Seagate Drive Lineup


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I'm looking at replacing a couple HD's and there are a lot more options these days than about a year ago or so the last time I bought any.  There are lots of options in the 3/4 TB range and not sure if there is any need to go with the more expensive options in an unRaid environment.  I'm using the 3TB as a reference point below, but may go 4 and upgrade my two parity drives for now rolling those down and replacing old 2 TB drives, OR I may just get 3's.. 

 

  1. Barracuda - standard desktop drive $89.  This looks to be pretty comparable to what i've been running to date.
  2. Skyhawk $104 - looks to be tweaked for CCTV systems where they are pretty much constantly recording to all day long.  I"m guessing this would not make sense.
  3. Ironwolf $144 - NAS drive.   Aren't these intended to be in conventional RAID setups where the drives spin constantly?   with drives that spin down more often than not, is it worth paying a 50% premium?
  4. Constellation - $147 Enterprise quality drive.  same price range as Ironwolf, which would make more sense?
  5. Old Version Seagate NAS drive ST30000VN000 - $104.   Is this a good compromise between the Barracude and Ironwolf.  Again is there any benefit?
  6. At the 4 TB size you add the Barracuda Pro and Ironwolf Pro as options

 

I think there are some drives that are SSD / HD hybrids, wouldnt I want to stay clear of these for unRAID?

 

Other manufacturer's have similar line ups.  I've had pretty good luck so far with Seagate and leaning that way, but i'd listen to arguments to change.  

 

Any input on all of these options is appreciated.

 

 

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1 hour ago, TODDLT said:
  • Barracuda - standard desktop drive $89.  This looks to be pretty comparable to what i've been running to date.
  • Skyhawk $104 - looks to be tweaked for CCTV systems where they are pretty much constantly recording to all day long.  I"m guessing this would not make sense.
  • Ironwolf $144 - NAS drive.   Aren't these intended to be in conventional RAID setups where the drives spin constantly?   with drives that spin down more often than not, is it worth paying a 50% premium?
  • Constellation - $147 Enterprise quality drive.  same price range as Ironwolf, which would make more sense?
  • Old Version Seagate NAS drive ST30000VN000 - $104.   Is this a good compromise between the Barracude and Ironwolf.  Again is there any benefit?
  • At the 4 TB size you add the Barracuda Pro and Ironwolf Pro as options

 

You're going to get  a bunch of opinions on what drives are *necessary*, but in my own personal experience, they all work. Keep in mind, a few years ago, there were no NAS-specific consumer drives, and there wasn't a rash of drives constantly exploding in people systems :).

 

Personally, I would go with whatever drive you can get the best price on. NAS drives are nice, but I have yet to see the price premium paying off in significant real-world ways. If you can get one for only a few bucks more than a non-NAS version, then I'd go for it, but otherwise I wouldn't bother. Also, I think I read that the old Seagate NAS drive and the new IronWolf drive are the same drive, just rebranded, but I'm too lazy to dig up some references and I'm not 100% sure on this point :).

 

Now, after all that, I should mention that one place where all these drives differ is warranty. You *are* going to get a significant difference in warranty coverage (drive warranties generally vary from one to five years), and if that's important to you, definitely make your buying decisions based on that.

 

Finally, I would not go less than 4TB nowadays. Physical Space is always at a premium, and the money you save today in buying a smaller drive, will be lost (and more) when you need to remove a smaller drive to replace it with a larger one because there is no more room in your server...

 

HTH!

Edited by DoeBoye
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On 3/9/2017 at 4:03 PM, DoeBoye said:

 

Finally, I would not go less than 4TB nowadays. Physical Space is always at a premium, and the money you save today in buying a smaller drive, will be lost (and more) when you need to remove a smaller drive to replace it with a larger one because there is no more room in your server...

 

HTH!

 

I have two parity drives that aren't that old and thought about just replacing both oft those with 4 - TB drives and rolling the 3 TB parity's down into data.  I have 3 - 2 TB drives that are in the 5-7 yr old range.  They are slow and one is loud, so I know it's only a matter of time.  

 

The only downside is Parity checks taking 33% longer for no reason, as none of my actual data drives are 4 TB and I wont have need to upgrade any others for some time.  By the time I use up the space I have and really need bigger drives, then replacing 3's with 4's is a pretty painful way to go about it.  I'd probably want to replace 3's with 6's or more depending on cost by then.  

