What Drive Should I Get? A Guide to the Mechanical HD Market

[PIRATA!]

On 8/13/2018 at 9:08 PM, seagate_surfer said:

These two devices are pretty much the same, they both are 7200 RPM and offer you 5 years warranty and share the same amount of load cycles. If you want to point to the differences then you need to look under specifications at the columns:

• Cache: Seagate has 256MB and WD has 128MB of cache. More caches is good for when you use several different type of data or applications, the drive stores in the cache the most frequently used data to have it available for when is requested and that helps minimize wait to load times.
• Nonrecoverable Read Errors per Bits Read, Max: Seagate has 1 per 10E15 and WD has 1 per 10E14. This number means the amount of possibilities that a sector could fail, not every body likes math but 1 per 10E15 means that there are less possibilities for one sector to fail than 1 per 10E14.

I don't really believe you are gonna get regretted for buying one or the other, get the one that suits your budget better.

Hi there!

I see that you are related to Seagate...or I'm misunderstanding?

 

I was thinking to get a 5y warranty hdd for my new computer, and its destine will be to manage games and online gaming. I have a few questions:

 

1. The Barracuda Pro 4Tb is interesting, IMHO. I am on intel and could also update my system with Optane in future. Will it give performance to such good drive?
2. Regarding its cache, it's 128Mb like the WD Black. How is cache important and where is it used??
3. Speaking of noice...how to understand if the Seagate will be a noisy one? I can find any info regarding certified noise levels, for both Seagate and WD.

 

Ah! I forgot to mention that I'll have my os and main apps onto a 512Gb M.2 SSD placed directly onto the motherboard. The hdd will be my main games storage.

 

Ps: I would have gone for the Toshiba X300 drives as they are cheaper...but 2y warranty it's a NO-GO! for me. I'm too tired of risking.

 

 

Thank you.

[seagate_surfer]

On ‎8‎/‎17‎/‎2018 at 7:29 PM, PIRATA! said:

Hi there!

I see that you are related to Seagate...or I'm misunderstanding?

 

I was thinking to get a 5y warranty hdd for my new computer, and its destine will be to manage games and online gaming. I have a few questions:

 

1. The Barracuda Pro 4Tb is interesting, IMHO. I am on intel and could also update my system with Optane in future. Will it give performance to such good drive?
2. Regarding its cache, it's 128Mb like the WD Black. How is cache important and where is it used??
3. Speaking of noice...how to understand if the Seagate will be a noisy one? I can find any info regarding certified noise levels, for both Seagate and WD.

 

Ah! I forgot to mention that I'll have my os and main apps onto a 512Gb M.2 SSD placed directly onto the motherboard. The hdd will be my main games storage.

 

Ps: I would have gone for the Toshiba X300 drives as they are cheaper...but 2y warranty it's a NO-GO! for me. I'm too tired of risking.

 

 

Thank you.

 

Hello PIRATA!,

 

The Optane module of Intel is compatible with SATA drives and our hard drives are not an exception, they will be accelerated to NVME speeds as advertised. To answer your second question about cache, the cache is the buffer in between your computer and the hard drive. The cache/buffer memory stores frequently accessed data for next time and it is good for when you use several different files or applications, they will load faster because were "preloaded" already. Finally for the noise levels you need to look for the word "Acoustics" in the specs sheet, the following is an example of a 2.5 drive:

 

[PIRATA!]

On 8/21/2018 at 2:18 PM, seagate_surfer said:

 

Hello PIRATA!,

 

The Optane module of Intel is compatible with SATA drives and our hard drives are not an exception, they will be accelerated to NVME speeds as advertised. To answer your second question about cache, the cache is the buffer in between your computer and the hard drive. The cache/buffer memory stores frequently accessed data for next time and it is good for when you use several different files or applications, they will load faster because were "preloaded" already. Finally for the noise levels you need to look for the word "Acoustics" in the specs sheet, the following is an example of a 2.5 drive:

 

Thank you very much for your reply.

 

I have some questione for you.

 

How does internal cache (64, 128, 256) weight on the overall performance if an Optane memory is place in the system? 

 

For example, considering theoretically the exact same hard-drive in the 128mb cache version Vs. its 64mb one:

 

>>> if in the system I'll adopt and Optane memory, will their differences in performance be the same regardless the presence or not of the Optane memory? In other words, will the performance be proportionally the same, or will the Optane memory affect any results such that one drive will give better results than the other one with the presence of an Optane memory? 

