Should I get a 3TB or 4TB HDD? Are they reliable?

[Muse]

The problem won't be Windows if your Windows is relatively recent. It could be the HD controller on your motherboard in terms of being able to deal with a big HD.

Speaking from my own experience, I went for many years without having difficulties with increasingly large HD's, all the wayfrom well under 1GB (I remember when they sold for $1000) to 500GB. Then I upped the ante and got a 2TB external (the HD controller on my desktop wouldn't accommodate such large HD's), and have had a ton of trouble with many of the 2TB drives I got (WD ELEMENTS USB). I have now gotten 3TB drives (Western Digital ELEMENTS), and my problems continue. So, if you ask me, NOT RELIABLE.

 

[Gronnie]

I have 6 of the 4TB Seagate drives that often go on sale for 139.99 that have been running 24/7 for a year with no problems with any of them.

 

[Muse]

To the OP, I find that I have plenty of uses for my older drives and its usually not worth selling them. Despite preaching to my whole family about backups, I generally have my data in 2 places but my offsite backup is spotty at best.

-Make a periodic copy of all of your important stuff and take the drive to work, let it sit on the shelf there. Don't get too wrapped around the axle trying to set up a rotation system or a complicated offsite setup that you don't end up implementing.

-Make a drive image of your OS and put it on a 250GB drive and let it sit in a drawer. Always good if you want to test some software or drivers that have a chance of hosing things.

Drive docks make internal drives just as easy, if not easier, to work with than externals. Drop the drive in the dock, copy files, stick in static bag and cardboard box and bring it somewhere.

This all sounds sensible to me.

Question: I hadn't heard of drive docks. I've not bought 3.5" large capacity HDs because I don't have a machine that can handle one. Do the drive docks use USB to connect to a desktop or laptop? Recommendations/suggestions?

 

[ignatzatsonic]

This all sounds sensible to me.

Question: I hadn't heard of drive docks. I've not bought 3.5" large capacity HDs because I don't have a machine that can handle one. Do the drive docks use USB to connect to a desktop or laptop? Recommendations/suggestions?

There's a bunch of them available from various manufacturers. I've got a Rosewill RX-DUS 100; 4 years old and still working.

Mine can connect through either USB 2.0 or eSATA--the latter is a lot faster.

Newer models use USB 3.0. I'm not sure that all can be used with large drives, but I used mine to format and fully test a 3 TB drive.

They all look a bit flimsy, so I'm not sure about longevity. I typically use mine only every 2 or 3 months. Otherwise it's in the closet.

Some can accept 2 drives.

Prices begin around $25 and I frequently see them on sale. Better for many purposes than fiddling with an external drive and an enclosure.

 

[Muse]

I have 6 of the 4TB Seagate drives that often go on sale for 139.99 that have been running 24/7 for a year with no problems with any of them.

I recently bought three 3TB external USB Seagate HD's at Costco, have yet to plug one in.

I'm shopping for either a server machine (may build) or more likely a NAS (some Synology maybe), and wonder if I can remove the HD's from the Seagate enclosures, say 2 of them, and have in RAID 1 in a 2 HD Synology NAS. Most people use WD Red, it seems, but it seems to me this might work. I paid $100 + tax for the Seagate's.

 

[geokilla]

Bought the Seagate 3TB (ST3000DM001) however the high failure rates scare me... Maybe I'll return it. But $80 + tax is a hot price for it.

 

[Edgy]

had 2 units of seagate 3TB drives which are about 1.3 years old - failed last couple of weeks... It's almost like a conspiracy that both drives lasted almost the same time period before the infamous death clicking started.

Maybe it's just me but my household is filled with more than 10+ failed seagate 3TB HDD during past 8 years or so and I won't be buying any more seagates even with strong UPS protection and quality PSU/components.

The oldest drive I have that's still going strong after 10+ years is Seagate 640G which in my opinion was the last of the generation of seagate drives that were made when their reliability were peerless - this drive lasted countless power outages with no UPS protection, california earthquakes, and many swapping from older systems to newer ones.

It's a shame that so much focus is on increasing capacity rather than improving reliability as there are so many things that can destroy HDDs at home use compared to the meaningless reliability tests and data that manufacturers promote to market their so called "low failure rate" of their HDD products.

Sure, under ideal, controlled conditions, a crap HDD probably can last 3+ years like MFG claims but home use environment has too many other dangers that they just don't account for anymore.

That's my experience anyways - stay away from seagate at higher (2TB+) capacities and plan for redundancy/backup even if going with other MFG high capacity HDD.