Hi everyone, I am currently looking for a new hard drive to add to my media server and want to buy a 20TB drive. Now the question is what manufacturers would you recommend or avoid?

As far as I can see it’s either Toshiba, Seagate or WD.

    • ares35
      23•8 months ago

      if you buy off amazon, buy from amazon. buying storage from a marketplace seller is a total crap shoot.

      • @WASTECH@lemmy.worldEnglish
        14•8 months ago

        Do they not still intermingle their stock? Last I remember, if a 3rd party seller lists a product that Amazon also sells, the stock is all put together in the Amazon warehouse. I’ve gotten counterfeit electronics even when it says “ships and sold by Amazon”. I’ve started buying from B&H.

        • @dan@upvote.auEnglish
          9•8 months ago

          B&H are the best. No Amazon-style marketplace sellers on their site (even Walmart and Target have started doing that). They actually know about all the products they sell. Their OEM hard drive packaging is by far the best I’ve seen from any store - I’ve gotten some from Newegg that were only wrapped in bubble wrap.

          • @AtmaJnana@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1•8 months ago

            I’ve gotten some from Newegg that were only wrapped in bubble wrap.

            You got the VIP treatment! I swore off NewEgg for 20 years because they packed 1200 CD-RWs poorly, which caused the product to be mostly ruined by jostling around in the box. They wanted me to pay return shipping or no refund at all for the useless product.

            Good to hear they haven’t changed the shipping department.

            • @dan@upvote.auEnglish
              1•8 months ago

              Wow, that sucks.I didn’t realise they were bad at shipping even back then.

              In my experience, Newegg used to be good but they’re pretty bad now. I only bought a drive from them because it was cheap.

              ServerPartDeals’ packaging was good. They had the drive wrapped in bubble wrap, in a small box just the right size for the drive, then that box was wrapped in a lot of bubble wrap and placed in a larger box.

              B&H’s was the best though. The inner box was exactly the right size and they used pieces of flexible plastic on each side of the HDD to hold it and essentially make it ‘float’ in the middle of the box, ensuring the hard drive never directly touches the walls of the box (and thus never receives any shocks directly). This box had some padding in it too. This inner box was then tightly wrapped in bubble wrap and placed into another box.

              B&H also sometimes have retail drives for the same price as OEM drives. These are great because they come in a regular retail box instead of just the drive itself (so it’s pretty much guaranteed that it’s packed properly), and often come with a free SATA cable.

        • ares35
          3•8 months ago

          co-mingled inventory is a thing, yes, but i think you get better support from amazon for items they sell, even if from that inventory, if there’s a problem.

      • LemongrabEnglish
        1•8 months ago

        Good to know, haven’t had issues but would love other resources if you can offer some.