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10 minutes ago, TODDLT said:

The only downside is Parity checks taking 33% longer for no reason

 

I hear this. I just recently upgraded my 4TB parity drives with 2 8TB drives. No other drive in my system is bigger than 4TB, but parity checks still take way longer. That said, "so what?" :). Parity runs once a month, and happens at night while the server is not being used. If it does impact regular usage time, I see it as a necessary evil...

 

 

17 minutes ago, TODDLT said:

I have two parity drives that aren't that old and thought about just replacing both oft those with 4 - TB drives and rolling the 3 TB parity's down into data.  I have 3 - 2 TB drives that are in the 5-7 yr old range.  They are slow and one is loud, so I know it's only a matter of time.

As far as replacing your own parity drives, it's really up to you. If your usage is such that you don't foresee using up your available space for several years, then I'd say 4TB parity drives and converting the old 3TB drives to data drives is fine. It opens up the field of purchase options down the road to 4TB drives, and if you are concerned about the longevity of existing drives, getting more data drives in the mix never hurts. I wouldn't rush to do it, but when you see a good deal, go for it!

 

Finally, long ago I started the habit of keeping a "cold spare" in my server, so if a drive ever craps the bed, I can powerdown, plug it in, powerup, and be rebuilding the failed drive in minutes, rather than having to source a new drive (at whatever the current cost is - and there's never hard drive deals when you *need* them), pre-clear it, and then shut down and reboot. If you have plenty of space, add one drive and preclear the other one but don't add it. That way, you'll be ready for the eventual failure of one of your old drives...

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  • 2 months later...

Hi, TODDLT. We noticed you are, and wanted to say thank you for, considering Seagate drives. We wanted to start off by saying that, in the end, nobody can tell you exactly which drives to buy for your needs, and you're the only one who can make that decision. 

 

It looks like you've been doing some pretty solid research on the differences between the BarraCuda, IronWolf, and SkyHawk series hard drives. You're correct in that the basic breakdown is that BarraCuda is for general PC and gaming applications, IronWolf is optimized for NAS and designed to be constantly spinning and ready for quick access to data, and SkyHawk is designed for surveillance, or efficiently writing blocks of high-detailed, intensive data most of the time, with limited read access. IronWolf drives are designed to be constantly ready for quick access at a moment's notice for a variety of users in a NAS application.

 

The bottom line is that, yes you could technically run any of these compatible drive types and it would somewhat work. However, to get the most efficient performance and the longest life out of your investment, it is best to use drives that are specifically designed for the purpose in which they're going to be used. Here is a useful video on the subject.

 

You're probably right that, for the application you've described, the SkyHawk drive line is not going to be the most efficient use of your resources here. I would look at the BarraCuda data sheets and IronWolf data sheets (you can feel free to look at the others as well), compare them to what your estimated needs, priorities, etc. might be, and then draw your conclusions about which price point and match you feel most comfortable with here. Please feel free to reach out if you have any questions!

Edited by seagate_surfer
Fixed a link for the video.
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  • 2 years later...
13 minutes ago, eduardopventura said:

I have 3 3tb ironwolf and a 4tb ironwolf for parity. I was thinking put a 3tb skyhawlk for parity since only need to read him if something goes wrong. I thinks this can speed up the write for parity but not sure if i'm thinking right.

If 4TB is the slowest disk then it will have some write improvement, but just little.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I would honestly jump to 8tb it might suck hitting the wallet but space is worth it. I had a 720xd with 12x2tb and it was full after the day I setup the array. I just ordered 4x8tb ST8000NM0055 and im about at 20tb since I finaly backed up my movie collection but havent got around to compression yet. but with my current server build I should be able to upgrade to 8 more drives and would still pay the premium for larger drives since for me I will not have to upgrade for quiet some years. So save yourself the headache  and get the bigger drives even though drive prices are falling quick because of sizes but purchasing more drives often is not cheaper than bigger drives now

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  • 4 months later...
On 7/23/2019 at 5:39 PM, Titus said:

I would honestly jump to 8tb it might suck hitting the wallet but space is worth it. I had a 720xd with 12x2tb and it was full after the day I setup the array. I just ordered 4x8tb ST8000NM0055 and im about at 20tb since I finaly backed up my movie collection but havent got around to compression yet. but with my current server build I should be able to upgrade to 8 more drives and would still pay the premium for larger drives since for me I will not have to upgrade for quiet some years. So save yourself the headache  and get the bigger drives even though drive prices are falling quick because of sizes but purchasing more drives often is not cheaper than bigger drives now

How is your experience with ST8000NM0055? They currently sells even cheaper comparing to ironwolf 8tb & ironwolf pro 8tb

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