Has anyone done the numbers. If one 14tb drive costs 250$ how long does it take to make that money back?? Once it’s full of plots. Like how much chia is that one drive worth for its 6 year lifetime?
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No way to tell. Over such a long period you’d have to factor in developmens on power costs and netspace . Each of those can have huge effect on ROI, let alone both . But… If you can predict those factors, there’s better ways to invest 250$ I guess;-)
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There is also the resale value of the drive. It might not be much, after a few years. But it counts.
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Quick google sheets math shows 1,261 days ROI, That does NOT include power.
Ill be honest though, I wouldn’t spend $250 for a 14 TB drive. Re-sale of the drive can bring that down if you use today math, But who know how much a TB will be worth in a few years. We may all have 100TB SSD’s that we toss around by then.
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In my part of town, a 6 watts mosty idling drive at .12 kWh rates costs me about $6.70 a year in power, or about $40.30 for those six years you are looking at. It’s nothing near as brutal as GPU mining but it is a consideration!
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Lots of info already here. Change numbers to suit.
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You can take that times 5 for Western Europe, so running cost for 6 years is close to the initial investment for the drive 
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Power in the UK is to hit £0.59 per kWh in October, that’s US $0.64
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there is no resale value on the drive
I wish for once people would let that sink in through their thick skulls
Apparently, you have not gotten the word out.
Where have you been advertising your news?
It seems that people are still selling used drives on eBay, newegg, and even negotiating sales on this forum’s “Buy/Sell/Trade” section.
I might be missing the news on other items, too. So before I waste my time trying to sell my car, do cars have a resale value?
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I think what he probably means is, “I wouldn’t buy one…”.
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That is not what @efIN6FN2UM wrote.
And considering that he wrote “I wish for once people would let that sink in through their thick skulls”, he meant what he wrote.
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Well who know’s why he’s thinking that. In essence, he’s saying if he buys a $200 drive today, it’s worth $0 tomorrow.
We all know he’s wrong!
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Considering recently I’ve sold various drives at good prices you are very clearly mistaken. Suggest your skull is thicker than you think it is 
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Wow - that really smarts…! 
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Looks like the government might be capping at the current rate of £0.29, hopefully not the October rate.
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Big assumption by the OP on the lifespan of the drive. It is yet to be seen the lifespan of any of these drives. This is the big, unaccounted question and answer for Chia. I think the first real question is whether these drives that a lot of people are using, were they designed and tested in a Chia farming environment. When Bram started Chia, did he think about ROI and drive failure? Drive failure is a certainty but net space variable and Chia value are the wild cards. I’m not saying that famers will tap out and there is going to be a mass drive failure issue but two things will happen. You are likely going to see changes to warranties by the WD and Seagate. Crypto = void warranty like with GPUs. Failing drives is bad for a brand and Chia farmers will publicize these drive failures. If you can’t ROI or only enjoy 12 months of profit after making nothing for 3/4/5 years? What a futile waste of power and effort. For the greater good of Chia and the ecosystem? Please. Where did I leave my barf bag? If you ask most professionals, they are likely to tell you that Seagate are the least reliable drives, yet most farmers rely on them. If Chia is build on Seagate drives then get ready for issues down the road.
People seem to forget Chia farming is ultimately a test project. It hasn’t proven any long term viability. Farming is not “in the bag”. And to you guys thinking anyone wants your 14tb or 18tb hard drive? Think about it. Most people will start to realize that those will be the “farmed on” drives that stayed on 24/7 for how long? In essence, there is potential that Chia farming will tarnish the used market for these larger sized drives. Who in their right mind would want/use a 14tb or 18tb drive. Only at the dirt cheap used price, but if Chia proves to be burning out drives then certainly you will be forced to run them into the ground and hope you make profit for a few months in the twilight of their lifespan.
Sorry for the messaging. Sometimes the truth hurts.
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Where did you get that information from? I recently got a GPU exchanged after it died mining. And GPU mining actually handles GPUs very well. Gaming and other tasks are much more stressing to GPUs.
There will be no way for Manufacturers to know whether a HDD has been used for NAS or Farming. And HDDs are idle in farming most of the time anyway. Apart from that, I agree with you on the longevity problem. But there is only one way to find out. I was sofar lucky with mine as none died after 18 months of farming. And most of them were shucked USB drives so I am kind of playing with fire (voided warranties since day 0).
Let’s see how it goes. As it currently stands, I’d be breaking even on Chia if it reaches 300 USD assuming 0 resale values of my HDDs. Not too bad, considering I have some other crypto investments that tanked more than 90%.
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The longest lasting drive I ever had was a consumer grade Maxtor - 3GB drive, originating from the late 1990’s. It lasted 18 years of almost continous use (like 24/7) for the latter 15 years of it’s life.
It was put into a system as a boot drive of a NAS distro as a temporary measure - it stayed in there for 15 years. Even when it ‘died’, it didn’t completely die straight away, I still managed to take a final, up to date clone of it. It just failed to spin up often enough upon the occasional reboot that it became annoying.
But 15 years of continous use - impressive by any measure.
Another long lived drive I had that I used as a tertiary backup was an old ‘OneTouch’ USB drive, again this was on 24/7 it’s entire life, with a backup written to it every day for 11 years before it failed.
On the other hand, I’ve had my fair share of drives that have only lasted 4-5 years too, with a few that have lasted less than 3 years.
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You can read any warranty disclaimer from GPU manufacturers. Crypto mining voids warranty. I didn’t pull this out of thin air. It’s called fine print. Obviously people will not disclose they were mining. Hard to prove. Same goes for Chia farming? The drive manufacturers can’t see what was on the drive and see crypto? Most people here talk about getting the drive contents saved while doing warranty. Those days are numbered in my opinion. It’s about brand. Mass failed drives is bad for business in a big way. Too much publicity around it? They will change policies. Their brands depend on it. I can easily see them saying “not designed for…” or something similar.