 

Also, I'd like to know if it's worth to search / price watch / pay more for a 128mb hard-drive instead of getting its 64mb version and go for an Optane memory....that might also contribute (I think) to all the hard-derives installed in the system.

 

Regarding this last thing:

1) will the Optane memory affect positively (or even negatively) if used in a system where there is the presence of multiple hard-drives? (No RAID, only regular storage)

2) will it affect also any SSD hard-derives? 

3) if multiple hard-derives are installed, will the Optane memory work at the same time for all hard-derives?

4) in case of the presence of multiple hard-drives, will the overall performance generated by the Optane memory result in lower performances as the hard-drives could read/write at the same time?? 

 

 

Ps: the hard-drive in question I was thinking at is rather a Seagate Barracuda PRO or a WD Black.

Reason of use: Gaming

Hard-drive is not a primary hard-drive.

Primary hard-drive is an Intel M.2 SSD 512Gb on which I'll install Win10Pro and all apps.

 

Pps: extra questions about Seagate:

1) what are the real benefits of the FIRE hybrid hard-derives?

2) Do they really give something extra? 3) Will they be affected positively/neutrally/negatively by an Optane memory?? 

 

 

Thank you again.

 

 

[seagate_surfer]

1 hour ago, PIRATA! said:

Thank you very much for your reply.

 

I have some questione for you.

 

How does internal cache (64, 128, 256) weight on the overall performance if an Optane memory is place in the system? 

 

For example, considering theoretically the exact same hard-drive in the 128mb cache version Vs. its 64mb one:

 

>>> if in the system I'll adopt and Optane memory, will their differences in performance be the same regardless the presence or not of the Optane memory? In other words, will the performance be proportionally the same, or will the Optane memory affect any results such that one drive will give better results than the other one with the presence of an Optane memory? 

 

1 hour ago, PIRATA! said:

Pps: extra questions about Seagate:

1) what are the real benefits of the FIRE hybrid hard-derives?

2) Do they really give something extra? 3) Will they be affected positively/neutrally/negatively by an Optane memory?? 

 

 

Thank you again.

 

 

Well, pretty much the answer to these questions is very similar. The first thing to know is that your adding technology to your drives instead of using ours, that means that the results will be depending on the Intel Optane technology and not on the drive. The algorithm that Intel uses when you "concatenate" (or "accelerate" but they say concatenate to sound more cool!) a SATA drive both the Intel® Optane™ memory and the accelerated SATA drive appear as one SSD volume to the operating system. So, whatever test you do regarding the size of the cache (64, 128, 256) will not depend on the hard drive, what you will see on your test results will be numbers based on PCIe NVMe* connection of Optane for any drive, pretty much a hard drive with Intel® Optane™ memory is about twice as responsive and that includes the FireCuda also eventhough it has a small SSD for cache internally.

 

You can accelerate any type of SATA-based storage media, including SATA SSDs and SATA SSHD. However, performance benefits of adding Intel® Optane™ memory are greater on slower storage devices like an HDD, versus a faster storage device like a SATA-SSD. 

 

The system acceleration is really not a new idea, it has been in the market since the creation of the RST but it is now more famous thanks to the Optane module. All drives include cache and that helps leverage the access to your data and of course more cache means that more applications, more files like movies, pictures, etc... will be prepared for when they are requested. More cache is good for system where multitasking is needed but if you are gaming you only need to open one application (the game) and multitasking may not be a priority in those cases.

 

FireCuda has its own small SSD included with the purpose of accelerating the responsiveness of the plates of the hard drive since the most frequently data, files, applications will be located in the small SSD included in the FireCuda and that of course makes it faster than a hard drive that has its cache within the plates because SSD storage chips react faster than HDD plates, sorry if I sound redundant but need to say it to make it more clear.

2 hours ago, PIRATA! said:

Regarding this last thing:

1) will the Optane memory affect positively (or even negatively) if used in a system where there is the presence of multiple hard-drives? (No RAID, only regular storage)

It won't have any impact as long you don't try to accelerate more than one unit. System acceleration with Optane is only supported with one Optane module and one SATA drive. 

2 hours ago, PIRATA! said:

2) will it affect also any SSD hard-derives? 

Yes, you can accelerate SSD SATA based hard drives too as mentioned earlier.

2 hours ago, PIRATA! said:

3) if multiple hard-derives are installed, will the Optane memory work at the same time for all hard-derives?

I guess I replied this on question number 1 , you can only accelerate one SATA based drive, it can be HDD, SSHD or SSD but it needs to be SATA and it can be the primary boot unit or your secondary storage device.

