Western Digital elements or Seagate Expansion

[ghardwares]

Hi,

I want to buy an external harddisk but I doubt between the Seagate Expansion portable and the Western digital expansion. Does anyone know which brand is more reliable? I read that the Seagate is slightly faster (20 MBps faster), but the Western Digital has 2 years warranty (in Europe) (seagate has just 1 year of warranty).
Do you guys think the two years warranty of the WD is the best reason to choose for the WD?
I hope someone can help me

 

[E-50]

WD

 

[ghardwares]

WD

Why because of the warranty or because of the reliability?

 

[E-50]

I would say both. Unlike Seagate hard drives that you get back from WD from RMA are not refurbished (previously failed units), but actually new drives - thats 1. After 43% failure rate of Seagate 3TB ST3000DM001 I am not sure how people still buy their drives. I had 2 Seagates fail mechanically by themselves without any reason in 4 months since purchase. And when it comes to recoverability, WD is more likely to be recovered if sh** hits the fan.

 

[htradne]

Since 1993 when I built my first desktop I've had 9 failed Seagate drives, 1 failed WD (and a couple of Maxtors). I still have them all in a closet. I stopped buying Seagate several years ago, but as far as I know their reliability is still horrible (compared to WD) like it has been for many years.

 

[Solandri]

Drive reliability correlates most closely with drive model, not manufacturer. Do a little research (read the customer reviews) to pick out which models seem to have high failure rates, and avoid them. Most of the bad rep of Seagate stems from just two bum drive models - ST3xx000x41AS (older model, no longer sold) and STx00DM001. The recent Seagate models have been more reliable than recent WD models. Though statistically, you'd have to own a few dozen of each to even begin noticing the slight difference. If you're only getting one drive, luck plays a bigger role.

I would prefer the drive with the longer warranty. However, be aware that some WD external drives don't have a SATA interface. Their mainboard uses a proprietary USB interface. If the USB connection ever fails, there is no way to get your data off the drive. Unlike with a SATA drive in a USB enclosure, where if the USB interface ever fails, you can pop the drive out of the enclosure and connect it to a computer via SATA. If this bugs you, do your research and make sure you're getting an external drive which has a SATA interface.