Looking for New Mechanical Hard Drive

[4Strings]

Yo Peeps,

So I've had my current rig (see signature) for more than a year now, and I've finally filled my 1TB WD Black drive... Now, before you ask me why I only got a 1TB HDD to go with my 250GB OS SSD, I'll remind you that in December 2012 there was still quite a shortage of mechanical hard drives because of the flooding in Thailand, and so the prices for, say, 2 or 3TB HDDs was kind of outrageous. So I managed to fing my 1TB WD Black for a (relatively) good price, and haven't had any problems with...

 

But that was more than a year ago, and with the steady increase in size of my photos, movies, music and games libraries, I find myself well within the My Computer "Red Zone" at less than 70GB of free space...

 

But back to the subject at hand: What is a good 2-3TB mechanical hard drive? I know that different people have different opinions, but I'm not picky. I just want something that's dependable. So basically what I'm asking is not what's a drive that is guaranteed not to fail, but more along the lines of what are good model numbers to look out for, and if there are any bins that should be avoided like the bubonic plague?

 

 

Sorry for the long-winded opening over a hard drive,

Thanks-a-TON-in-advance,

4Strings

[Tea1337]

A WD Black or Blue 2tb drive would be a good choice. Or a Seagate Barricuda 2TB.

[Guest]

Barracuda's, Blacks, Hitachi's Diskstars? - all pretty much the same.

[dizmo]

A WD Black or Blue 2tb drive would be a good choice. Or a Seagate Barricuda 2TB.

2tb Blue doesn't exist

I'd just get another Black tbh.

If it's strictly storage and you don't run anything off of it a Red would probably be just as fine.

[4Strings]

Thanks guys!

Any particular batches to avoid?

[Tea1337]

2tb Blue doesn't exist

I'd just get another Black tbh.

If it's strictly storage and you don't run anything off of it a Red would probably be just as fine.

Forgot about that, thanks.

 

 

You could also go with a NAS or any other storage device, that way you don't have to keep adding HDD's to your current system.

[4Strings]

Forgot about that, thanks.

 

 

You could also go with a NAS or any other storage device, that way you don't have to keep adding HDD's to your current system.

That's true... But I kinda like have my heavily accessed files inside my PC and then backing up  an external storage. :3

[Tea1337]

That's true... But I kinda like have my heavily accessed files inside my PC and then backing up  an external storage. :3

That makes sense, a 2TB drive from WD or Barracuda would be good.

[4Strings]

Thanks!

[Antistatic12]

WD Black for sure.

[4Strings]

Any reason why the Seagate Barracudas are half the price of the WD Blacks?

[TheProfosist]

Segate sv35 or if youve got the dough get another bigger black.

[4Strings]

Segate sv35 or if youve got the dough get another bigger black.

Interesting... What does "Video Surveillance" mean for a hard drive???

[crudefallout]

Also, for the 2TB Barracudas, there are two different models that run at different speeds. There is a 2 platter 4 head variety, and a 3 platter 5 head variety. Of the two, the 2 platter - 4 head variety is much faster (due to the fact that there is 1 TB/platter, leaving less distance to travel for random iops). The problem is that they both have the same model number. Luckily the version number is usually different. Only purchase versions xxExxxxx [and possibly x24xxxxx - x24 is unverified info so far] of the 2TB model. Seagate has seen the problem and has started to advertise "the power of one" (terabyte), where the newest drives all have 1TB/platter. However, the older drives are still in distribution centers, so there is still a high chance of receiving one of the poorer drives. For any 3TB drives though, there is no issue. All have 3 platters, six heads. 

[TheProfosist]

Interesting... What does "Video Surveillance" mean for a hard drive???

Its meant for DVR, CCTV, and stuff like that. Basically very good sequential read and write. Its not much more expensive than a normal drive but technically considered a entry level enterprise drive so it has a better warranty and it rated for 24/7 usage. The other nice thing about it is that it has 1TB platter density which is good for a number of reasons. I have been recommending them a lot for people who record their game streams since that data is very close to its intended use. It a quite good drive for just about anything though because of the other things I mentioned.

[TheProfosist]

Also, for the 2TB Barracudas, there are two different models that run at different speeds. There is a 2 platter 4 head variety, and a 3 platter 5 head variety. Of the two, the 2 platter - 4 head variety is much faster (due to the fact that there is 1 TB/platter, leaving less distance to travel for random iops). The problem is that they both have the same model number. Luckily the version number is usually different. Only purchase versions xxExxxxx [and possibly x24xxxxx - x24 is unverified info so far] of the 2TB model. Luckily, Seagate has seen the problem and has started to advertise "the power of one" (terabyte), where the newest drives all have 1TB/platter. However, the older drives are still in distribution centers, so there is still a high chance of receiving one of the poorer drives. For any 3TB drives though, there is no issue. All have 3 platters, six heads.

Or you could just pick up a drive from their SV35 series which one of the selling points is the 1TB platter, so your guaranteed it along with a number of other things for usually barely anything more.

[4Strings]

Well guys, I managed to clear up about 100GB of space from my mechanical (gotta love SpaceSniffer) and so the urgency for a new drive has kind of been reduced. Thanks for all the help, I'll keep all your suggestions in mind once it's finally time to buy a drive!

[TheProfosist]

@4Strings I assume that software is something like windirstat?

[4Strings]

@4Strings I assume that software is something like windirstat?

Its this really useful portable app the scans and shows you a graphical representation of your selected drive. The drive is divided in to blocks of different sizes depending their size (duh), if you click on a block, it sub-divides into its sub-folders which are also sized.

 

It's really useful for finding what is using the most space on your drives.

Here's a link:

http://www.uderzo.it/main_products/space_sniffer/

[Cwazywazy]

70GB is what you consider to be the red zone? My laptop's single SSD is smaller than that..

 

How do you take that many photos? And I thought everyone watched Netflix?

[4Strings]

70GB is what you consider to be the red zone? My laptop's single SSD is smaller than that..

 

How do you take that many photos? And I thought everyone watched Netflix?

Lol. 70GB is pretty small for a 1TB hard drive... But I take a few hundred pics a month (both work and personal stuff), but most of the space is music. I'm a musician and I collect new music habitually, I have two music libraries of about 80GB each, as well as audiobooks and some game-capture videos.... So yeah, It was getting pretty full.... But I used SpaceSniffer and found more than 60GB  worth of game installers from GOG that were just sitting there.

[TheProfosist]

Its this really useful portable app the scans and shows you a graphical representation of your selected drive. The drive is divided in to blocks of different sizes depending their size (duh), if you click on a block, it sub-divides into its sub-folders which are also sized.

 

It's really useful for finding what is using the most space on your drives.

Here's a link:

http://www.uderzo.it/main_products/space_sniffer/

so its essentially windirstat

[4Strings]

so its essentially windirstat

I guess... I've never heard of it...

[TheProfosist]

I guess... I've never heard of it...

its a classic google it.

[4Strings]

its a classic google it.

Looks interesting... I just like SpaceSniffer because you get a nice visual representation of where your larges files/folders are...