$69.99: WD Caviar Black 2TB @ Target

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zmhaha

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you might have known the 2TB WD Essentials external drive for $69.99 in target.
I bought one and opened it up to see what model of the drive was. Guess what, it is the Cavia Black inside.
and the P/N of the drive is WD2001FASS.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136456

One thing you need to know that if you look at the packaging, there are 2 different model # of it ( not the # in on the actual drive):
WDBAAF0020HBK-NESN and WDBAAF0020HBK-NETG
Mine was NETG. So you might wanna try that one. Also there are couple of people on evga forums found the same thing.
Even it was not the black edition, it is still a pretty good deal.

It is 2 days sale, which means you have one last day, tomorrow, to grab one at this price.
(mine store got it sold out already)


Another place to get it: Staples
They have a promotion called Cyber Monday, which starts on Sunday and ends on Monday.
The will have this drive for $69.99 as well, with free shipping.
http://www.facebook.com/staples
http://www.staples.com/cyber-Monday...t&cid=SM:SBD:TWITTER:SNK_CYBER:20101123:EVENT

However, there is one question. Is it gonna be NETG or NESN, made in Malaysia or Thailand? Since it is online only, there is no way to check it... (the webpage shows only the general model number, i.e. WDBAAU0020HBK)
 
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Nice to know! I picked up three of em and they are all NETG. I don't plan on pulling them out of the enclosures any time soon though. Between this and the Samsung deal I've picked up 10TB of storage in 3 weeks and haven't figured out what I'm going to fill it with. Time for redundant backups.
 
If I were you, i'd put the WD black inside. kinda wasted to let it run on USB.
The samsung F4 is kinda slow and you can put it into the ex enclosure since USB is bottlenecking for all drives anyway.
 
All the targets by me sold out of those in 20min. There was a guy that found one in back and he was taking it to a customer and a lady stole it out of his hands and said he would have to fight her to get it back.
 
Hmm tempting but I don't even need it. Still have like 700gb left each on my F3 and F4. I should keep that money towards snowboarding.
 
Thanks for the heads up, all the stores in my area still have them in stock.
 
munkle said:
All the targets by me sold out of those in 20min. There was a guy that found one in back and he was taking it to a customer and a lady stole it out of his hands and said he would have to fight her to get it back.
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I was walking out with the last two in the store, when a lady hit me with a baseball bat from the sports section and must have ran off with it.





Seriously, thanks OP, so there's no problem taking it out of the enclosure and using it SATA internally?
 
darkpaw said:
Yah, I probably will. At that price the warranty isn't a huge deal.
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there aint any seals on it. it is totally fine to open it. and making a few scratches on the enclosure wont void the warranty.
Also, I believe the warranty for this ex drive is 1 year, while a WD bare drive is 5 years.
if the drive broke in the future, you can just RMA it as a bare drive (thats what I have been doing so far, lol)
and hard drive manufactures dont need a receipt, the warranty starts from when the drive was made.
 
Well, I just check the warranty with the S/N on the bare drive.
It is 1 year instead of 5 years. and WD recognizes it as the inner drive of WDBAAU0020HBK-NETG
 
munkle said:
All the targets by me sold out of those in 20min. There was a guy that found one in back and he was taking it to a customer and a lady stole it out of his hands and said he would have to fight her to get it back.
Click to expand...

Believe it or not, there's still like 4 stores in my area that have em in stock. I'm hoping the price is still good tomorrow, I may grab a couple of em :)
 
5 stores in my area have them (not including the "limited availability" stores). already got the google maps route planned out to hit 4 of them by 9am. :)
 
Actually, only made in Malaysia drives have Caviar Black inside them, there are plenty of NETG drives from Thailand with WD Green drives ;) In either case, pretty good deal.
 
TehQuick said:
Actually, only made in Malaysia drives have Caviar Black inside them, there are plenty of NETG drives from Thailand with WD Green drives ;) In either case, pretty good deal.
Click to expand...

you positive about that? source? regardless, thanks for the heads up!
 
zmhaha said:
Well, I just check the warranty with the S/N on the bare drive.
It is 1 year instead of 5 years. and WD recognizes it as the inner drive of WDBAAU0020HBK-NETG
Click to expand...

I hope opening it doesn't void your warranty, as now they know you opened it if you know the internal drive's SN.
 
