jborza%burgundy@Sun.COM (Jim_Borza) (11/22/88)
It seems to me that, because of the *enormous* volume of ST225 disks supplied by clone vendors and as third-party add-ons to PC/XT's etc., there would be a larger number of ST225 users who've experienced problems of one sort or another. Remember: this has probably been the most popular winchester disk of all time. I'd be curious to know the actual Failure Rate or MTBF experienced by this disk in actual use. I doubt Seagate would let this in- formation out but I'd wager it's not *substantially* greater than most others. I've used ST225 and ST238 for years without incident but, for a critical ap- plication, I'd stay away from "mass market" drives and buy an "industrial strength" unit with a published MTBF and conservative specs. Drives from Micropolis and CDC and Maxtor usually fall into this category. Although ex- ceptions abound, you usually DO get what you pay for.
sac90286@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (12/09/88)
RLL controllers are DEFINITELY worth the (small) premium! Be sure to get a drive that is RLL certified, however - the ST225 is not (although I have an ST225 running under an RLL controller, and it works fine most of the time, I probably just got lucky and wouldn't recommend it to anyone).