Samsung launches not-2TB drive

Samsung, stepping up to the 500GB per platter level, has chosen not to follow Western Digital and Seagate's 2TB hard drive lead and restricted itself to a 1.5TB capacity. Seagate has tweaked its perpendicular magnetic recording technology to attain the 500GB/3.5-inch hard drive platter level. But by using three platters, …

[Chris]

release date?

thats great news can't wait to order several of these any news of a release date?, I have been so happy with their 1TB model.

very reliable drives, so expecting the same quality from Samsung, compared to Seagate cock-ups of late.

[Anonymous Coward]

Always been happy with Samsung drives

Reliable, quick drives. I'll happily forgo the extra 500GB and get one of these.

[Richard]

So how big is it really?

Once you got past the marketing lies and BS, how much capacity are you actually getting?

Lets assume they've gone with the lie that 1TB = 1 trillion bytes, that means the actual capacity of this drive is:

*drum roll*

1.3 TB. The amount you've been conned out of is:

139.01 GB

You know, a few years ago, we called 139GB a hard drive's worth.

Anyone feeling conned yet?

-- Richard

[Ross Fleming]

Another advocate here

Just love 'em. Have 4 x 1TB drives - 2 Seagates, 2 Samsungs. The noise the Seagates kick out is ridiculously intrusive, Samsungs are blissfully quiet (presumably the 3/4 platter difference).

[Anonymous Coward]

And in related news...

Three is less than four.

The drives aren't the only thing spinning.

[Anonymous Coward]

Samsung reliability

Judging by the number of comments on Dabs.com I think there is a problem with Samsung drives in general. They just seem cheap and cheerful.

http://www.dabs.com/ProductReviews.aspx?&CategorySelectedId=11154&PageMode=1&Quicklinx=4ZTT&NavigationKey=11154&RecordOffset=10&%20

[Anonymous Coward]

Nah not interested...

I can wait.. money stays in my pocket.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Samsung reliability

I was worried there for a second, I'm about to oder a QNAP NAS box with a Samsung drive - I did note, however, that the poor reviews were dated prior to August 2008. However, since then, there have been good reviews.

WD is the credible alternative, however, it's over 50% more (though it's claimed to be Green !).

I think Samsung must have had a bad batch, I'll risk it (the NAS is for backup).

[Richard Lloyd]

1TB drive is great...

I bought a couple of 1TB Samsungs a few months back and they are one of the best purchases I've ever made. 116Mbytes/s read speed, really quiet, run cool and I got them at 75 quid each. Fast, cheap, quiet, cool - Samsung were the first to tick all the boxes for 1TB+ drives, IMHO. Surprisingly, the typical price of the 1TB is now 80 quid - perhaps Samsung can't make them quick enough :-) I hope the 1.5TB version is as good as the 1TB, because it'll be at the top of my next hard disk purchase list if it is.

[Richard Drinkwater]

@So how big is it really?

The important thing to note here is the difference between gigabytes(GB) and gibibytes(GiB). Many people incorrectly use gigabytes and megabytes to refer to measurement using powers of two when they should be using gibibytes and mebibytes.

1GB = 10^9 bytes

1GiB = 2^30 bytes

This idea follows for kilo/kibi and tera/tebi. You will find that hard drives are correctly refered to as tera-/gigabytes whereas memory is incorrectly using these when they should be using gibibytes. If you are still confused, just look on Wikipedia. The lack of knowledge of these terms means people do not use them so the mix-up lives on.

On the Samsung thread, I've had to bin the drive I got mid last year because it was vibrating a lot. I'm now using 4x1TB and 2x1.5TB WD drives and have had no problems with those.

[Mr Yemi Elegunde]

Samsung launches not-2TB drive’

WD already has a 3 platter 1.5TB as well as the 4 platter 2TB. they are both from the company's Caviar Green range. which does boast a lot of good energy saving features and WD lists them all on its website.