This could get lengthy but i want to make sure i give as much info as possible (im going to email this exact thread (only the text) to Maxtor and ask them the same but i wondered if any of you could help) Right ive bought a Maxtor 300GB SATA HDD (150mb/s) from Amazon for £77 ohh theyve put the price up better check receipt ok all good, in the box comes: 1 x HDD 1 x SATA 1 Controller Card with 2 SATA 1 ports and 1 IDE port (saved me £20+) 1 x Drivers CD 1 x Sata Cable in red 2 x Manuals as from the link at the top i bought this from Amazon (i have not contact them as of yet) and i purchased a DiamondMax SATA drive. i have opened the box and taken the drive out of the antistatic wrapper to install into my machine. as per the instructions i installed the SATA card first booted my machine and installed the drivers from the provided CD, it would not install the drivers correctly as it was looking for a DLL file called ptipbm.dll but i could not find this on my machine or on the CD. i have not downloaded the latest drivers form Maxtor website yet, but i hope this will solve this problem. whilst i was installing drivers and waiting for my machine to boot a copule if times i had a quick flick through the manuals (one for the SATA Card and the other for the HDD)and i noticed that the HDD (before opening the HDD bag) should have a 15pin Sata Power port and a standard 4 pin power port. (the same as CD-roms etc), if it didnt have both ports i should have received (in the box) a converter cable allowing me to power the HDD from a PSU that does not support SATA. i didnt not get a converter cable nor does the HDD support the 4 pin (older) power port. But i feel this is possible due to my next problem (and major problem in my eyes). i inspected the HDD, just looking at the names and numbers on the label attached to the drive and i noticed the name on the drive, Maxline III. i inspected the box (as there is a label on the out side of the box) and the label says DimondMax, i checked the S/N: on both the box and drive and they matched. Close up of the label on the antistatic bag the drive came in, with the same S/N: ive looked at the Maxtor Website and i cant really tell what the major differences are except that the DiamondMax has Dual power ports and is possibly quietier, Maxline III info i cant find on the Maxtor Website a DiamondMax drive thats Sata with 16mb of cache that 300gb, the max ive found is 160gb. have i received a better/worse drive that i origionally purchased? How can the box say one model of drive, and the HDD have a sticker with a different name? how to i get hold of a power converter? or should i just stop whinging and get on with it? Thanks in Advance
alright mate i have a 300gb maxtor drive its a sata 150 drive with 16mb cache http://photobucket.com/albums/b12/yousafn/?action=view¤t=DSC00149.jpg as you can see from the pic, it is stated as a diamondmax drive here is the drive in question that i bought from the place i bought it http://www.microdirect.co.uk/ProductInfo.aspx?ProductID=9508&GroupID=597 and here is the drive you have in your possession http://www.microdirect.co.uk/ProductInfo.aspx?ProductID=9617&GroupID=597 i would keep it as its meant to be an enterprise drive ie higher reliability for servers etc as for the sata power connector you can buy a molex-> sata power convertor or a molex -> 2 x sata power splitter hope this helps, peace
Cheers for that, so i have a better/more reliable drive than a diamondmax? do you think my warraty will be affected/will i still have one?
not sure ive never had to rma a maxtor drive or owt to amazon as long as you keep the box and all bits and pieces you should be sweet mate, the rma'er on the other end will probably not even look at it and send you a new one should it break or theyll just see a 300gb maxtor and be sweet and send you a new one... dont hold me to that tho mate but
The Maxline IIIs are meant to be server reliability, and something else enabled in the Firmware too. I'd swap my DM10 300gigs for MLIIIs anyday.
The MaxLine IIIs are identical drives to DM+10s, they just usually come in a box with a warranty. They might also be somehow sturdier, but they're functionally identical.
the only difference is that they're run in for a bit longer at the factory, the actual hardware is identical though as for the firmware, I belive the maxline and diamondmax firmwares are identical. its just seagate and WD that enable TLER on their nearline drives
Yup as covered the MaxLineIII is the same thing, just a little more expensive and intended for important corporate situations where 100% reliability is paramount. As for the lack of old 4pin power I think most modern HDs have dropped these although Maxtor did hold on to them longer than most so the manual probably just reflects this (manuals are rarely up to date). Bottom line is that a £1-2 SATA power cable is all you need. As for the SATA PCI Controller card if the drivers on the CD won't work look online (where the drivers are usually newer and better). You should probably look up the chipset on the card as opposed to using Maxtor's own site.
Cheers for that guys its made me hapier that ive got either a equal or better drive than i bought, i just didnt want a under par drive. ive got the latest drivers off of the Maxtor website (same build 1.50.3 IIRC) it was the CD missing a file not an imcompatibility but that is sorted. cheers Kenco!!
I must have got the **** end of the stick then cause ive already RMA'd 1 DM10 and they dont "feel" that reliable tbh.