2 hours ago, PIRATA! said:

4) in case of the presence of multiple hard-drives, will the overall performance generated by the Optane memory result in lower performances as the hard-drives could read/write at the same time?? 

 

Ps: the hard-drive in question I was thinking at is rather a Seagate Barracuda PRO or a WD Black.

Reason of use: Gaming

Hard-drive is not a primary hard-drive.

Primary hard-drive is an Intel M.2 SSD 512Gb on which I'll install Win10Pro and all apps.

If I understood correctly you are asking this assuming that several hard drives can be accelerated with Optane. Well, as mentioned earlier you cannot accelerate more than one unit, that means you cannot accelerate one RAID configuration with Optane, neither a primary and a secondary drive with Optane. The results you will get will not change because you can only accelerate one drive at a time. So, it doesn't matter how many drives you have in your machine, the results of the one that's accelerated will be independent to the other components of your system. 

[PIRATA!]

On 8/23/2018 at 5:08 PM, seagate_surfer said:

 

Well, pretty much the answer to these questions is very similar. The first thing to know is that your adding technology to your drives instead of using ours, that means that the results will be depending on the Intel Optane technology and not on the drive. The algorithm that Intel uses when you "concatenate" (or "accelerate" but they say concatenate to sound more cool!) a SATA drive both the Intel® Optane™ memory and the accelerated SATA drive appear as one SSD volume to the operating system. So, whatever test you do regarding the size of the cache (64, 128, 256) will not depend on the hard drive, what you will see on your test results will be numbers based on PCIe NVMe* connection of Optane for any drive, pretty much a hard drive with Intel® Optane™ memory is about twice as responsive and that includes the FireCuda also eventhough it has a small SSD for cache internally.

 

You can accelerate any type of SATA-based storage media, including SATA SSDs and SATA SSHD. However, performance benefits of adding Intel® Optane™ memory are greater on slower storage devices like an HDD, versus a faster storage device like a SATA-SSD. 

 

The system acceleration is really not a new idea, it has been in the market since the creation of the RST but it is now more famous thanks to the Optane module. All drives include cache and that helps leverage the access to your data and of course more cache means that more applications, more files like movies, pictures, etc... will be prepared for when they are requested. More cache is good for system where multitasking is needed but if you are gaming you only need to open one application (the game) and multitasking may not be a priority in those cases.

 

FireCuda has its own small SSD included with the purpose of accelerating the responsiveness of the plates of the hard drive since the most frequently data, files, applications will be located in the small SSD included in the FireCuda and that of course makes it faster than a hard drive that has its cache within the plates because SSD storage chips react faster than HDD plates, sorry if I sound redundant but need to say it to make it more clear.

It won't have any impact as long you don't try to accelerate more than one unit. System acceleration with Optane is only supported with one Optane module and one SATA drive. 

Yes, you can accelerate SSD SATA based hard drives too as mentioned earlier.

I guess I replied this on question number 1 , you can only accelerate one SATA based drive, it can be HDD, SSHD or SSD but it needs to be SATA and it can be the primary boot unit or your secondary storage device.

If I understood correctly you are asking this assuming that several hard drives can be accelerated with Optane. Well, as mentioned earlier you cannot accelerate more than one unit, that means you cannot accelerate one RAID configuration with Optane, neither a primary and a secondary drive with Optane. The results you will get will not change because you can only accelerate one drive at a time. So, it doesn't matter how many drives you have in your machine, the results of the one that's accelerated will be independent to the other components of your system. 

Woww!! Well, with this reply you have practically told me almost quite all that I need to know.

 

Just to put all the dots on the "i", please let me understand a few things better:

 

1. regular cache of HDDs is onto the plates, and not in solid-state memory? For example, the BarraCuda PRO, WD Black and Toshiba X300 dives, are still regular HDDs and have their cache (even if 128 or 256 mb) allocated onto the plates??
2. the FireCuda Hybrid HDD has the cache in solid-state, right? So if used next to an Optane memory, I might see an increasing of performance, but not as if placing an Optane memory next to one of the HDDs I've mentioned up here, right? 
3. but if an Optane memory is placed next to a BarraCuda PRO and next to a FireCuda, I will get quite same results as the Optane memory is so overwhelming upon any internal HDD cache, that even the solid-state memory of the FireCuda will result in not making any extra difference, right?
4. so for what I've stated up here, if I'm correct, the Optane memory doesn't concatenate to the already available cache...or better said, it concatenates but as it's so much more fast, the internal cache of any HDD is so irrelevant that is like seeing only the Optane memory....yeah?? 

