Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 140 posts

Re: Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

#71

Post by augustt »

jasonhansel wrote: post #67

This reminds me of how, to make a whole lineup of Intel chips, they just make the highest-price model, and then disable features to create the lower-price ones. Or how shorter-range Teslas have the same battery capacity as longer-range ones--they just disable using the extra capacity in software. In this case, the "5400 RPM" drive runs at 7200 RPM, but WD presumably makes it (either via software or hardware) perform…

They'll start with the same silicon design but manufacturing variability requires them to bin the chips based on functionality & performance, which is how you get all these different models.

Re: Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

#72

Post by dependenttypes »

causality0 wrote: post #63
throw0101a wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no "may" about it: they are oversubscribed for consumers so as to get the price points down. If anyone wants to have an unfettered pipe then call up a Tier 1/2/3 ISP and ask for a commercial connection via a single-mode fibre, and be ready to pay quite a bit for it.

This varies wildly by location and company. Approximately half my family is subscribed to Cox, and the other half mostly to Spectrum. The Cox connections never drop below 80% of their advertised speeds and the Spectrum ones rarely rise above 50%. Huge swaths of Spectrum's service area are so resource-starved they don't rise above 10% of their advertised speeds during daylight hours.

IMO, there should be some regulation where they should be forced to mention the current and maximum allocation that they are willing to make as well as the average/median bandwidth that the active users enjoy per hour.

Re: Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

#73

Post by gorgoiler »

orbital-decay wrote: post #22
smnrchrds wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What a world when you can't even trust the spec sheet. What's next, 10 watt class drives that pull 20 watts? 3-year class warranties? Just like how internet speeds are advertised ("Up to 300 Mb/s").

There's a solid technical reason for that though, as ISPs have no control over the performance of your connection's remote part. Sure, it leaves plenty of room for abuse, but this is a necessary disclaimer, not some slippery marketing.

The ISP is also in the best position to publish the p50, p90 and p99 speeds their customers reach. But why bother, when they can feign ignorance and just talk about what the boffins in the Science Lab say it should be.

Perhaps, with tongue in cheek, we could call this the p0 speed — as in it doesn’t make sense and it’s guaranteed that 0% of customers achieve it.

Re: Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

#74

Post by Fej »

Adjacent to WD's recent scumminess, I recently purchased an Ultrastar drive (no longer HGST-branded) and it came with a slip in the box informing me that by purchasing this product (from B&H) I had somehow agreed to binding arbitration.

Companies have been abusing the ability to force consumers into binding arbitration but this is another level. I'm not a lawyer but it doesn't seem to be clear if this would hold up in court; it is however pretty clearly a scare tactic, which is almost worse.

Re: Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

#75

Post by AnonHP »

I’ve not touched WD drives in a long, long time, and the recent SMR fiasco made the brand seem even more untrustworthy than what was in my imagination.

In this case, it sounds (from the official response) as if WD is trying to “dumb down” the specs so that generally less informed buyers can compare them easily and make the right choices?! But this effort will fail because it hides information in scenarios where it certainly must cater to different needs — not everyone wants all the speed at a specific price just as not everyone wants the lowest power consumption at a specific price.

The discerning users who want to get the specs and then decide what trade offs are worth it for their use case must be able to get it, even if it’s on page 6 of the “technical specifications” document.

Re: Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

#76

Post by acidbaseextract »

swiley wrote: post #41

This kind of crap is why I hate shopping for computer hardware.

In general it's an amazing time to be a computer hardware consumer. There's real competition in pretty much every primary component hardware vertical. The spinning rust data storage market has been uniquely crappy of late.

The sketchy stuff shows up in cheap components with slim margins (budget AIO watercoolers, budget hard drives, budget PSUs budget/no-name ebay video cards).

Re: Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

#78

Post by bleepblorp »

dependenttypes wrote: post #72
causality0 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This varies wildly by location and company. Approximately half my family is subscribed to Cox, and the other half mostly to Spectrum. The Cox connections never drop below 80% of their advertised speeds and the Spectrum ones rarely rise above 50%. Huge swaths of Spectrum's service area are so resource-starved they don't rise above 10% of their advertised speeds during daylight hours.

IMO, there should be some regulation where they should be forced to mention the current and maximum allocation that they are willing to make as well as the average/median bandwidth that the active users enjoy per hour.

The UK has a rule which requires ISPs to only advertise speeds achievable by 50% of users during peak periods. Customers are also allowed to leave contracts without penalty if ISPs are unable or unwilling to provide advertised speeds to the end user[0].

Such rules are not within the American Overton window for the usual reasons.

[0] https://www.broadbandchoices.co.uk/ask-our-expert/broadband-...

Re: Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

#79

Post by bleepblorp »

Fej wrote: post #74

Adjacent to WD's recent scumminess, I recently purchased an Ultrastar drive (no longer HGST-branded) and it came with a slip in the box informing me that by purchasing this product (from B&H) I had somehow agreed to binding arbitration. Companies have been abusing the ability to force consumers into binding arbitration but this is another level. I'm not a lawyer but it doesn't seem to be clear if this would hold up i…

The USSC has ruled that binding arbitration clauses in shrink-wrap consumer contracts are legal and enforceable.

For the usual reasons, congress has refused to change the law to vacate the ruling.

Re: Western Digital is trying to redefine the word “RPM”

#80

Post by tomc1985 »

akhosravian wrote: post #40
orbital-decay wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a solid technical reason for that though, as ISPs have no control over the performance of your connection's remote part. Sure, it leaves plenty of room for abuse, but this is a necessary disclaimer, not some slippery marketing.

Does anyone in the US actually get the “up to” even plugging directly into the ISP provided modem at off peak times?

I'm on spectrum in a high-tier US city and can regularly achieve a number very close to my cap (400mbs) throughout the day.

Granted, before my current router I was only hitting just over 50% of the rated speed. But that turned out to be the router I was using, its CPU was not fast enough or something. With a new router and all wired connections between me and the 'net, I get the speeds I pay for.

Post reply on HN