4TB HDDs have landed

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SouthBit

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Seagate pulls out the biggest hard one in the industry

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/09/07/seagate_4tb_goflex/

Hot on the heels of Hitachi's terabyte platter drives comes Seagate's 4TB GoFlex Desk external drive, a terabyte fatter than the previous version.

It is the highest capacity hard drive in the industry and is a 3.5-inch SATA unit, spinning at 7,200rpm. Seagate is carefully not saying how many platters there are inside it. Has it actually managed to reach the TB-per-platter area density level it bragged it was ready to productise in May? At that time a 3TB GoFlex used a 5-platter disk drive.

We suspect it has done it: built a 4TB, 1TB/platter drive, with a 625Gbit/in2 areal density.

A 4TB Barracuda can't be far behind, surely?

The 4TB GoFlex comes with USB3 support, plus cable. You can buy separate FireWire 800 and eSATA adapters. There is, as before, an illuminated capacity gauge.

Seagate says this GoFlex can store 2,000 high-definition movies.

It also sports a new minimalist industrial design: any colour you like as long as its glossy black, it appears. All the GoFlex products will change to this design.

The GoFlex drives have interchangeable adapters which cost extra. Seagate says a GoFlex Desk for Mac external drive, with both FireWire 800 and USB 2.0 will be available in Apple stores by the end of the month. It is making approving noises about Thunderbolt and we suppose it will be supported with a new adapter soon enough.

Automatic, continuous backup software, and encryption software, is included and the drive works with both Windows and the Mac OS. A home network adapter means it can be used as a network drive in the home.

It's available from www.seagate.com now and will be found at certain online retail sites in a month's time. The suggested price is $249.99, the same as the3TB GoFlex when it was announced. You can buy the older 3TB model for less than $140 now.
 
Very good news , I hope though that the backup program isn't that rubbish meebo? program that requires you to buy it after 31days, I'm pretty disappointed in Seagate after I saw that. Also I take it we will only get a 2 year warranty here in SA on that drive? :(
 
Oh my frayed nerves. 4TB is a lot of data.

I have recently learned that for every drive purchased you need another drive of the same capacity as a backup... it is easier to just image it once a week, then disconnect and store.
So, now I purchase two of the same at a time.

Paranoid perhaps... but I have had drives drop like flies this past year... and the only real backup is a drive image really. Pfffffft meebo trial rubbish!
 
You're not the only one who does that :) I've got offsite images of all my important drives, it's the only way to be sure that you're covered.
 
The time it takes to image a drive is about the same as an application takes to backup data.

Just let it image the drives at night and problem solved really. Everything mirrored. Image can then be mounted for selective picking or restored completely in the event of a failure. It is the only thing that calms my nerves.

Thus, when purchasing, if I need 1TB, I buy two.

4TB single drive would give me sleepless nights. Yeeeps. The new 2 year warranty does not inspire confidence at all... to me it hints at an enforced redundancy to stimulate sales.

South_Bit said:
You're not the only one who does that :) I've got offsite images of all my important drives, it's the only way to be sure that you're covered.
Click to expand...
 
The thought of losing 4TB of data is very scary. There's no excuse not to backup though, and I would imagine for someone buying a 4TB drive it will probably be full of movies and tv series, so stuff that is easily replaceable.

What are you using to image with? I've recently moved to Macrium Reflect, very nice product.
 
Indeed, Macrium is just great.

I have been using the free Macrium reflect for about 2 years now. It REALLY is fast, and fool-proof. The only thing the free version lacks is the incremental imaging... it does everything else though. It also mounts images conveniently - and zero footprint overhead or bloat.

The problem I encounter with large backup drives, is that people (friends and family) usually get one 2TB drive and backup all their docs, pics and stuff onto this... and that is it. That drives is their backup. Movies and music may be replaced, but digital images = poooof if the drive goes... and they get the biggest drive at the time because the salesperson says so. When that drive fails, much wailing and regret. I see a backup drive as needing another drive to back it up too.

