"Surveillance" hard drive - what is that exactly?

[Willie Trombone]

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From what I've read, these surveillance HDDs are better suited to withstand more writes and always on connectivity, etc.
Why are they so often cheaper then?

 

[Mr Justice]

They are designed for 24/7 hour operation as required by CCTV equipment. Cheaper because as an archival hard drive may not have the read write performance as required by other tasks such as gaming etc.

 

[PhireSide]

I think as said above, surveillance drives are manufactured for constant erase and write instructions, and are generally not tuned for day to day use and favour sequential playback instead of random IOPS as what would be required with a conventional hard drive

 

[Willie Trombone]

So perfect for archive / backup / storage then

 

[Pineapple Smurf]

Surveillance drives such as Seagate’s SkyHawk are a subset of hard drives built to process large volumes of data from high definition cameras as accurately as possible while still focusing on maximizing the drive’s lifespan and power consumption with 24/7 read/write recording setups in mind.

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[Thor]

Mostly a gimmick

 

[Aghori]

They're probably slower than conventional drives but are more robust.

 

[Willie Trombone]

built to process large volumes of data from high definition cameras as accurately as possible

OK, that made me lol.
These are digital devices. Are they saying the zeros and ones could end up being cockeye if I used it for storing regular binary data?

 

[Willie Trombone]

They're probably slower than conventional drives but are more robust.

That sounds about right. Probably the best to the point description thus far.

 

[ArmatageShanks]

They are better at handling constant long duration writes, and also heat, they won't suffer at 40+

 

[Pineapple Smurf]

They are better at handling constant long duration writes, and also heat, they won't suffer at 40+

Sounds like me, Im 48 and can go for hours non stop at a steady pace, just ask @BloodrayneZA

 

[PhireSide]

Sounds like me, Im 48 and can go for hours non stop at a steady pace, just ask @BloodrayneZA

No wonder she ran away to the UK, it was probably to get away from you

 

[Matt91]

My shiddy WD blue has been hard at it for over a year now on my 8 camera CCTV system. Still going strong.

 

[quovadis]

Optimized for sequential writes and reads as opposed to random. Some surveillance models eg Seagate Skyhawk Lite are also shingled.

 

[Mr Justice]

So perfect for archive / backup / storage then

Maybe not, it's designed to be used constantly and for the most part have a consistent and constant write need, where they are only required to read occasionally when reviewing the video. Think about it race cars are for constant high power where consumer cars are slow but are abused more often.

In this case not using the drive in a 24/7 scenario could be bad for it. That is why archival drives for NAS is in a special category where it is parked for the most part.

What is the price difference? If you're going to leave your computer on all the time, if the cost says it's worth it, it may be useful to test.

 

[quovadis]

Maybe not, it's designed to be used constantly and for the most part have a consistent and constant write need, where they are only required to read occasionally when reviewing the video. Think about it race cars are for constant high power where consumer cars are slow but are abused more often.

In this case not using the drive in a 24/7 scenario could be bad for it. That is why archival drives for NAS is in a special category where it is parked for the most part.

What is the price difference? If you're going to leave your computer on all the time, if the cost says it's worth it, it may be useful to test.

Totally disagree on the analogy and archival comments. Archival drives are usually shingled which creates performance issues when overwriting data. Surveillance drives will be fine for most workloads that aren't heavy read, random and small block size/high IO combinations.

 

[gregmcc]

Sounds like snake oil.

 

[quovadis]

Sounds like snake oil.

Not really although initially it had alot to do with certain manufacturers purchasing others and then using reliable products for certain use cases and less reliable for other use cases however there are vast differences electronically (different cache sizes, micro controllers etc) and mechanically (motor mechanisms, material quality, vibration/dust/heat mitigation) amongst other factors between various classes of drives too.

 

[Apogee]

Surveillance Vs Desktop HDD: Choose Wisely to Get Best Performance

Surveillance Vs Desktop HDD comparison will guide you through the difference that lies in the technology of the HDD, so choose as per your usage.

www.pcquest.com

 

[SauRoNZA]

Usually the variance with these models also lies in the warranty periods.

Haven’t checked them lately though.