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Question SMR HD for game drive

C

CU

Platinum Member
Anyone use an SMR HD for a game drive? How is it? I know they are not good for lots of writes, but I would assume they are fine for holding nothing but games. I was looking at the Seagate BarraCuda ST2000DM008 2TB 7200 RPM 256MB, but I cannot find any reviews of it. Unlike most SMR drives I have seen this one is 7200rpm. It is also only $55. Anyone know where to find a review of it? I was looking at 1TB SSD's first, but this is half the price and twice the storage plus I don't think it matters as much for just a game drive. OS is already on a 512GB SSD.
 
i would spend a bit more and grab a HGST Ultrastar or a Toshiba X400 as these are far better drives for gaming then a Seagate.
Even a WD RE or WD Black would be my choices before i go down the floodgates on a Seagate drive.
 
Since games are mostly static data, an SMR drive should be fine for games. SMR doesn't have any read penalties, it's only writing that's an issue if you fill up the CMR cache.

Since you're probably limited by your internet connection download speed, poor write performance shouldn't be any issue either. It'll have plenty of time to do housekeeping when you install games. I have an ST4000DM004, and it'll happily do ~140MB/s sequential both read and write. Random performance is not too good though.
 
aigomorla said:
i would spend a bit more and grab a HGST Ultrastar or a Toshiba X400 as these are far better drives for gaming then a Seagate.
Even a WD RE or WD Black would be my choices before i go down the floodgates on a Seagate drive.
Click to expand...

Trying to stay around $50. Was looking to add them to my kids' computers. So, I would need three of them. One for each.
 
CU said:
Trying to stay around $50. Was looking to add them to my kids' computers. So, I would need three of them. One for each.
Click to expand...

I completely understand, but i really do not trust seagate.
I just have had too many fail on me.
I used to love them then i started losing 1 each month for a total of 8.

They also have one of the worst failure rates on backblaze.
hard_drive_failure_rates_q2_2019.jpg


They say in the PC world, you truely do get what you pay for, down to the last cent.

How do you feel about renewed products?

Amazon.com: Hitachi Ultrastar A7K3000 2TB HUA723020ALA641 (0F12470) 2TB 64MB Cache 7200RPM SATA III (6.0Gb/s) Enterprise 3.5in Hard Drive (Renewed): Computers & Accessories

Buy Hitachi Ultrastar A7K3000 2TB HUA723020ALA641 (0F12470) 2TB 64MB Cache 7200RPM SATA III (6.0Gb/s) Enterprise 3.5in Hard Drive (Renewed): Internal Hard Drives - Amazon.com ✓ FREE DELIVERY possible on eligible purchases
www.amazon.com

The company GoHarddrive is pretty reputable, has 1 year warranty.
I would still pick that drive over a new Seagate.

This WD RE even has 5yr from seller direct:

I would probably honestly Pick up those WD RE.
They are very fast drives, a bit noisy tho, but not too bad like 10k drives, but again, they are fast drives.
 
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Not really into getting a used HD even if it enterprise grade. I would think used enterprise drives have been running for years non-stop.
 
CU said:
Not really into getting a used HD even if it enterprise grade. I would think used enterprise drives have been running for years non-stop.
Click to expand...

i would still pick those WD RE's over new seagates any day of the week.
Mechanical are not like SSD's which have limited writes.
If anything the motor can wear out, however enterprise grade drives have a much beefier motor which are designed to last much longer then consumer, so even used enterprise can out last new consumer by a large margin.

And with a 5yr seller warrenty from GoHardDrive, its not bad risk to take.
I have quite a few drives from them, and so far they have lasted a while.
It will probably outlast your needs until your kids get greedy and want QLC SSD's to replace them in the future.
 
Does anyone else have an opinion on used enterprise drives like the WD RE's? Used drives have just always worried me. MB's, CPU's, GPU's, etc no issue with used. But HD's? Although the 5 year warranty is nice.
 
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