I am oooold school. 4TB is just scary !!!!!!!!!!!!

South_Bit said:
The thought of losing 4TB of data is very scary. There's no excuse not to backup though, and I would imagine for someone buying a 4TB drive it will probably be full of movies and tv series, so stuff that is easily replaceable.

What are you using to image with? I've recently moved to Macrium Reflect, very nice product.
Click to expand...
 
South_Bit said:
The thought of losing 4TB of data is very scary. There's no excuse not to backup though, and I would imagine for someone buying a 4TB drive it will probably be full of movies and tv series, so stuff that is easily replaceable.

What are you using to image with? I've recently moved to Macrium Reflect, very nice product.
Click to expand...

Agreed.If you can get 3 X 1.5TB HDD for the same price as a 4TB why on earth would you risk getting the 4TB and suffer the indignity of losing all your data at one go.
They rather work on a HDD that has 3 seperate drives in one unit,which can be individually detached and replaced if it need be.
 
Very def interested in this development..

and Yes losing 4TB of data is a scary concept.. this is why all my systems are redundant nowadays.. when I buy new drives.. I buy 3 of them and stripe with parity.
 
kilobits said:
Oh my frayed nerves. 4TB is a lot of data.

I have recently learned that for every drive purchased you need another drive of the same capacity as a backup... it is easier to just image it once a week, then disconnect and store.
So, now I purchase two of the same at a time.

Paranoid perhaps... but I have had drives drop like flies this past year... and the only real backup is a drive image really. Pfffffft meebo trial rubbish!
Click to expand...

Agree on buying two drives and using one as backup. Don't agree on putting all your eggs in one basket though. If it gets stolen, struck by lightning, destroyed by water/fire etc then all your data is gone.

Rather put the the backup drives in something like a NAS or a spare pc you keep in a safe place.

Eish, I would cry if I lost 4TB of data.
 
A colleague of mine used to backup all of his data to an external drive. A few weeks ago they broke into his office and stole his laptop...and the external drive. So he had backups, but they were of no use in that scenario. Offsite or online backup is the only real solution that gives you true peace of mind.
 
ponder said:
Agree on buying two drives and using one as backup. Don't agree on putting all your eggs in one basket though. If it gets stolen, struck by lightning, destroyed by water/fire etc then all your data is gone.

Rather put the the backup drives in something like a NAS or a spare pc you keep in a safe place.

Eish, I would cry if I lost 4TB of data.
Click to expand...

Indeed... I would prefer an external enclosure... or a dock... for the backup drive's backup drive. A NAS dock would be win-win!

I have a convenient dock thing where I can easily image the drives and then remove and safely store until the next routine backup.

South_Bit said:
A colleague of mine used to backup all of his data to an external drive. A few weeks ago they broke into his office and stole his laptop...and the external drive. So he had backups, but they were of no use in that scenario. Offsite or online backup is the only real solution that gives you true peace of mind.
Click to expand...

Eish... indeed. Not having offsite backup storage is like saving your backups on another partition on the same drive - I am still dumbfounded by how many people I find still do this. Eish.
 
kilobits said:
Indeed... I would prefer an external enclosure... or a dock... for the backup drive's backup drive. A NAS dock would be win-win!

I have a convenient dock thing where I can easily image the drives and then remove and safely store until the next routine backup.
Click to expand...

At least you have some form of backup unlike people that have no backups :D

Even a drive split in to two partitions with the second partition acting as a backup for the first has saved some peoples bacon before, every little bit helps :D
 
4TB... :wtf: :cry: I think I have the equivalent of data-vertigo... * shudder *
 
Lol just as I started buying 3TB drives they release a 4TB... Oh well, getting bargain prices on the 3TB's anyways, so I can get 2 x 3TB's for the price 1 x 4TB will be
 
I think that a more accurate capacity indication for one of these drives would be 4 terrorbytes! The suckers who buy these early models could be in line for a few sleepless nights if they don't have backups!
 
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