 

Regarding my computer usage, I'll use it also for working of course, but as I will have all the apps together with the os onto C: (that will be the M.2 SSD) I assume that the other disk will not even be a part of the considerations about the system performance for such work behaviors, right? 

 

Trying to sum up all the thing said, and if I'm correct up here, I'd like to know one last thing:

is it really better to get any kind of mechanical HDD with even 64mb of cache onto plates and place a simple Optane memory, resulting in getting a cheaper HDD but with the need to buy extra the Optane memory, or maybe go for a FireCuda instead from the beginning, or maybe even get a good HDD like the BarraCuda PRO 128mb cache and get stuck with that for a while until the Optane memory drops drastically?

 

 

Thank you so much.

[seagate_surfer]

On ‎8‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 7:12 PM, PIRATA! said:

Woww!! Well, with this reply you have practically told me almost quite all that I need to know.

 

Just to put all the dots on the "i", please let me understand a few things better:

 

1. regular cache of HDDs is onto the plates, and not in solid-state memory? For example, the BarraCuda PRO, WD Black and Toshiba X300 dives, are still regular HDDs and have their cache (even if 128 or 256 mb) allocated onto the plates??

Well, I'd like to quote the following from the definition of hard disk cache first: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disk_buffer

 

disk buffer (often ambiguously called disk cache or cache buffer) is the embedded memory in a hard disk drive (HDD) acting as a buffer between the rest of the computer and the physical hard disk platter that is used for storage.^[1] Modern hard disk drives come with 8 to 256 MiB of such memory, and solid-state drives come with up to 4 GB of cache memory.^[2]

 

I though that it this part of the definition matters because "cache" by itself means a lot, the hard drive in the actual controller board may have a chip to act as a little RAM for the hard drive itself, also the operating system that's installed in the platters and such a drive has one space assigned for cache. All this means is that is a combination, whenever you are multitasking like in one server for example, you'll need more cache because what it does is that it archives data that's used very often so the drive doesn't have to read everywhere, it always looks first the cache and if it is located there the load times will be lower. So in cases where you need a lot of multitasking I would try to get drives with 256 of cache. But in systems where you only load one application like gaming rigs for example, I wouldn't really worry about big cache that much because it doesn't bring as much benefits like in systems where you need to load several applications at a time. 

 

The short answer is a yes, as mentioned earlier the OS could save cache files and the OS is in the platters. The OS has space assigned but it is known as paging file/paging cache:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_cache

 

But also the controller board, and this is in most of the cases, is where you can see a chip dedicated for the cache of the HDD.

 

On ‎8‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 7:12 PM, PIRATA! said:

2. the FireCuda Hybrid HDD has the cache in solid-state, right? So if used next to an Optane memory, I might see an increasing of performance, but not as if placing an Optane memory next to one of the HDDs I've mentioned up here, right? 

The idea of having a small SSD inside of a HDD is with the purpose of accelerating the rates, but still is a hard drive. This concept of accelerating HDDs with SSDs is not new as I guess I mentioned earlier, of course there will be benefits on using one hybrid drive like this one compared to one normal HDD, and yes you are right also with combining it with Optane. Concatenating a HDD with Optane will bring more noticeable benefits when you do it on normal HDDs than when you do it on one hybrid SSHD or on one SSD. And will add only one more thing, the hybrid drives are faster than normal HDDs but the SSDs are faster than any hybrid drive.

 

On ‎8‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 7:12 PM, PIRATA! said:

3. but if an Optane memory is placed next to a BarraCuda PRO and next to a FireCuda, I will get quite same results as the Optane memory is so overwhelming upon any internal HDD cache, that even the solid-state memory of the FireCuda will result in not making any extra difference, right?

  Right! After concatenating with Optane, if you perform a test in one BarraCuda Pro that has been concatenated and one FireCuda that also was concatenated with Optane, those results will be very similar because your system will see the concatenated drive as one single unit (like in a RAID configuration) based on the NVMe connector of the Intel Optane module, and those speeds are way faster than SATA.

 

On ‎8‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 7:12 PM, PIRATA! said:

4. so for what I've stated up here, if I'm correct, the Optane memory doesn't concatenate to the already available cache...or better said, it concatenates but as it's so much more fast, the internal cache of any HDD is so irrelevant that is like seeing only the Optane memory....yeah?? 

Yes! The Optane module acts like that RAM chip on the controller board I was talking about, it moves essential files and the frequently accessed files, applications and data so that everything gets handled over the NVMe interface of Optane and not over the built-in-cache of the HDD.

