Which 1TB HDD is recommended?

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Valnar

Supreme [H]ardness
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Apr 3, 2001
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I keep reading about horror stories of 1TB+ hard drives. So which ones are good? Speed does not matter - only reliability. This will be for a USB enclosure for backups.
 
WD10EADS - great for external as its low power, low heat (won't need active cooling), but still a decent performer.
 
Another vote for the greenpower, it's cool, quiet, and fast enough for most tasks.
 
I am using a Seagate 1.5TB that I got for $130, no problems other than Nvidia drivers fucking up the drive format.
 
I've got a couple Samsung HD103UJ in Raid 0, best drive in this class. Runs like a top, fast and super quiet, I never even hear the things.
 
I know Newegg reviews aren't to be trusted, but there are quite a few bad ones on the Samsung. Not so many on the WD.

Shoot, one guy said he bought 6 of the Samsungs. Three were bad. That's not a good ratio.
 
Valnar said:
I know Newegg reviews aren't to be trusted, but there are quite a few bad ones on the Samsung. Not so many on the WD.

Shoot, one guy said he bought 6 of the Samsungs. Three were bad. That's not a good ratio.
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That would probably be their packaging if anything.

Half of the reviews on Newegg are just people who received DOA drives for one reason or another because UPS decided to play soccer with them! :eek:
 
I've had great luck with the Samsung 103UJs as well. Speed-wise the 3-platter Hitachis (E7K1000 I believe) are great, but I don't think they've been out long enough to know about reliability.

The GreenPower sucks for speed and doesn't use much less power.
 
Samsung HD103UJ. I have had one for about a year and a half, running in my NAS for all my storage. It runs great, quiet, smoothly, and fast. I would suggest it over all others.
 
A WD10EADS uses <3w at idle and has a 14.8ms access time.

A Samsung HD103UJ uses 7+w at idles and has a 14.2ms access time.

You'd think for all that power, the Samsung could be a bit better performer.
 
Ok, so it uses half as much power, but the 7Watts in the first place is so low, the only time it would be worth it to get the GreenDrives is when you are in a server environment or when you are running 20 in some ridiculous raid configuration.
 
True... but the lower operating temp can be very important in an external enclosure. Most 7200rpm drives running often will suffer without active cooling, but I'd have no qualms about running a WD10EADS with limited ventilation.
 
JRS said:
True... but the lower operating temp can be very important in an external enclosure. Most 7200rpm drives running often will suffer without active cooling, but I'd have no qualms about running a WD10EADS with limited ventilation.
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But if you have a WD Black 1 TB in an external with a fan to help, wouldnt it ok then?
 
Absolutely. And if you needed a performer, that would be the way to go. But imho, for an external enclosure storing backups (which does not need a perfomer), than a WD10EADS in a fanless enclosure is quieter and uses a few less watts.
 
JRS said:
True... but the lower operating temp can be very important in an external enclosure. Most 7200rpm drives running often will suffer without active cooling, but I'd have no qualms about running a WD10EADS with limited ventilation.
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Google's testing says essentially that drives running hot is not a bad thing.
 
The price difference on the 1TB drives vs the "problematic" Seagate 7200.11 1.5TB drive is pretty low. It might be worth it to wait for other manufacturers to get in the game and just get those.

I have a pair of 750GB drives now in external USB enclosures and a 250GB jump doesn't seem like it would be worth it, considering it is strictly for backups.

Who is coming out with a 1.5TB or higher next?
 
Valnar said:
The price difference on the 1TB drives vs the "problematic" Seagate 7200.11 1.5TB drive is pretty low. It might be worth it to wait for other manufacturers to get in the game and just get those.

I have a pair of 750GB drives now in external USB enclosures and a 250GB jump doesn't seem like it would be worth it, considering it is strictly for backups.

Who is coming out with a 1.5TB or higher next?
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There are speculations about a 2TB Western Digital Green Power drive coming out soon - the WD20EADS.

If you're in the market for massive storage density, I'd wait for these drives to come out and then make a decision.
 
xdivenx said:
Ok, so it uses half as much power, but the 7Watts in the first place is so low, the only time it would be worth it to get the GreenDrives is when you are in a server environment or when you are running 20 in some ridiculous raid configuration.
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Actually, this is a completely FALSE statement! The only time it would matter would depend on what matters. Of course, I know what you mean here, but think about this on a global scale. If everyone had option A or B, and option A saves 5 watts, and there are millions of these people, then it makes a huge difference. I am sure you also realize this, but I wish more people actually would care. It is part of what is wrong with the human race (that they just don't really care).
 
madcoder said:
Actually, this is a completely FALSE statement! The only time it would matter would depend on what matters. Of course, I know what you mean here, but think about this on a global scale. If everyone had option A or B, and option A saves 5 watts, and there are millions of these people, then it makes a huge difference. I am sure you also realize this, but I wish more people actually would care. It is part of what is wrong with the human race (that they just don't really care).
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this doesn't really make any sense

go turn off your kitchen room light you have on right now; you' dbe saving more power than the hdd topic.

:p
there are more obvious energy wasters that you should be concerned about than a harddrive.
 
SYN ACK said:
this doesn't really make any sense

go turn off your kitchen room light you have on right now; you' dbe saving more power than the hdd topic.

