Steve,
Don't take this the wrong way. You got a deal on a large capacity drive, but by no means did you get Seagate's "top of the line" hard drive.
There's a reason the drive you bought only has a 1 year warranty. Seagate bare internals have 5 year warranties. And the drive model number you give isn't the top Barracuda XT (non enterprise) models.
Not all drives are created equal, that's why you got a 3TB drive at that price. All the companies make drives to different standards, just the facts. Most prepackaged external drives have 1-3 year warranties while the internals have 3-5 year warranties. It says a lot when a company only warrants a product for a year and another "similar" one for 5 years.
The drive you bought is now $249 via that Amazon link, unfortunately the deal has passed for others since drive prices now are all over the place with the shake-up from the flooding. Identical drive model numbers are being priced no where close from Tiger Direct to Macsales to B&H for bare internals from any brand. As long a warranty as possible is a good thing for drives. I've swapped out Seagates just shy of the 5 year time and those replacements are still going.
My feeling is buy cheap cables for anything, monoprice.com comes to mind, buy 87 octane, socks don't need to be pricey, nor white tees. But when it comes to data, simply buying the cheapest drives is something I never understand. I buy bare drives in triple, 2 are made RAID 1 and the third is an off site backup on a weekly schedule done with a drive dock. Expensive yes, but for client work, it's a minimum to insure data is protected from the basic failures of a single drive and immediate theft or fire.
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1. Tell me what drive from Seagate is better, and why. Curious how you're evaluating this.
2. There is a reason for a 1 year warranty. But why do you assume it's only defined by the bare drive itself? How about the enclosure, support circuitry (USB interface), marketing competition, and the way it's designed to be used? External drives get a lot more physical abuse from being knocked around than does an internal. As an example, Seagates Goflex drive has the exact same bare drive as the Expansion. One has a 2 year warranty, one has a 1 year warranty. So yes, there is a reason it has a one year warranty but not necessarily because the bare drive itself is inferior in any way.
3. Which one is and how does it differ from the one you think is the top one? You don't think it's possible Seagate uses one model number to supply their external drives and another for their internal, and they might be the same drive? I don't know that they do, but the specs show them to be the same based on specifications alone.. I understand there could be more to it, but I can't find more to it.
4. Yes it does. But I don't think we're hearing the same things. You're hearing the drives are different, one made to lesser standards. I'm hearing they're being used for different purposes, an external drive in inherently more prone to damage. What I'm hearing is rather obvious, but you're hearing might or might not be.. but I've seen nothing to support what you said. Your entire premise seems to be that the warranty alone defines the quality of a drive for reasons not listed in the specifications. There could be differences, but I don't think the warranty has much to do with it.
5. The $110 price was good for about 2 weeks AFTER internal drives took a hit in price. I suppose it took about 2 weeks for word to filter out that you could get top quality 3tb drives from inside lower priced external enclosures. Btw.. the brand new 3tb Goflex model with the exact same internal drive as the Expansion is still $159.. I'd get yours soon.
6. Hmmm.. you wear white tees and cheap socks and drive a car that takes 87 octane.. I suppose they fit your needs. But I wouldn't presume to think you bought them just because they were cheap. I'll never understand those who evaluate products based on price alone, there really is a lot more to it.