On ‎8‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 7:12 PM, PIRATA! said:

Regarding my computer usage, I'll use it also for working of course, but as I will have all the apps together with the os onto C: (that will be the M.2 SSD) I assume that the other disk will not even be a part of the considerations about the system performance for such work behaviors, right? 

If you want high speed access then yes, just get an SSD instead and don't worry about the what cache on an HDD and this or that... In perspective, even 64mb is rather minuscule relative to the total size of the drive. A secondary drive to me, what becomes relevant is the size because what is more important will be in the M.2, and once again, any SSD will be faster than nay hard drive.

On ‎8‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 7:12 PM, PIRATA! said:

Trying to sum up all the thing said, and if I'm correct up here, I'd like to know one last thing:

is it really better to get any kind of mechanical HDD with even 64mb of cache onto plates and place a simple Optane memory, resulting in getting a cheaper HDD but with the need to buy extra the Optane memory, or maybe go for a FireCuda instead from the beginning, or maybe even get a good HDD like the BarraCuda PRO 128mb cache and get stuck with that for a while until the Optane memory drops drastically?

 

 

Thank you so much.

Several questions for being the last one! This is the exact use of Optane, there are many people out there and for many of those Optane is not worth it, there are also millions of people that only want one upgrade of their existing equipment without investing that much and here is where Optane comes. It has the purpose of accelerating a cheap drive to outstanding performance of NVME and these people is what really will get a benefit out of the Optane than other people more willing to spend on one upgrade, but for many of us out there, there is no need to invest that much, just get an optane and accelerate the best SATA HDD offer you can find, it helps way too much like to be ignored. You can use one HDD concatenated with Optane to boot your system and make it your primary device and then get a second HDD just for the storage, so will end up with 2 bigger units for storing/back up and this will result on a faster system than booting up from FireCuda, because NVMe is way faster than SATA, so if you boot from NVMe which is what the Optane does on boot devices (it moves boot files to the Optane module) the load times will be significantly lower than when you boot from any SATA drive.

 

Regarding the prices... I don't think the type of chip that was used to create the Optane will drop soon, this chip uses different algorithms and under the microscope the way it stores data also changes, so this is not gonna happen on 2018 or 2019 (or at least I don't think it will), what is going to drop is the price of the NAND chips because there is over production, so during the following months and throughout 2019 the SSDs that are based on these chips are expected to drop its prices, SSDs based on NAND chips are expected to equal the prices of HDDs so at some point there won't be any reason why not to get one.

[PIRATA!]

21 hours ago, seagate_surfer said:

Well, I'd like to quote the following from the definition of hard disk cache first: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disk_buffer

 

disk buffer (often ambiguously called disk cache or cache buffer) is the embedded memory in a hard disk drive (HDD) acting as a buffer between the rest of the computer and the physical hard disk platter that is used for storage.^[1] Modern hard disk drives come with 8 to 256 MiB of such memory, and solid-state drives come with up to 4 GB of cache memory.^[2]

 

I though that it this part of the definition matters because "cache" by itself means a lot, the hard drive in the actual controller board may have a chip to act as a little RAM for the hard drive itself, also the operating system that's installed in the platters and such a drive has one space assigned for cache. All this means is that is a combination, whenever you are multitasking like in one server for example, you'll need more cache because what it does is that it archives data that's used very often so the drive doesn't have to read everywhere, it always looks first the cache and if it is located there the load times will be lower. So in cases where you need a lot of multitasking I would try to get drives with 256 of cache. But in systems where you only load one application like gaming rigs for example, I wouldn't really worry about big cache that much because it doesn't bring as much benefits like in systems where you need to load several applications at a time. 

 

The short answer is a yes, as mentioned earlier the OS could save cache files and the OS is in the platters. The OS has space assigned but it is known as paging file/paging cache:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_cache

 

But also the controller board, and this is in most of the cases, is where you can see a chip dedicated for the cache of the HDD.

 

The idea of having a small SSD inside of a HDD is with the purpose of accelerating the rates, but still is a hard drive. This concept of accelerating HDDs with SSDs is not new as I guess I mentioned earlier, of course there will be benefits on using one hybrid drive like this one compared to one normal HDD, and yes you are right also with combining it with Optane. Concatenating a HDD with Optane will bring more noticeable benefits when you do it on normal HDDs than when you do it on one hybrid SSHD or on one SSD. And will add only one more thing, the hybrid drives are faster than normal HDDs but the SSDs are faster than any hybrid drive.

