I’m currently a student so I don’t have thousands to spend on hard drives and I’d really love to make a compact storage server with large capacity to do stuff like a Plex server. I’ve been looking and I see good deals on sites like eBay, however they seem too cheap sometimes. What are things I should look out for/should I just not get used hard drives?
I need to mention this would not be for critical data such as personal photos etc. it would just be raw data storage that I could afford to lose- it would just be a pain.
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In case OP or any visitors don’t know:
Recertified ≠ Refurbished/used/preowned.
Manufacturer recertified means the drive you get is one that passes OEM/factory testing. There’s a certain QA standard that manufacturer recert drives need to meet.
Refurb etc means you get a gamble drive that probably has SMART data reset so you have no idea what you’re getting. Could be a good deal or a waste of money, very little predictability.
Personally I’d never buy a refurb—I’d only buy recert or something that a trusted friend has used.
They’re always a gamble.
Sometimes you have another decade of life in them and sometimes they fail within a month. I wouldn’t bother unless I was getting an insanely good deal (like over 50% off retail) as I’m likely to replace it within the year.
I also wouldn’t trust them outside of a mirrored or pairity RAID just in case the data on that disk proves to be important
I don’t like sloppy seconds. Buy new, buy big!
It’s fine as long as you do a proper secure erase on them first.
I’ve only bought one so far, but i’m a fan of manufacturer re-certified drives from serverpartdeals. Prices seem to go up and down however, as the 18TB i bought for $180 is now $270 (seagate exos 2x18)
If buying in bulk they are the best buy since save so much you can buy a spare or 2 and still save. If you can’t afford a spare don’t do it either way