Source for inexpensive new hard drives?

[Fardringle]

I have a situation where I'm refurbishing a bunch of old engineering workstations to be given to a charity (Boys and Girls Club) for the kids to use to do their homework, access the Internet, email, etc.

I don't want to spend money on SSDs or large capacity mechanical drives and frankly, 250GB spinning drives would be perfectly adequate for this situation. I've done some shopping online but I'm looking for suggestions as well since I'd like to keep the cost as low as possible since I'm spending my own money for this, but I do want to use new drives and not old stuff so I have less risk of the drives dying right away. 7200 rpm drives are preferable to boost the speed a little, but 5400 rpm is acceptable if the price/reliability is good enough.

 

[UsandThem]

Send a message to VirtualLarry (or he probably will stop by this post at some point). He's always tinkering around with inexpensive PCs, and I know he has ordered a fair amount of drives from Ebay before. He could tell you how they turned out and what he paid for them.

 

[Puffnstuff]

WD's $16.60 each https://www.amazon.com/Western-Digi...d=1487872040&sr=8-2&keywords=250gb+hard+drive.

 

[cbn]

Watch out for low capacity drives labeled "New" from certain vendors. There have been cases where the drives smart data has been reset.

https://forums.servethehome.com/ind...ing-smart-data-selling-used-hdds-as-new.4507/

Also I found out that at one least White label company resets smart as Standard operating procedure.

https://www.teleplan.com/2015/03/09...o-you-and-includes-sell-and-buy-side-options/

Companies looking to buy HDDs from Teleplan can purchase either White Label (factory returned Hard Disk Drives, tested and data-wiped to stringent white label industry standards with no OEM identification) or refurbished out of warranty HDDs (tested and refurbished and sold in “As-is” condition as HDD OEM standards). Teleplan can supply many form factors across multiple capacities such as 160Gb, 250Gb, 500Gb, 1Tb and beyond.

Our white Label drives are tested for read and write performance across the full media whilst smart logs and user data are cleared and reset. OEM labels are removed and any electronic identification removed. We have the capability for personalization of bespoke branding and packaging requirements for customers with larger consistent volumes.

Our refurbished drives do not have their SMART logs cleared in order to retain visibility of their true lifespan expectancy. The drives are fully data-wiped and a final random blank check is carried out. You can be assured of the highest quality products equivalent to OEM standards.

 

[cbn]

Besides buying new, one thing to consider would used low capacity drives short stroked from a 1 TB capacity platter.

This way you at least know the drive was of a more recent manufacture compared to other used low capacity drives. (A nice side benefit is that it will also be faster due to the increased area density of the platter)

EDIT: After looking into the situation further I am having a hard time finding these below 500GB. However, WD5000AZLX looks pretty common and as seen from this image below WD have been known to make these with a recent manufacture.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Yes, I scour the interwebs for cheap storage.

I lucked out some time ago, and picked up a qty. of "zero POH" WD factory-refurb drives, for $15 ea. from Newegg, but they were only 160GB.

Looking for larger, I picked up ten 500GB "WD AV-GP" drives supposedly "new" off of ebay, "from US warehouse" (even though it turn out to be a China seller, that seemingly changed their username every week).

Well, they were a hodgepodge of drives, different model numbers, different firmwares, some reporting 5400RPM, some reporting 7200RPM, very strange mix. Yet they all had similar labels, and came in WD-branded anti-static bags.

So either these were floor-scrapings from WD, packaged and sold out the back door as their lowest grade of drives, or they were re-labeled and had their SMART reset by the reseller (likely).

I paid $10 / drive, plus $5 / drive in shipping. So, $50 shipping total, for 10 drives. They didn't even ship them in an OEM HDD box, they threw them all in together into a cardboard box, like books. No protective bubble-wrap.

Only 7/10 drives survived. I got a partial refund from the ebay seller.

Haven't used the other drives in anything yet.

Btw, Newegg had $40 1TB Seagate 3.5" HDDs recently, and I picked up a qty. of 500GB HGST portable externals, that might be shuckable 2.5" HDDs, for $34 ea.

 

[VirtualLarry]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-WD-WD25...673247?hash=item235d4539df:g:FGkAAOSwZVhWTR5E

$19.99 FS, from goharddrive on ebay, for a 250GB AV-GP drive, supposedly "new", but who knows.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Seagate-ST3...002421?hash=item4b12165bf5:g:GUYAAOSwB09YInx6

Lot of six 250GB Seagate SATA HDDs for $49.99 FS, used.