:p
there are more obvious energy wasters that you should be concerned about than a harddrive.
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Energy waste is cumulative, so lights left on that are not in use are just another area where people could save energy. Just because there are some devices and/or behaviors that can save more energy than others doesn't mean that it isn't worth doing with the others. To me, your comment is the one that doesn't make any sense. I could write paragraphs outlining the faulty logic, but if the point is not taken from my original comment, then it is a waste anyway, because you just don't get it.
 
There is more "energy" wasted in this thread than by the idle power draw of a hard drive.
 
PC_User said:
There is more "energy" wasted in this thread than by the idle power draw of a hard drive.
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+1 LOL, next they will tell us to start unplugging them from the wall when not in use just like that stupid cell phone chargers, all to save the same amount of power per month a light bulb uses in 5 seconds.
 
pirate252 said:
WD Blues, I have the blacks and they are great, but since you are not worried about pure performance only reliability go for the blues, stay away from those green ones, no reason to buy a 5400RPM decktop drive these days....

edit: nm the blues dont come bigger than 750GB, guess you will have to look at the blacks :)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136284
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You sir, are mistaken. The WD Green is in an entirely different class with a complete different purpose. There is a point to buying 5400rpm drives when they are almost as fast as the 7200rpm drives, run much cooler, and use less than half the amount of energy. Especially if these drives are mainly used for storage and are not used on a daily basis as the "main drives." I just got myself a WD10EADS to keep my photos/music on there. I listen to the music but the read/write speeds aren't too important for me, and the access speed is almost the same as the black/blue drives.
 
OK you got me there, I wasnt considering them as a storage only drive or especially a bank of storage only drives.

I personally didnt even give them a second thought when I see them as being the 'green friendly' drives when I was building a system that I wanted to be fast, especially when the hdd's are about the slowest thing there is in the computer :)

I am just surprised to see a majority of people on a forum made of of mostly people who live on, or near the bleeding edge when it comes to tech talking in favor of giving up performance for something like 5 watts of power savings.

OCing (which I know not everyone on here does, just a lot of them do) takes up more watts, definetly a lot more than 5 lol

But my point was that you can save the same 5 watts by running instead of walking across the room to turn off the light/tv/whatever (exaggerating but trying to form my point here lol)

I guess I will have to re educate myself and look at the numbers in comparison between the greens and blacks, if they do actually come close with 5400rpm to the 7200rpm one that is pretty impressive, still seems strange to me though :)
 
Take a look at this article: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/green-terabyte-1tb,2078.html

You speak of performance, yet we're talking about 10-15 seconds in read/write time and ms in access/seek time. Do those infinitesimal figures really play a critical role in a drive that is not to be used for performance? For some, it's not all about speed and power. In this case, the trade-off (a few seconds lost versus several degrees celsius less, 5 watts less, and less noise) is certainly worth it.
 
That is interesting to say the least! How in the world did they actually get it to beat out the other 1tb wd drive in some of those tests?

And ya I know, in the overall scheme of things 10 pts on a benchmark may mean no real world performance gain. I did however notice quite a huge difference between my old 500GB 7200.10's and these new 1TB wd blacks in day to day tasks. Wonder if thats just due to platter density though?

Very impressive number from a green product, does it perhaps 'throttle up' and spin at a faster speed when under load to get those numbers?
 
pirate252 said:
That is interesting to say the least! How in the world did they actually get it to beat out the other 1tb wd drive in some of those tests?

And ya I know, in the overall scheme of things 10 pts on a benchmark may mean no real world performance gain. I did however notice quite a huge difference between my old 500GB 7200.10's and these new 1TB wd blacks in day to day tasks. Wonder if thats just due to platter density though?

Very impressive number from a green product, does it perhaps 'throttle up' and spin at a faster speed when under load to get those numbers?
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Yes. The drive is rated as 5400 - 7200 rpm so it spins faster when needed.

dandragonrage said:
Never trust THG.
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Why not?
 
PC_User said:
Yes. The drive is rated as 5400 - 7200 rpm so it spins faster when needed.
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No, it doesn't. It's just clever marketing. The drive either spins at 5400RPM or 7200RPM, though to have the energy usage that it has, it's likely the former. Or maybe a figure "in-between", but it certainly isn't "variable" as WD cleverly puts it. Funny how they don't go into any more information other than their vague "5400RPM to 7200RPM" figure. Hell, I guess that means something like 6153RPM maybe? :rolleyes:
 
Syntax Error said:
No, it doesn't. It's just clever marketing. The drive either spins at 5400RPM or 7200RPM, though to have the energy usage that it has, it's likely the former. Or maybe a figure "in-between", but it certainly isn't "variable" as WD cleverly puts it. Funny how they don't go into any more information other than their vague "5400RPM to 7200RPM" figure. Hell, I guess that means something like 6153RPM maybe? :rolleyes:
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Actually, what I meant was that it spins either at 5400rpm or at 7200rpm during those rare instances when it is needed. It's not any more variable than those two speeds and does not spin at a speed in between those two end points.
 
PC_User said:
Yes. The drive is rated as 5400 - 7200 rpm so it spins faster when needed.
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OOOOkkkk that make a lot more sense now as to how it can keep up, especially in benchmarks where it will be spinning at the 7200 RPM speed.
 
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