Hi,

I am looking to buy a 4TB SATA hard drive. Use case is backup about once a week with and external dock, looking for files every now and then.

The general idea is that I would have two of them, and use the method of storing them with one pebble to indicate where to backup next, so I have one security copy always.

Speed is not important, durability is. What should I buy?

  • Far_Marsupial6303@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Speed is not important, durability is. What should I buy?

    Whatever’s cheapest and/or has the best warranty.

    Since speed for write/rewrites isn’t a concern, even SMR, Seagate Barracuda, WD Blue, WD Red (not Red Plus or Red Pro), Toshiba P300, DT02 and DT02-V are fine. Read speed on SMR drives are the same as non-SMR drives.

    Durability is nonsense since any storage device/media can fail at any time, for any reason, with or without notice.

    Longevity and reliability is backups. Which you have planned, but the second should ideally be kept offsite in case of a local catastrophe.

  • snatch1e@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Look for NAS/Enterprise grade drives (they are all cmr) with the best $/TB ratio and warranty time. There is really not much difference between alternatives from different brands.

  • binaryriot@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    If you have backups it doesn’t matter much what you buy. It’s not like there’s much choice anyway. :)

    Do you want to buy a small 2.5" one? Or a larger 3.5" one?

    All the small ones are SMR these days, so that’s something you should consider. Depending on exact use cases this may become very slow, and in case of error, like a sudden drop of power source which easily happens with externals, they also corrupt more easily (in other places, not just necessarily in the data you just wrote to them).

    If you go for a bigger 3.5" drive go for a larger size and CMR. 4 TB is laughable and ultimately more expensive (EUR/$ per TB). I would recommend to look for 12TB and upwards with helium filled. The 18TB disks are the current price sweet spot it seems.