Bah Target online system is garbage, also said all stores had them in stock. Got there, none to be seen. Clerk: "Yeah, some times it doesn't update correctly."
Really?
 
WildMonkey said:
Bah Target online system is garbage, also said all stores had them in stock. Got there, none to be seen. Clerk: "Yeah, some times it doesn't update correctly."
Really?
Click to expand...

when did you check? maybe target just does inventory updates a couple times/day, or just once at night? i know both Microcenter and BB are real-time.
 
Dam thats nice to know. I Picked up 2 at mine.. They had so many instock too.
 
Does anything happen to the warranty on this if you take it out of the enclosure?

Thanks for the heads up, going to Target with my family tomorrow, I'm trying desperately to keep my sanity and not buy this simultaneously.
 
supposedly, it'a a 1yr warranty if it remains in the enclosure, and no warranty if you remove it.

also, after doing a bit more research, i have determined the following ....

* you cannot find the black drives simply by looking for -NETG at the end of the part number on the product box.

* Some NETG boxes had green drives. All of the NETG green drives were made in Thailand.

* If you want a caviar black drive, you need to find a box that has both -NETG at the end of the part number AND was made in Made in Malaysia.

* and now the potential bad news .... i saw a mention from an industry insider who said they put refurbs in the WD Elements.


fwiw, here's an image of the label, so you'll know what it looks like and where to find the model # and country of manufacture ...

WD%20Black%20NETG%20Box%20Label.jpg
 
haven't been able to get confirmation of the refurb statement. did find a couple of interesting things though ....

* WDC does not list the cache or platter speeds for these anywhere on their website.

* when reviewing the 2TB Elements forum posts on the WDC support forums, i saw an interestingly large number of people who mentioned that they found their "brand new 2TB Elements" drives formatted in ntfs or exfat, or even unformated, and they found additional system files or "hidden files". makes one wonder if these might be refurbs that were not properly wiped/degaussed.
 
I think we can assume at this point that WDC knowingly puts different drives in the Elements Desktop models.

WD Support > Knowledge Base > Frequently Asked Questions
Question
What kind of hard drive is inside a Western Digital external hard drive?
Answer: http://wdc.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/wdc.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=1704


and it's interesting that the Target.com page for this product has a link to a popup - look for the link, entitled "Learn more about this product". The popup has data provided by WDC. On the Specs tab, rotational speed is listed as 7,200RPM, and RST: 8.9ms
 
PhantmShado said:
You do not resell a degaussed drive. A degaussed hard drive is useless. It cannot be used again.
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as long as the only thing they had to do was rewrite the timing/servo tracks, the drives would definitely be resellable. would have to remove the platters before degaussing them though to ensure that other parts of the hard drive are not destroyed. so, yes, this would not be the most effective method for a company to use when refurbing drives. a software-based erasing tool is what they would use.
 
Don't worry, it's a Seagate, so it will certainly remove all of your data very soon....nice feature.....lol
 
So any of you that went for them... Did it say on the website that they had them but then didn't? Cause the Target about 2 miles away lists them as in stock. Think I might have to go get a couple.
 
First Target I went to this morning (online said they had stock) had none. Salesguy knew exactly what I was asking for though. Suspicious. Next Target had 5 in stock and they were all NETG Malaysia, so o grabbed them all. Soon as I get home I will check the drives and analyse to see if they are returns.
 
Anyone who opened them, any way to see if its been opened or not? Basically I don't mind the 1 year warranty but I'd like to use it if need be.
 
i went to 2 targets and called 2 more. All listed available but had none of the shelves. I went to best buy and PC richards. All had NESN.
 
got mine opened. serial numbers have been blurred out for obvious reasons.

cb1.jpg

cb4.jpg

cb2.jpg

cb2.jpg
 
pc1x1 said:
Anyone who opened them, any way to see if its been opened or not? Basically I don't mind the 1 year warranty but I'd like to use it if need be.
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if you're REALLY careful you can probably pry them open and leave no marks. maybe try using a small plastic trim removal tool for small dash trim from an auto parts store.
 
Picked up 5 in Orlando, FL. 5/5 were Caviar Black, WD2001FASS.

I actually could use at least one Green setup, since it runs cooler. PM me!
 
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