Western Digital Caviar Blue 640 GB Bulk/OEM Hard Drive 3.5 Inch, 16 MB Cache, 7200 RPM SATA II WD6400AAKS

by Western Digital

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 5.8 x 4 x 1 inches ; 1.4 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B0017XUX7O
• Item model number: WD6400AAKS
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (132 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #12,196 in Electronics (See Top 100 in Electronics)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes
• Date first available at Amazon.com: July 7, 2004

Product Description

Capacity: 640 GB

From the Manufacturer

It's easy to choose the world-class quality of a Western Digital hard drive. We’ve not only designed a drive that's right for you, we've also made it simple to find. These drives are ideal for business, home use, or high performance desktops, and are available in capacities up to 2 TB. With our renowned leading-edge engineering, you'll always make the right choice with WD. And you'll never compromise on quality.

The power of choice. The quality of WD.
WD Caviar® Blue™ Performance and reliability for everyday computing. Select true blue for reliable quality in everyday use.	WD Caviar® Green™ Cool, quiet. Select green for doing more with less energy consumption.	WD Caviar® Black™ Maximum performance for power computing. Select black when you demand the highest performance.

WD Caviar Blue – Performance and reliability for everyday computing

To make drive selection simple, we've gathered all our popular WD Caviar SE16, WD Caviar SE, and WD Caviar drives under one umbrella we call WD Caviar Blue. Built to Western Digital's awarding winning quality standards, these drives are available in a full range of performance features.

Features at a glance Solid performance Ultra-cool and quiet Capacities up to 750 GB 3-years limited warranty

Interface

PATA - Enhanced integrated drive electronics (PATA), also called Parallel ATA (PATA), hard drives have been the standard in the computer industry for more than 10 years.

SATA - Serial ATA (SATA) hard drives are quickly becoming the new standard. Motherboard manufacturers now include SATA inputs on their boards. Because of their considerably narrower cables, SATA hard drives provide increased airflow and less clutter and in the computer system compared to PATA drives.

The performance difference - PATA drives support data transfer rates up to 100MB/sec, and all WD Caviar Blue SATA drive support 3 Gb/s transfer rates.

Cache - WD Caviar Blue is available in 2 MB, 8 MB, and 16 MB cache sizes. Bigger cache memory yields faster performance.

Capacity- We offer drives ranging from 40 GB to 750 GB. Pick the biggest capacity your budget will allow. You can never have too much storage space.

Reliability - We understand the importance of your data, and we are committed to protecting that data with exceptionally reliable products, advanced data protection technology and superior customer support.

Cool - Keeping the drive cool enhances reliability. WD continues to develop new and innovative ways to keep drives cool while they are operating.

Quiet - The technology that Tom's Hardware Guide called "very fast and nearly silent" is used throughout this family of drives. Our WhisperDrive technology minimizes noise to levels near the threshold of human hearing. To cut seek noise, SoftSeek technology streamlines read/write seeking algorithms, resulting in more efficient operation.

View IntelliSeek demo here.

NoTouch™ ramp load technology - The recording head never touches the disk media ensuring significantly less wear to the recording head and media as well as better drive protection in transit. (Available on 120 GB capacities and above)

IntelliSeek™ - Calculates optimum seek speeds to lower power consumption, noise and vibration. (Available on 120 GB capacities and above)

Compatible - We perform tests on hundreds of systems and a multitude of platforms in our FIT Lab and Mobile Compatibility Lab to give our customers confidence that our drives will work in their systems.

How this WD hard drive protects your data

• Data Lifeguard is an exclusive set of data protection features, including shock protection, an environmental protection system and real-time embedded error detection and repair. WD's Data Lifeguard technology automatically finds, isolates, and repairs problems that may develop over the life of a hard drive.


• Data Lifeguard Tools are software utilities designed for WD hard drives that work with the embedded Data Lifeguard features to make hard drive installation,diagnostics and repair both simple and worry-free.


• ShockGuard instantaneously protects the hard drive against damage from bumps and vibrations while it is running. This technology enables WD Caviar drives to achieve industry-leading shock specifications.

Ideal For
Family and business computing.

Product Description

WD Caviar Blue hard drives are available with either SATA or EIDE interface in a variety of cache sizes with a multitude of available features to deliver rock solid performance and ultra-cool and quiet operation. Pick the drive that suits your needs with the confidence in knowing that all WD Caviar Blue drives are built to the highest standards of quality and reliability. With capacities ranging from 40 GB to 640 GB, these drives are the perfect solution for family and business computing.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

76 of 82 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Western Digital 640GB Caviar SATA Hard Drive, July 27, 2008

By 

rorschach99 "rorschach99" (West Monroe, LA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Western Digital Caviar Blue 640 GB Bulk/OEM Hard Drive 3.5 Inch, 16 MB Cache, 7200 RPM SATA II WD6400AAKS (Personal Computers)

I build computers as a hobby. Why pay for someone else to build one (one size fits does not fit all) when building your own is not too difficult and you can build with quality parts tailored to your own specific needs. Case in point, the WD 640GB HDD. Large hard drive prices are economical right now. Generally speaking, the larger the drive, the less the cost per gigabyte (GB). At Amazon's prices the WD 640GB drive was about $10 bucks more than the WD Caviar 16 320 GB drive with the same cache. Western Digital has recently color coded their drives: Black (high performance), Blue (mainstream) and Green (no brainer: ecologically friendly-for a hard drive). Where does marketing get these ideas? The Caviar 16 640GB falls into the Blue category. It is amazingly fast and quiet, thanks to its 16 MB cache and 3 Gb/s transfer rate. The technology is interesting in that WD utilized two 320GB platters which gives this drive an edge as compared to say 750 GB drives with similar cache size. The drive itself is nearly silent and the quietest HDD I have used. Its rated over 90MB/sec read and write speeds, which is very fast. Yes there are faster hard drives, but for the money this drive is an excellent choice.

My only complaint: the drive is warranted for 3 years not 5.

Amazon had the lowest price I found, and shipped the drive quickly. Turn around time from placing the order to delivery at my door step was four days. Stable, reliable and excellent price to performance ratio, this drive is a great choice for everyday computing needs.

33 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Right price, January 11, 2009

By 

Jerry L. Rainsdon "Jerry" (Houston, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Western Digital Caviar Blue 640 GB Bulk/OEM Hard Drive 3.5 Inch, 16 MB Cache, 7200 RPM SATA II WD6400AAKS (Personal Computers)

The hard drive worked great I had to go online to get the product manuals and purchase the cables since it is a SATA II drive and my computer supports SATA I it took me several hours to make it work but once I figured out how to slow down the drive with the jumper which was not supplied it was a plug and play process. Make sure you know your system specifications before you order and get the needed cables and jumper & Screws all at once.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars WD Caviar Blue 640GB OEM Drive, October 4, 2009

By 

sc - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Western Digital Caviar Blue 640 GB Bulk/OEM Hard Drive 3.5 Inch, 16 MB Cache, 7200 RPM SATA II WD6400AAKS (Personal Computers)

The drive is pretty fast and allows for allot of storage room. Amazon needs to learn how to pack a hard drive for shipment! The hard drive arrived in a box with a static bag around it and no protective padding at all!!! My drive is warrented until 2012 from WD and it is already making noise upon spin up. So it looks like I am going to have to ship it back to WD for replacement. I would not purchase this item from Amazon again not because of the drive; but because of the horrible packaging the drive was shipped in.

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