20 TB for $329.99 translates to $16.50 per TB, which is about as low as I have seen for any new drive for that capacity.
How many beers did you have last night, sorry I forgot you don’t drink.
Are those drives coming out the back door in North Jersey? Your link clearly show $429.99 which is $100.00 more than your post. Your information lately is making me yawn and shake my head.
It seems that you must be a Best Buy member to get the $329.99 pricing:
I did not notice that when I made the initial posting.
I believe that to become a member, all you have to do is sign up.
When members make purchases, they get points that reduce the cost of future purchases (like digital gift cards).
On the machine I did the search on (using RDP) I wasn’t logged into bestbuy
Price still too high, for a drive I’m going to have to shuck and install into the 8-bay.
Good find @seymour.krelborn
Not bad (after u login) new price w/2yr warranty. I’ve bought Seagate recerts for $280 w/2yr warranty, and $260 w/1yr warranty. Figure if they warranty at all, then it should be good.
At least, good news is price is falling on these. Maybe soon 22TB will get decent price too.
Now pls find me some cheap $$$ to buy them with lol! I’m kinda tapped out currently…
Good to know that 20TB starting to come down to earth price wise but $16.5/TB is still at a considerable premium while you can get 18TB @ ~$13/TB or 16TB @ ~$12.5/TB SATA white label Seagate X18 on Amazon today without any special deals. Just got a number of these 18TB Exos X18 @$235/each and they seam to work good. I just checked and looks like they now have 20TB as well for $295! Ref: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BC2HSXVR
The Western Digitial drives are new, verses the $235 not-new Water Panther drives that you quoted.
The Western Digital drives are USB. The Water Panther drives are SATA.
The Western Digital drives are warrantied by Western Digital (and WD’s claim process is abysmal).
The Water Panther drives are warrantied by Tech on Tech. I know nothing about their claim process – but any process will be better than WD’s process.
I own a few Water Panther drives, and I am probably going to be ordering more.
Note that you can save a little more by purchasing the same refurbished drives directly from Water Panther’s site:
You will not get the Amazon return policy protection. But Water Panther seems to be reputable. But I have not had an occasion to test them with a return.
True they are refurbs/white label but since they are Exos you know they can run 24/7 which the USBs are not rated for and WD can make a stink about that when they look at the run counter in SMART and tell you that is not supported under warranty. Plus, what is a warranty worth when the manufacturer will make it very hard to exchange the drive under warranty? WD is not the best when it comes to warranty claims, I personally had less trouble with Seagate warranty replacements, so I’m willing to give the Water Panther 2Y warranty claim the benefit of a doubt. Very likely these refurbs are <3Y old so they are likely piggybacking off the Seagate 5Y warranty for these Exos drives.
Surely it’s not a guarantee that all Water Panther drives are going to be ex Seagate ?
I placed 3 orders with them, and they were all Seagate drives.
When I did web searches, the only brands I saw people mention were that they got Seagate drives.
Guaranteed to be Seagate? I do not know.
A few hours ago, I ordered eight refurbished 16 TB drives from Water Panther’s Arsenal line, for $169.99, each. I should have them by Thursday. I am curious as to what Crystal Disk Info will report about them.
I believe that they have a sales e-mail address:
sales@waterpanter.com
Or, via their web site, they have a web based section where you can ask them a question.
I used it once to ask them about who handles their warranties, and also if any single order for the same size drives will result in all of those drives being the same model.
They replied to my questions within a few hours, and it was someone that actually answered the questions without needing to go back and forth.
I use Seagate Exos X20z HSMR 18TB drives in my farm (currently 12 pcs) @1500-1600CNY (~205-220USD = 11.39-12.22USD/TB). So far so good, no any issues.
D… Why those drives are so cheap in North America. Not fair. In Europe there are no such bargains. BTW… what is minimum wage in your country (the smallest monthly payment an employer can offer)?
These white label HDDs are refurbs which means they are NOT NEW and that’s why they are at a discount. You will not find new drives at these prices. Very likely these refurbs are from large data centers which either could not use them due to HDDs not passing some specific certification for the intended use case or they have been replaced as part of a scheduled upgrade. It’s very likely that these drives will still be operating just fine for years especially with Chia (write once & read occasionally) so it’s a good way of recycling them. Note that you are taking a bit of a risk when purchasing a refurb drive and it will come with much shorter warranty period if any at all which is factored in to the price.
Two year warranty – but not from the manufacturer.
The warranty is provided by “Tech on Tech”, which is their seller’s name on Amazon.
Perhaps Water Panther ships overseas?
If that added cost is reasonable, and you are comfortable with refurbished drives, then it could be a good deal for you.
Even if they ship to EU this will likely get hit with EUs ~30% import VAT so factor that into your equation when comparing to local prices. I imagine local prices have that use VAT included already, but if you cannot find local places that sell refurbs/white label drives then it may still be worth checking if they ship to EU.
I hsd sone drives from amazon usa to uk, seller paid taxes. No additional price hike, prob rare though.