I certainly can't complain about the 5 year warranty that it came with. 🙂