 

  Right! After concatenating with Optane, if you perform a test in one BarraCuda Pro that has been concatenated and one FireCuda that also was concatenated with Optane, those results will be very similar because your system will see the concatenated drive as one single unit (like in a RAID configuration) based on the NVMe connector of the Intel Optane module, and those speeds are way faster than SATA.

 

Yes! The Optane module acts like that RAM chip on the controller board I was talking about, it moves essential files and the frequently accessed files, applications and data so that everything gets handled over the NVMe interface of Optane and not over the built-in-cache of the HDD.

If you want high speed access then yes, just get an SSD instead and don't worry about the what cache on an HDD and this or that... In perspective, even 64mb is rather minuscule relative to the total size of the drive. A secondary drive to me, what becomes relevant is the size because what is more important will be in the M.2, and once again, any SSD will be faster than nay hard drive.

Several questions for being the last one! This is the exact use of Optane, there are many people out there and for many of those Optane is not worth it, there are also millions of people that only want one upgrade of their existing equipment without investing that much and here is where Optane comes. It has the purpose of accelerating a cheap drive to outstanding performance of NVME and these people is what really will get a benefit out of the Optane than other people more willing to spend on one upgrade, but for many of us out there, there is no need to invest that much, just get an optane and accelerate the best SATA HDD offer you can find, it helps way too much like to be ignored. You can use one HDD concatenated with Optane to boot your system and make it your primary device and then get a second HDD just for the storage, so will end up with 2 bigger units for storing/back up and this will result on a faster system than booting up from FireCuda, because NVMe is way faster than SATA, so if you boot from NVMe which is what the Optane does on boot devices (it moves boot files to the Optane module) the load times will be significantly lower than when you boot from any SATA drive.

 

Regarding the prices... I don't think the type of chip that was used to create the Optane will drop soon, this chip uses different algorithms and under the microscope the way it stores data also changes, so this is not gonna happen on 2018 or 2019 (or at least I don't think it will), what is going to drop is the price of the NAND chips because there is over production, so during the following months and throughout 2019 the SSDs that are based on these chips are expected to drop its prices, SSDs based on NAND chips are expected to equal the prices of HDDs so at some point there won't be any reason why not to get one.

Well...you pretty have answered to all I needed.

 

As I have all my primary os and apps onto an M.2 SSD, I think I'll concentrate in a fast hdd for storage and gaming. I think I'll go for a FireCuda 2Tb as I've found it cheaper then regular BarraCuda PRO 2Tb.

 

Regarding the "longevity" of the M.2 drive, that I imagine is the same of all the SSD drives as they have a limitation in Numb. of times to which each blocks can be written on....how many years could I assume it will live if using if as the main write/read drive of the system?

 

Thank you.

[seagate_surfer]

5 hours ago, PIRATA! said:

Well...you pretty have answered to all I needed.

 

As I have all my primary os and apps onto an M.2 SSD, I think I'll concentrate in a fast hdd for storage and gaming. I think I'll go for a FireCuda 2Tb as I've found it cheaper then regular BarraCuda PRO 2Tb.

 

Regarding the "longevity" of the M.2 drive, that I imagine is the same of all the SSD drives as they have a limitation in Numb. of times to which each blocks can be written on....how many years could I assume it will live if using if as the main write/read drive of the system?

 

Thank you.

Oh that's nice! Yes, try to get the best offer you can find and get that FireCuda ?. The life expected is based on what is know as the load cycles, if you could have an idea as to how much data you are writing daily and then check in the specs of the drive to see if you are exceeding the drive limitations (which hardly happen by the way), or if  you are below the limitations of daily IOPS. 

[PIRATA!]

52 minutes ago, seagate_surfer said:

Oh that's nice! Yes, try to get the best offer you can find and get that FireCuda ?. The life expected is based on what is know as the load cycles, if you could have an idea as to how much data you are writing daily and then check in the specs of the drive to see if you are exceeding the drive limitations (which hardly happen by the way), or if  you are below the limitations of daily IOPS. 

Thank you!

Is there a way, suing some apps or so, to monitor my daily data writing?

And where for example on the FireCuda specs are these IOPS limitations?

 

Thanks again. 

[seagate_surfer]

Yes, there are ways to monitor what data is being written in your hard drive by one specific software or process. Tools like Process Monitor v3.50 can help, one this tools is installed go to filters and set a Process Name filter to the name of the process you are interested in, set a Operation filter to contain WRITE, and a Result filter to SUCCESS. Now, as long as Process Monitor is running, it will record writes done by the process you told it to log.When you have collected your data go to Tools > File Summary and it will give you a summary of all the file system activity it has logged. Since you told it to only log writes for a process the summary will be a summary of just the writes done by that process.

