Hard Drive Cost/GB Chart for January 2011
Posted January 20, 2011 by Nick Vogt in Computer Hardware
This is a comparison of desktop computer 7200RPM 3.5" SATA hard drives. Prices were obtained at Newegg and include shipping and discounts where applicable (mail-in rebates not included). All drives have a 70% or greater 5/5 egg rating. I consider the ratings to be a good indicator of how many people are receiving drives DOA or are having drive failures. I chose the best priced and rated drive in each size category. The Ratio is the number of gigabytes each dollar purchases, so naturally the higher the better.| Drive | Size | Cache | RPM | Price | Ratio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 | 80 GB | 2 MB | 7200 RPM | $42.28 | 1.89 |
| Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 | 160 GB | 8 MB | 7200 RPM | $42.28 | 3.78 |
| Western Digital Caviar Blue | 250 GB | 16 MB | 7200 RPM | $44.99 | 5.56 |
| Western Digital Caviar Blue | 320 GB | 8 MB | 7200 RPM | $44.99 | 7.11 |
| Western Digital Caviar Blue | 500 GB | 16 MB | 7200 RPM | $54.99 | 10.00 |
| Western Digital Caviar Black | 640 GB | 32 MB | 7200 RPM | $64.99 | 9.85 |
| Western Digital Caviar Black | 750 GB | 32 MB | 7200 RPM | $69.99 | 10.72 |
| Samsung Spinpoint F3 | 1 TB | 32 MB | 7200 RPM | $69.99 | 14.29 |
| Seagate Barracuda * | 2 TB | 64 MB | 7200 RPM | $169.99 | 11.77 |
A number of prices dropped since late last year and a few positions changed, but the list remains largely unchanged. There is still no highly-rated 1.5TB drive on Newegg, which could be the fault of Newegg's product selection or that there aren't any good 1.5TB drives on the market. The 2TB Barracuda from the last list remains, though its rating dropped to 69%. (*) That would normally preclude it from this list, but there wasn't anything else worth mentioning so I kept in on there for funsies.
There are cheap Hitachi 2GB and 3TB drives on the market now, which both offer excellent $/GB ratios, but their ratings are dismal so it'd be a roll of the dice. 1TB still seems to be the sweet spot right now and is what I'd recommend. Beyond the Samsung, there are several 1TB drives with good ratings. Be sure to do your research and make sure the drive you do end up getting has the fewest platters (for 1TB drive, that is two 500GB platters). I have done some looking around and it does appear the the 1TB Samsung above is a 2x500GB-platter drive.
| Series | Hard Drive Cost Charts |
|---|---|
| Tags | newegg hard drive |