Choosing external HDD for long time storage

[DZimmy]

Dear all,
I would really like to know what external HDD would you recommend for long erm storage? Especially of photographs backup. 1 TB would be nice, I have USB 3.0. Price doesn't matter that much.

Thank you very much in advance for you suggestions.
Best Regards,
DZimmy

 

[Joe C]

An Enterprise drive is probably your best option. In this report from Backblaze, the best hard drives for longevity and reliability turn out to be Hitachi followed by Western Digital.

Seagate has a 14% failure rate with it's 1.5 and 3 tb drives compared to Hitachi being around 1% and the WD's just over 2%

At the end of 2013, we had 27,134 consumer-grade drives spinning in Backblaze Storage Pods. The breakdown by brand looks like this:
http://blog.backblaze.com/2014/01/21/what-hard-drive-should-i-buy/

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[PP Mguire]

If it's left unplugged in theory any drive should last a long time.

I found that article interesting. They talked about the LP 2TB drives but I've had 2 of those in service for years in a terrible environment. They also admitted the drives they will be buying is the 4TB Seagate yet their charts show they shouldn't? Kind of mixed signals, considering by their data they should be going with HGST. Their highest failure rate Seagate also happens to be the bad model batch everybody had problems with including myself. I also don't find this article very relevant to the OP considering the environment and usage is really different. Those pods are cool as hell though.

 

[DZimmy]

Thank you for your reply, good sir.
I was about to choose WD (Western Digital My Passport Essential SE / Western Digital Elements Portable SE). Unfortunately they do not have any Hitachi HDDs in the store I'll have to buy it from.

 

[Joe C]

If it's left unplugged in theory any drive should last a long time.

I found that article interesting. They talked about the LP 2TB drives but I've had 2 of those in service for years in a terrible environment. They also admitted the drives they will be buying is the 4TB Seagate yet their charts show they shouldn't? Kind of mixed signals, considering by their data they should be going with HGST. Their highest failure rate Seagate also happens to be the bad model batch everybody had problems with including myself. I also don't find this article very relevant to the OP considering the environment and usage is really different. Those pods are cool as hell though.

This only a report from one company that uses a lot of drives, it's not an official review of hard drives. I find this report to be accurate myself because my biggest issue with Seagate drives is the vibration. I've RMA'd several drives because of this but the drives they RMA are no better than the drives I sent them. Used "refurbished" drives that have a nasty vibration to them. Personally....I've had it with Seagate and I'll never buy another one ever

 

[strollin]

Are you talking about long-term archival storage as in decades? I don't think any hard drive is good for that type of storage. Optical media such as DVD is more appropriate for that type of storage.

 

[Joe C]

Are you talking about long-term archival storage as in decades? I don't think any hard drive is good for that type of storage. Optical media such as DVD is more appropriate for that type of storage.

Déjà vu...........
http://www.techist.com/forums/f76/q...pes-digital-files-storage-270939/#post2094771

 

[carnageX]

Déjà vu...........
http://www.techist.com/forums/f76/q...pes-digital-files-storage-270939/#post2094771

I was thinking about the same topic while reading this thread lol.

 

[PP Mguire]

This only a report from one company that uses a lot of drives, it's not an official review of hard drives. I find this report to be accurate myself because my biggest issue with Seagate drives is the vibration. I've RMA'd several drives because of this but the drives they RMA are no better than the drives I sent them. Used "refurbished" drives that have a nasty vibration to them. Personally....I've had it with Seagate and I'll never buy another one ever

I have 3 Seagate drives in my case right now and have no vibration. The noisiest drive I've had from them on an audible front would be the 1.5TB clunker junk. Least I didn't have to pay for it.

Everybody has their issues with certain brands. WD make good drives too but every single WD drive I've owned minus 1 has died. I've had maybe 20 or more WD drives before. Before the big WD vs Seagate thing I used to use Maxtor that people used to say they avoided like the Deathstar drives. I only had one Maxtor drive die on me but the old IDE ones still work today.

 

[Joe C]

Yup...I still see some of those old IDE Maxtors and WD's around too.