 

Download link: https://docs.microsoft.com/pt-br/sysinternals/downloads/procmon

 

The following is a video example to shows what entries were made by a software the using Process Monitor tool:

 

I showed you that tool because of the feature it has to monitor one single service or application. But also other tools like Hard Disk Sentinel can give you a total of how much data is written to a HDD/SSD more easy than Process Monitor, I quote the following from their website:

 

Hard Disk Performance
Logs how much data were read from or written to the hard disk. Displays current transfer rates for both reading and writing and estimates the maximum available (theoretical) transfer rate for a particular hard disk.

 

Download link: https://www.hdsentinel.com/hard_disk_sentinel.php?page=features

 

With that said, I found a little bit unnecessary to be obsessed with data (happens to many of us here LOL) because the amount of writes that you need to burn one drive are hardly reached by standard users. I will expand this saying the following, once your hard drive reaches the 2,3 or 5 years warranty offered by your manufacturer, that hard drive will continue to work for much longer than that. The reason why this happens is because of the limitations on the load cycles that can be made before the hard drive fails, this number is difficult to reach and I will use the FireCuda as an example. Please check the Load Cycles for this: https://www.seagate.com/internal-hard-drives/hdd/firecuda/#3-5-inch-specs

 

According to the specs the FireCuda has 300,000 Load Cycles limit, that multiplied by the amount or capacity of storage of the hard drive results on a very high number. So, let's say we will use a 2TB hard drive, please multiply 300,000 x 2000 (2000 is the translation in GB of 2TB) and will come up with 600000000, and this is the incredible amount of GB you can write before it fails. To know what would that be daily take the warranty period offered of 5 years and divide the load cycle into that number, so we should have 300000 load cycles divided by 5 years and it results on a limit of 60000 load cycles yearly, that divided in 365 days a year results on 164.38 load cycles daily. Now multiply that daily number for the storage capacity... Is needless to say to almost no one can reach that number unless they have it installed in a server where daily writes are very high or when they have software in their systems that multiply data erroneously creating write amplification problems between some other possible issues.

 

The formula should be something like: 

 

LoadCycles Limit  x  Storage Capacity

_____________________________

 

Warranty Period

 

 

And that should give an idea as to how much data you can write yearly or monthly or daily depending on what you use for the warranty metric. (years, months or days). Whatever happens first is your warranty, so either you reach the 5 years mark or the 300K load cycles limit your warranty will be over but the hard drives usually last way more than 5 years under normal circumstances, and under high volume environments according to Backblaze the 80% of the hard drives start to fail after 4 years of use.

 

There are other type of hard drives that were manufactured to be always on working 24/7 like the IronWolf, those drives have a different scope tan yours and they have Load Cycles of 600,000, so just imagine what needs to happen in those environments to reach that number.

[Stefan Payne]

On 14.8.2018 at 2:05 AM, Stefan Payne said:

Are there any really quiet 4TB Drives on the Market?
I mean EARX level of quietness (have two 2TB ones of those).

 

The 4TB EZRX is pretty annoying and loud. The 4TB MD04ACA400 are even worse but not by much....

 

The ST4000DM004 seems OK, but seems to resonate with my Deep Silence 5B a bit (and its a rather flimsy Drive as well a bit more metal would have been nice)...

That's so far the quietst 4TB HDD, though I'm not really satisfied.

 

Any better alternatives that I missed??

Anyone has a good recommendation for a rather quiet 4TB Drive that doesn't Resonate with my Deep Silence 5B??

Something like the good old WD EZRX?

 

[seagate_surfer]

If you need to compare drives to that level then you will need to look for the user manual or data sheet and then do CTRL+F and type "acoustic". Like this you will be able to see the level of noise when in idle and while working.

[seagate_surfer]

I am posting the sound levels of BarraCuda and Barracuda Pro just in case you need them.

 

BarraCuda

Drive acoustics, sound power:

Idle*** 2.3 bels (typical) 2.5 bels (max)

Seek 2.5 bels (typical) 2.6 bels (max)

 

BarraCuda Pro

Drive acoustics, sound power (bels)    

Idle** 2.8  (typical) 3.0     (max)    

Performance seek 3.2  (typical) 3.4     (max)

 

 

[phluxer]

What about other manufacturers like intenso or toshiba? 

Are they all crap?

[seagate_surfer]

Read the comments of the people who have purchased the product you are interested on, that's a good way to know whether the device works well or it people are having issues. In general, well known companies will try to keep up with high quality standards, that doesn't keep anyone from making devices that will fail at some point, some more often than the others...

