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![Seagate Expansion 4TB Desktop Hard Drive USB 3.0 for $169 [Click & Collect]](https://files.ozbargain.com.au/n/85/117785.jpg?h=239f2a3e)
Simply plug in the included power supply and USB cable.
The hard drive is automatically recognised by the Windows operating system – no software to install and nothing to configure.
Drag and drop to save files to the Expansion external hard drive.
Built-in power management automatically ensures energy-efficient operation.
OW has this @$219
Price Match! Price Match!
http://www.officeworks.com.au/retail/products/Technology/Dat…
hmm what drive/s are inside this, is it two 2's or 1 4?7CM would be enough to fit 2 if each is 2.54 thick…
hmm the 3's seem to be a single drive, not a bad price for a 4TB tempted to rip it out and use it as an internal drive….
It should be a 1x 4TB hdd in it.
i got 4 of them today they work internal drives
So you ripped them out and they are functioning now?
I'm thinking the same… why are internal drives more expensive? Is it just because they tend to have slower 'junkier' drives in enclosures?
no its the buying power of the large chain stores and their willingness to do "loss leader" specials
msy ordering 200 cant compete with dick smith ordering 1000.
Ahh. Goodo. Thanks!
I dont know about that, I personally have jumped on one of the 3 tb Seagate desktop Hard drive specials listed on ozbargain several months ago and both of them have died. I also made sure to remove them from the external case and use them as internal drives due to the fact that i had heard people say the main reason these external drives die is due to the case / chipset but the actual hdd should be the same as an internal one. That sadly hasnt been my experience, so these days i dont get external hdds if i want to remove the hdd out of them as that voids the warranty.
I get the feeling its possible that the lower quality drives off the chain / batch may be used in external cases as opposed to being sold as an internal / OEM drive. I could be wrong but thats what my experience seems to tell me. I keep coming across a lot more problematic external drive hdds than the internal ones.
hmm what drive/s are inside this
1 x 4TB 5900RPM Seagate ST4000DM000, according to someone on hotukdeals: http://www.hotukdeals.com/deals/seagate-expansion-desktop-ex…
Cheapest deal for the HDD alone is $195 on staticice. This doesn't make sense…
At specialist PC hardware stores that sell both external and bare drives, the externals tend to be similarly priced or more expensive, so the explanation for a DSE or Officeworks being able to sell externals this much cheaper is probably much better wholesale prices through sheer volume. Always a bit grating for folks like me who buy bare drives for internal/dock/rack use rather than externals.
1year warranty vs 2 year
Your right i could not get bare drive for this price anywhere
I can confirm they are 5900RPM drives inside these.
Good deal, but Seagate only seems to guarantee it for 2400 "power on hours", that is 100 days.
http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=26568.0
review here:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/desktop-hdd.15-st4000dm0…
Does it actually say on warranty card 2400 hrs or 3 Yrs limited.
Usually the limited refers to the fact that the drives warranty is 3 yrs but the plug pak, leads are only 6 months.
(nb The 3tb dont have an additional references on the cards I have.)
Seems like a good price for a 4TB. I believe the drive is 5900RPM if anyone's wondering.
its 7200rpm.
Great find op! Would this be suitable for running games off? I've got a 1TB hard drive in my current laptop and my Steam and Origin folders have filled it up almost completely!
This is what I do.. I've installed steam directly to the hard drive and can unplug it at will… My 4TB steam drive is just about full, I have about 50gb left..
You no longer need to install Steam to the media you're installing games to btw, it's best to install Steam on the system drive and install all your games to whatever drives you want.
Correct, however, if you have a heap of games already installed, it won't make any difference. You can't tell steam to install to another drive once you've already installed a game. Yes you can manually move folders around for games you've already got installed but it's a hassle.
I think it's a lot easier using SteamTool, as that can move already installed games onto different drives, ie SSDs or large format drives..
For gaming as opposed to backup, I would recommend pulling the drive out and making it an internal drive (no external power source needed etc). The last Seagate I removed from it's case required the help of a screwdriver at first to pry the plastic open, but the rest was easy.
I see no reason why not, both my Steam and Origin folders are in my external drives, and those are 2.5mm HDD. You just need to make sure the HDD's are given the correct letter assignment you installed programs as, otherwise the computer will not know the programs are installed.
Thanks guys! I wasn't sure if USB would be fast enough, but I think I'll grab one :)
Just make sure you're using USB 3, I wouldn't recommend going USB 2, otherwise you'll be sitting around for days for games to load.. USB3 is no different to a SATA connection.. I know someone will jump up and down and say otherwise, but, i mean, you'll max out the drives read/write rate before hitting the USB3 throughput wall..
Yeah, I've got USB3. Thanks for the info!
Because you seem to know about this stuff. Say I jammed these in my qnap 212.
If anything was holding it back, would it be the drive speed, the sata connection, or the network connection?
