Tong Family Blog: DFI LanParty nF4 Ultra D and Maxtor DiamondMax 10 300 bugs. Well, here's an update, you need a couple of things to get this drive working right:
As they say at DFI-Street.com you have to get a new piece of firmware called the BANC1E00 and then you have to find a plain vanilla SATA drive controller. Not the one in the nForce. Fortunately, I have an old SATA controller in my Chaintech nF3.
It also turns out that there are serial numbers for drives that correspond to firmward releases, so if you buy the latest versions as listed below. The 6xxx series corresponds to the DiamondMax 10 and has a 3 year warranty, the Maxline III is the 7xxx series and is the exact same drive but has a 5 year warranty. Right now on Zipzoomfly, there is $2 difference, so get the Maxline III
| Maxtor Product Number | Firmware | DFI nF4 Compatibility |
| 6B300S0 | BANC1B70 or BANC1BY0 | Incompatible, requires update |
| 7B300S0 | BANC1E00 | Compatible |
| 7L300S0 | BANC1G10 | Compatible |
| 6L300S0 | BANC1E10 | Compatible |
As an aside, I did take a look at the new 400GB and 500GB drives that are coming out, but these are much more expensive right now. For instance, the award winning Hitachi 7K400 on storagereview.com costs nearly $275 on pricegrabber compared with $130 for the Maxtor.
The new 500GB drives are even more expensive with the Hitachi 7K500 at $370 according to pricegrabber.com so really out of reach
Same with the new Seagate 7200.9 500GB, which is a well rated drive according to anandtech. It also costs $360 at pricegrabber