[Pro Hustler]

Choosing an apt hard drive seemed like a tough task at first. But WD drives works very well for me as they're all priced within an affordable price range. Also decent for normal use and not for extensive ones. The black series is released being more powerful than the WD green series. I always go through tekhattan to effectively compare between such models before I make my buy.

[SkarmKaskus]

so my current hard drive is failing, it's a 1TB 7200rpm Toshiba driver.
currently still saving money for a new one, i check on my nearest local store, they have 1TB Seagate Barracuda/Desktop and  1TB PC P300 Toshiba.

 

i was thinking to get the seagate one because last week i read somewhere on the internet that it's a good drive, but today i watch a video that say it's not a reliable drive.

so, which one should i get? thank you

[seagate_surfer]

On 6/18/2019 at 2:02 AM, SkarmKaskus said:

so my current hard drive is failing, it's a 1TB 7200rpm Toshiba driver.
currently still saving money for a new one, i check on my nearest local store, they have 1TB Seagate Barracuda/Desktop and  1TB PC P300 Toshiba.

 

i was thinking to get the seagate one because last week i read somewhere on the internet that it's a good drive, but today i watch a video that say it's not a reliable drive.

so, which one should i get? thank you

It is good and reliable! Of course, if you want something with more endurance, get the PRO version of the Seagate BarraCuda, it also comes with a 5-year warranty and that's always good! You can check the following link for more:

• https://www.seagate.com/support/internal-hard-drives/hdd/barracuda/

[GamerTrem]

I have a use specific question. I do game streaming and have a Youtube started. I am running out of space fast with my SSD's for videos. Are mechanical hard drives at a point where we can reliably record 1440p gameplay at 60fps? If so, which would you recommend between the different brands?

[seagate_surfer]

 

 

 

On 6/18/2019 at 1:06 PM, GamerTrem said:

I have a use specific question. I do game streaming and have a Youtube started. I am running out of space fast with my SSD's for videos. Are mechanical hard drives at a point where we can reliably record 1440p gameplay at 60fps? If so, which would you recommend between the different brands?

There is one in specific for video from Seagate, if you want to see more you can open the following link:

• Seagate SkyHawk: https://www.seagate.com/support/internal-hard-drives/hdd/skyhawk/

However for what you expose with "reliably record 1440p gameplay at 60fps" you are suggesting that the HDDs cannot record videos effectively, and in fact, any HDD can record your streaming over the internet, but the model I put above is specific for video recording.

 

[GamerTrem]

8 hours ago, seagate_surfer said:

There is one in specific for video from Seagate, if you want to see more you can open the following link:

• Seagate SkyHawk: https://www.seagate.com/support/internal-hard-drives/hdd/skyhawk/

However for what you expose with "reliably record 1440p gameplay at 60fps" you are suggesting that the HDDs cannot record videos effectively, and in fact, any HDD can record your streaming over the internet, but the model I put above is specific for video recording.

 

Thank you, I'm looking into that now and the 4TB version seems reasonably priced. So that may be the route I go.

[seagate_surfer]

Of course! You are welcome and yes, many have told me the same about the price, some people even bought it just for that, because they found it on sale!

[WesTooLoose]

how are toshiba HDD's? are they worth it for an older laptop upgrade?

toshiba 2.5 in driver versus a seagate 2.5 in HDD

[seagate_surfer]

1 minute ago, WesTooLoose said:

how are toshiba HDD's? are they worth it for an older laptop upgrade?

toshiba 2.5 in driver versus a seagate 2.5 in HDD

It depends, of course, the more you pay the higher the quality you will get (not necessarily thou). For example, if you buy the BarraCuda Pro version you will see differences in the number of hours you can continue working because it can stay on 24/7 and an increase also in the 2 years to 5 years warranty... What model, in particular, caught up your attention? 

[WesTooLoose]

2 hours ago, seagate_surfer said:

It depends, of course, the more you pay the higher the quality you will get (not necessarily thou). For example, if you buy the BarraCuda Pro version you will see differences in the number of hours you can continue working because it can stay on 24/7 and an increase also in the 2 years to 5 years warranty... What model, in particular, caught up your attention? 

it's an older HDD that was in one of my parent's laptop they gave to me (salvaged the Hard Drive, Ram Sticks, and the CPU from it since it was broken) and I found a higher space Toshiba drive that i want to swap into another laptop (120 GB vs 320 GB) and i'm more afraid of the failure rate of both these older drives