USB3 is no different to a SATA connection
USB3 is very different from a SATA. :) It uses a shared bus (vs point to point link for SATA). The key differences in performance:
1. USB3 will have significantly higher latency. So random reads and writes would be quite "shithouse" <- the usage pattern for most games
Would recommend an internal drive over an external USB3 for games. Suggest you move your documents and storage files into the USB3 drive and keep your games on the internal drive.
The drive is on QNAP's compatibility list, though it is listed under 'not recommended'.
http://www.qnap.com/en/index.php?lang=en&sn=822&c=351&sc=514…
The drive would work, but the TS-212 is an entry-level NAS so I wouldn't expect amazing performance regardless of the drive you use.
Personally I would go for it :-), just be sure to upgrade the firmware on your QNAP.
All things considered, I doubt the average user would notice any difference between a SATA & USB 3 external drive.. yes, there are differences, but it's not like they are totally different.
PowerB said that he has a laptop, and I'd be hard pressed to find any internal 4TB drive..
I run my steam/origin games off a 4TB seagate external USB 3 drive and it's fine.. Yes I'm aware that SATA is quicker, but its like I notice it at all..
No an average user won't notice it at all. :) However, a gamer would notice it. Running Steam and origin on the internal drive, while moving all the accumulated crud on the to ext drive would be the better option.
Certain games may be fine running off the ext HDD, note that ones requiring constant texture streaming etc will stutter. Sometimes storage latency is quite perceptible (e.g. BF3, skyrim etc).
Addendum:
Obviously, you make do with what you have. So this may be the only viable option. I just wanted to recommend that if there was a way, perhaps PowerB would be better off shifting the "static" stuff (music, docs, movies etc) onto the ext HDD while keeping the games on the internal. If that isn't an option, well your advice would be the only viable option.
still works out more expensive than the previous 3GB deal at $109 = $36.33/TB
still a good buy though
the 2tb dick smith deal is $79, is that good? im using 500gb drive now, 2tb sounds like a lot to me.
Yes it is a good deal if you don't need 4tb. The 2tb is cheaper per TB and more reliable than its bigger brother
Got a link?
Seagate Expansion 2TB Desktop Hard Drive USB 3.0 - $79 with Free Delivery.
http://www.dicksmith.com.au/usb-hard-drives/seagate-expansio…
How do you get free delivery? Title currently says "$169 Delivered" yet when I go to check out it has $9.95 for delivery.
— Nevermind found out it's free delivery on the product once you go through the checkout. the shopping cart's shipping calculator didn't factor it in.
Could we please get confirmation from somebody on what drive is inside the case.
Thanks!
Someone opened one up on hotukdeals, and the drive inside was a Seagate ST4000DM000 (which as dtql74 points out above is a 5900RPM drive).
http://www.hotukdeals.com/deals/seagate-expansion-desktop-ex…
Almost $200 according to static ice.
Thank you!
Just bought two to update my qnap nas.
Cheers!
I had a few 'green' drives which are now on their way out due to the 24/7 usage (for which 'red' drives are designed for).
Will these last under standard NAS usage? Anyone?
disregard this comment
It depends how much you abuse your NAS.
Coporate / Commercial use, probably not, home use I doubt it will be a problem.
Are high cap drives now reliable enough to get a few years out of before they die?
I wouldn't hold your breath…
Rule of thumb: NEVER EVER store any personal data you can't get back from DLing on a such a large drive on a long term basis. Oh & backup regularly! Will save you the heartache…
Owned many drives, reliability is a mixed bag really.
Had a 2 x 1TB RAID-1 going once, one drive died after 2 weeks, no problem, replace and let it rebuild.
Only I didn't plan on the replacement taking 3 months to arrive.
Meanwhile the other drive went down and I lost everything.
Lesson learnt: go out and BUY a replacement drive immediately, don't assume store will swap dead drive for a new one on the spot or remaining drive will last long enough for replacement.
Or, make sure you have a spare (ie 3 drives) just incase something like that does happen..
Just price matched at office works @Glebe for $160.55 :D
Saw quite a few on the shelf and I assume there would be more behind the counter
Thanks OP!
I launched my missus to grab one for me… $160.55 in Lewisham. They had 17 when I called so 16 now!
I got a further 5% discount using ING paywave. :D
shouldnt it be 169-10% = 152 ish?
Thinking about getting one and strip it for my N40L.
Thanks. Officeworks East Perth pricematched for $160.55. Plenty in stock, will only price match one per customer though apparently.
They're lying. No such condition.
Just picked mine up. Read/Write speeds are as high as 180MBp/s, with an average around 150. Pretty awesome drive.
BTW you can't do delivery on this item. :\
looks like out of stock online. try ow.
Officeworks might already be onto it, just picked one up from OW Oxley and it scanned straight up at $169, no price match needed.
Damn, they cut out the 5% discount. :P
yep i guess all those 5%'s add up, still said $219 on the shelf though.
