[SOLVED] Seagate Barracuda vs Barracuda Pro/Iron Wolf Pro, which one is more durable/reliable ?

[knowledge2121]

I bought an external Seagate 8TB a while back which is a Barracuda...
I am planning to buy the 10TB version which is either an Iron Wolf Pro or Barracuda Pro...

I don't want to have the drives turned on 24/7 , I want to fill them with data and store them away and access the data very infrequently... I also don't care about drive speed and whether the HDDs use CMR or SMR technology..

Which drive is more durable/reliable this way ? is the 10TB one more durable/reliable than the 8TB version ? Should I transfer the files on the 8TB to the 10TB if the 10TB is more durable/reliable ? Will the 8TH fail sooner than the 10TB ?

 

[USAFRet]

"store them away"
For how long?

Drive reliability CANNOT be measured on a single instance of a device. ANY of them.

Storing your data on a single device, unused for X period of time....what happens when you DO crank it up and it fails?

Lets assume there is a fleetwide average of 10 years.
There will be a couple of outliers that fail within 6 month. Sucks if yours is one of those.


Data needs to be on more than one device.
Generally, 3-2-1.
3 copies, on at least 2 different media, 1 of them offsite or otherwise inaccessible.

(You've probably read that before)

 

[knowledge2121]

For how long?

I am also buying a 16TB Exos to back up the 10TB+8TB (I am not fully using them so they would fit in a 16TB) ....

Now with this setting, You are saying it doesn't matter if the drives(8TB, 10TB) are Iron Wolf Pro or Barracuda ? the Barracuda could possibly last longer than the Iron Wolf Pro ? The important thing is to have a backup ?

Is a third backup really necessary ?

 

[USAFRet]

I am also buying a 16TB Exos to back up the 10TB+8TB (I am not fully using them so they would fit in a 16TB) ....

Now with this setting, You are saying it doesn't matter if the drives(8TB, 10TB) are Iron Wolf Pro or Barracuda ? the Barracuda could possibly last longer than the Iron Wolf Pro ? The important thing is to have a backup ?

Is a third backup really necessary ?

Yes, the important thing is to have your data on more than one device.

We humans have never made a device that "cannot will not fail". Ever. Any device.

We have especially never made a device that is "Stupid Human Proof"
"oops, I accidentally formatted it"
"Oops, I clicked the wrong thing and got a ransomware"
"oops, oops, oops"

Some years ago, Seagate had a bad run of 3TB drives. Much more fail prone than other models, even from Seagate.
But even then...if you had several of them..it is unlikely that ALL of them would have failed at the same time.
Your data, living on more than one, would still have been safe.

The "third" copy, offsite, protects against fire/flood/robbery/etc.
Whether that is needed is up to you. And that may be something like OneDrive or DropBox.

Is an IronWolf Pro "more reliable" than a standard Barracuda? Yes. Within fractions of a percent, maybe.
It is not 100% 'will never ever die'.