Try going to ebay and typing in "bulk lot HDD".

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lot-of-19-S...715341?hash=item28204e9f4d:g:0cEAAOSwdIFX1-y2

Here's a lot of 19 Seagate 80GB drives, "tested, A+", for $100 shipped.

 

[cbn]

Looking for larger, I picked up ten 500GB "WD AV-GP" drives supposedly "new" off of ebay, "from US warehouse" (even though it turn out to be a China seller, that seemingly changed their username every week).

Well, they were a hodgepodge of drives, different model numbers, different firmwares, some reporting 5400RPM, some reporting 7200RPM, very strange mix. Yet they all had similar labels, and came in WD-branded anti-static bags.

So either these were floor-scrapings from WD, packaged and sold out the back door as their lowest grade of drives, or they were re-labeled and had their SMART reset by the reseller (likely).

I paid $10 / drive, plus $5 / drive in shipping. So, $50 shipping total, for 10 drives. They didn't even ship them in an OEM HDD box, they threw them all in together into a cardboard box, like books. No protective bubble-wrap.

Only 7/10 drives survived. I got a partial refund from the ebay seller.

That is quite a story.

Did the Anti-static bags look like they were factory sealed ones? Or were they not sealed?

 

[esquared]

That Amazon deal indicates there's a three year warranty. Is that real? Does that mean WD services the warranty or the amazon seller?
https://www.amazon.com/Western-Digi...d=1487872040&sr=8-2&keywords=250gb+hard+drive

Its amazon fullfilled but the seller is DBSKY. His seller ratings are 100% over the past year, if that means anything. 1259 ratings.
https://www.amazon.com/sp?_encoding...derID=&seller=A18WXU4I7YR6UA&tab=&vasStoreID=

 

[VirtualLarry]

Did the Anti-static bags look like they were factory sealed ones? Or were they not sealed?

Yeah, they were sealed, with WD logo stuff on them.

 

[Fardringle]

Thanks for the info. I do prefer to get new drives for these if possible, but used in good condition could be acceptable if the price is right. I'll check your links to see if I find something that appeals to me.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Not sure why you would be looking for "new" in under 500GB sizes, because they haven't mfg'ed them in some time, and would only have a vendor warranty, if any.

 

[Fardringle]

Because I don't want to give them old/used drives that are more likely to be close to the end of their usable life. I don't want them for the warranty so much as a somewhat better chance that I won't have to go replace the drives again in a short time when they die. New isn't a guarantee that they won't die, of course, just an improved chance that they'll last a little longer.

Quite honestly, I'm being a bit selfish about this, but while I definitely want to give them some computers to use, if they are likely to need servicing any time soon (especially for dead hard drives) I don't want to give them the machines at all. But I also don't want to spend a lot of money on big drives..

 

[VirtualLarry]

I would be more interested in how you approached the Boys and Girls Club, about donating PCs, and whether you offered to service them as well, for free or for a fee.

I was toying with the idea of donating my Q9300 rigs, as quasi-gaming rigs (Core2Quad 2.5Ghz @ 2.83Ghz, 160GB SSD, 500GB WD Black HDD, R7 260X 2GB GDDR5, legit Win10).

Got a pair of them, identical guts, different cases.

 

[Fardringle]

I would be more interested in how you approached the Boys and Girls Club, about donating PCs, and whether you offered to service them as well, for free or for a fee.

I was toying with the idea of donating my Q9300 rigs, as quasi-gaming rigs (Core2Quad 2.5Ghz @ 2.83Ghz, 160GB SSD, 500GB WD Black HDD, R7 260X 2GB GDDR5, legit Win10).

Got a pair of them, identical guts, different cases.

It's kind of an unofficial partnership between them and my wife's employer. I'm not sure how they got connected originally, but they sponsor the local club with supplies and parties now and then. I've been giving them refurbished computers off and on for quite a few years whenever I come across some that are still usable. The biggest difference this time is that I got a bunch of engineering workstations (Dell T3500) in good shape but they don't have hard drives because the drives themselves could not leave the facility. So I need some cheap drives to get the computers working.

There's no contract to maintain the computers, but I know they'd ask if something fails and I would feel obligated to help, at least for a while.