Confirmed, picked one up from Clarance St, Sydney, scanned for $169, no pricematch possible.
Was still $219 on the shelf.
Just picked one up from Springvale. Good deal. Nice little unit.
Bought 4 from OW. They reduced the price by the time I got there so there was not 5% off.
Anyway, all 4 will go into my N36L as a RAID 5 and I'll have a much smaller drive mounted in the optical bay for OS.
That should last me a very long time (so long as the drives don't all fail).
I dont think its a good idea to buy all 4 in the same batch as if they fail, all of them will fail together imo.
OW caught up with the price guys, at least here in Blacktown. They are selling it for $169 as well. On the shelf it's $219 but when you take it to the counter, $169 comes up. Damn you OW! Hahaha Still an ok price though, converted $150 w/o postage from amazon comes around $165. Good bargain but i don't think it's good enough to some who got their 20% off from jbhifi and was selling it for $187 which comes down to $149.
Fair assumption 8 hours after the deal and countless Ozbargainers making them bleed they're gonna catch up.
It is roughly the size of a 3.5" drive (slightly bigger), so it is definately has 1x4TB drive inside.
The device uses a USB 3.0 Male to Micro B cable (Like: http://www.amazon.com/BYTECC-39-37-Micro-Cable-USB3-1M-A/dp/…) and the cable provided is under 1m.
It also requires a mains adapter to operate, and it comes with a travel adapter which works in UK/EU/US/AU (and probably some others).
If anyone is stripping their case I'm chasing a couple of power adapters please
Thanks. Just price matched at OW (it didn't show up at the DS site at first using the search) and got an additional 5% discount using my ING card. :)
These drives have a tendancy to overheat and eventually fail. If you only need to turn on to backup files should be fine. For $169 it's pretty cheap. My advice spend an extra $30 and get a Seagate Desktop HDD.15 ST4000DM000 4TB or better still a WD Black or Hitachi Deskstar
Running 8 of these in my Synology, max temp they've hit is 29c, currently 26 and its on 24x7. No issues here.
Might buy one of these as a spare.
How long have they been on 24/7?
yup thinking of one of these as well for a 24/7 NAS…
In the 8 raid unit about a month but 4 of the 8 were previously in my other NAS from March this year.
Just got one from Officeworks — they are tricky, it is already showing $169 in the system so no 5% price match
They have OzB moles in their stores.
The team members at the stores do not change the listing price - the head office does.
I spent 25min wait for them at office works Townsville but i did get 2 drives
can i plug this into my netgear router to acess files via readyshare ?
currently using 1 tb wd passport.
also does it use power adapter or is it usb powered ?
thanks.
Not sure about readyshare but this uses a power adapter.
The beauty of these drives is that they will work with Windows XP due to a bit of trickery with the SATA to USB3 chip and sector sizes, plus also work with a WDTV Live SMP in the front USB port (I think there are issues with the rear USB port).
The WDTV Live SMP is capable of functioning as a simple NAS.
IIRC, Seagate had a special on these drives for $178 some months ago, then the dollar dropped and prices went up to $219. I'm glad to see them returning to a better price. During the $178 phase, someone posted a JB HiFi receipt for $150 and I was able to get a few for that price, but it stopped when the drives went up to $219.
I understand Seagate redesigned the case for better ventilation as the previous model did suffer overheating failures by all accounts. Not sure if the redesign has cured that type of failure, but I ran mine for about 10 hours straight backing up a couple of 2TB and the case was only warm, not hot.
for those that bought this to use as an internal drive, it's very easy to open up.. Just undo the clips as per this video..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11obHqzx_bw
I used a guitar pick, which is 1/3 of the width of a credit card yet even stronger.. so was just a simple matter of undoing the clips and unscrewing the usb3 adapter board.. Just record which drive belongs to which external enclosure and put it in the cupboard..
Couldn't be any simpler :)
I got the second last one on the shelf at Sydney George St @ $169. Not sure do they have stock at the back. I was nearly give up on buying it, but saw 90+ up vote on OZB… can't go wrong right? :)
werribee officeworks has empty boxes on the shelf, thus they get them from the locked cabinet behind the desk.. maybe they've had a number of thefts.. lol.. then again, it is werribee..
I hope you need it for something. :P
Can anyone who has opened and used for desktop or nas comment on if you can take it out while keeping the warranty intact or is there a seal you break that voids it?
I'm thinking of using a couple of these in a Synology NAS. Anyone have this as their set up?
I didn't encounter any seals on the enclosures.. you just have to be very careful not to break the clips when opening it..
That said, the enclosure & hard drive both have a serial number on them, so ALWAYS keep the original box/cables/enclosure should you ever need to reassemble it and send it back…
Mine is working quite nicely as an internal drive…
Great! just what I needed to know. I'll get onto a couple of these for my NAS then :)
Seriously, did you bother reading the thread at all?
good find!