Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

highvoltage12v

macrumors 6502a
Mar 27, 2014
923
929
It looks like a ZIF hard drive from an IPod with USB 3.0 added it it. If it is like an iPod hard drive the slightest amount of pressure put on the spindle motor will seize the drive.
 

Alphabetize

macrumors 6502
Oct 6, 2013
452
48
Looks industrial and ugly.
Also Seagate is worst in terms of reliability.

For whatever reason Seagate is the only brand that has provided me with the most reliable hard drives. I've gone through hundreds of dollars of WD drives, many of them were dead on arrival or crapped out after a few months.
 

unplugme71

macrumors 68030
May 20, 2011
2,827
754
Earth
Pretty nice, I use my 3.5 inch hard drives in a dock and the "naked" drives actually look much better than the cheap plastic/aluminum enclosures most manufacturers make. This drive is probably a drive and enclosure in one, which is how it can get this thin.

Though to me anything below 2 TB is tiny nowadays...

I used to think that. Now anything below 100PB is small after working where I am now.

----------

When this thing has built in 802.11ac and a status LED screen that has a built in file manager I'll consider buying it. Also it needs to be another 1.5mm thinner with 5500mAh battery life.
 

viorelgn

macrumors 6502
Sep 16, 2013
303
10
Romania
This seems like a prestige item for a crowd that doesn’t actually pride itself on that. The only people likely to recognize how impressive this is are the people who would rather go thicker and uglier and get 4X the capacity for the same price.
 

lederermc

macrumors 6502a
Sep 30, 2014
897
756
Seattle
I wouldn't use a Seagate even if it was free. Complete junk, their stuff is only good as doorstops and paper weights.
I've been using computers since 1973. I've NEVER had a problem with any of my Seagate disks. I have had problems with Western Digital disks. In addition, I've benchmarked WD vs Seagate and all my tests show my Seagate USB3 disk is faster than my WD USB3 disk. Your experience may be different.
 

Quu

macrumors 68040
Apr 2, 2007
3,420
6,792
I've been using computers since 1973. I've NEVER had a problem with any of my Seagate disks. I have had problems with Western Digital disks. In addition, I've benchmarked WD vs Seagate and all my tests show my Seagate USB3 disk is faster than my WD USB3 disk. Your experience may be different.

Just look at the Backblaze data. Some of the Seagate drives have a 43% failure rate over 12 months ownership. Overall Hitachi is the best brand, which is all I buy. Western Digital is a close second (They now own Hitachi's drive division btw) and Seagate is like so far out there.

Every Seagate I've ever bought has died before it should have I always knew they were crap, but Backblaze who had over 30K of the drives backs up my experience. They are by far the worst averaging 15%+ failure per year with drives as high as 43%. Hitachi was all 1-3% maximum year over year.
 

MatthewStorm

macrumors 6502a
Oct 19, 2003
923
511
Chapel Hill
Your list of pros is a single thing said 3 different ways.

Yeah, looks like they're a paid mouthpiece for Seagate cause seriously, the exact same thing said 3 different ways.

----------

I've been using computers since 1973. I've NEVER had a problem with any of my Seagate disks. I have had problems with Western Digital disks. In addition, I've benchmarked WD vs Seagate and all my tests show my Seagate USB3 disk is faster than my WD USB3 disk. Your experience may be different.

Hmm, yes, I know mine is. My experience has been exactly the opposite. Like most folks around here.
 

Kajje

macrumors 6502a
Dec 6, 2012
722
958
Asia
A couple years ago I bought a 1TB WD passport 2.5" USB3 drive which harddrive I was planning to swap with my 340GB MBP disk.

Opened the casing expecting to see a SATA->USB3 converter board...
The USB3 connector was hardwired to the disk. No SATA whatsoever. :confused:
 

lederermc

macrumors 6502a
Sep 30, 2014
897
756
Seattle
Just look at the Backblaze data. Some of the Seagate drives have a 43% failure rate over 12 months ownership. Overall Hitachi is the best brand, which is all I buy. Western Digital is a close second (They now own Hitachi's drive division btw) and Seagate is like so far out there.

Every Seagate I've ever bought has died before it should have I always knew they were crap, but Backblaze who had over 30K of the drives backs up my experience. They are by far the worst averaging 15%+ failure per year with drives as high as 43%. Hitachi was all 1-3% maximum year over year.

I've never looked into other people's data. However, Blackblaze is an online back service, so they are probably buying (better) commercial grade hardware - not consumer grade AND they are probably using those drive in a much more rigorous environment. My drives spin up only once per 2-hours for TM backup and several times a day when I access them for other purposes. The Blackblaze drives are probably spinning continuously. Regardless, I've always thought Hitachi were probably made better because most of my Mac's were shipped with Hitachi drives.
 

Quu

macrumors 68040
Apr 2, 2007
3,420
6,792
I've never looked into other people's data. However, Blackblaze is an online back service, so they are probably buying (better) commercial grade hardware - not consumer grade AND they are probably using those drive in a much more rigorous environment. My drives spin up only once per 2-hours for TM backup and several times a day when I access them for other purposes. The Blackblaze drives are probably spinning continuously. Regardless, I've always thought Hitachi were probably made better because most of my Mac's were shipped with Hitachi drives.

They only use Consumer drives. However they did a case study comparing Enterprise and Consumer drives and found no difference in reliability.

And of course they use the drives rigorously, but that's a good thing because their data shows the best drives. They literally had consumer grade seagates dying with a rate of 46% a year and Hitachis only 1-2%.

The drives were all Consumer and all 3TB and 4TB models.
 

lederermc

macrumors 6502a
Sep 30, 2014
897
756
Seattle
They only use Consumer drives. However they did a case study comparing Enterprise and Consumer drives and found no difference in reliability.

And of course they use the drives rigorously, but that's a good thing because their data shows the best drives. They literally had consumer grade seagates dying with a rate of 46% a year and Hitachis only 1-2%.

The drives were all Consumer and all 3TB and 4TB models.

Never mind ---> Can you reference where this data is online. I'ld like to read it. TIA <---
Just read the article: https://www.backblaze.com/blog/best-hard-drive

Which recommends new 4 GB Seagate drive. Their older 3 GB Seagate were crap.
 
Last edited:
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.