Don't give up on old spinners just yet.

Hi folks
For some things keeping older spinners is just fine (for multi media, backup, streaming stuff etc) so long as the quality is fine and they have a decent cache and at least 7200 rpm. Don't use for the OS but fine for all sorts of other things so don't dump them just yet.

Copying a lot of data from internal Nvme (ssd type) to a decent toshiba enterprise 14 TB HDD connected to a modest minipc via a USB3 caddy (with its own power supply) gives a decent transfer rate - no complaints. The host PC is a modest MiniPC and the data transfer is consistent.





Cheers
jimbo

jimbo45 said:

Hi folks
For some things keeping older spinners is just fine (for multi media, backup, streaming stuff etc) so long as the quality is fine and they have a decent cache and at least 7200 rpm. Don't use for the OS but fine for all sorts of other things so don't dump them just yet.

Copying a lot of data from internal Nvme (ssd type) to a decent toshiba enterprise 14 TB HDD connected to a modest minipc via a USB3 caddy (with its own power supply) gives a decent transfer rate - no complaints. The host PC is a modest MiniPC and the data transfer is consistent.

View attachment 148172



Cheers
jimbo

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Mine have all gone to the bit bucket in the sky. RIP.

I still maintain a HDD for data storage on most of my PCs. Cheap way to hold/archive data. My daily driver has an 8 TB model but I also have 3 NVMe drives for other purposes.

I fully agree @jimbo45

You can't even get properly sized SSDs as of yet. They will come soon though but they will also cost an arm and a leg plus some internal body parts.

Still counting on external HDDs for Downloads (even apps and drivers like the Nvidia package.... don't like the of idea of downloading a temp 1gb installer on a SSD - only to delete it shortly after installing the app/driver), large size and back-up. For same reason - have even browser disk cache disabled - on Firefox (yet another reason why i prefer over chromium - where there's only workaround like "C:\Program Files\BraveSoftware\Brave-Browser\Application\brave.exe" --disk-cache-size=1 --media-cache-size=1). For personal use - external HDDs are still wortwhile imo. Only for specific profesional use - like video recording and edditing (even photo - taking into account modern standards of curent profesional cameras), 3D modeling (even A.I. this days) and such - i find SSDs esential (after getting used to SSDs speed - even the fastest HDDs are rather cringe by comparision).

neves said:

Still counting on external HDDs for Downloads (even apps and drivers like the Nvidia package.... don't like the of idea of downloading a temp 1gb installer on a SSD - only to delete it shortly after installing the app/driver), large size and back-up. For same reason - have even browser disk cache disabled - on Firefox (yet another reason why i prefer over chromium - where there's only workaround like "C:\Program Files\BraveSoftware\Brave-Browser\Application\brave.exe" --disk-cache-size=1 --media-cache-size=1). For personal use - external HDDs are still wortwhile imo. Only for specific profesional use - like video recording and edditing (even photo - taking into account modern standards of curent profesional cameras), 3D modeling (even A.I. this days) and such - i find SSDs esential (after getting used to SSDs speed - even the fastest HDDs are rather cringe by comparision).

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One doesn't need these for high speed - especially for archival stuff, backups, file sharing or data streaming. But don't use the slow RPM stuff with poor cache sizes -- minimum should be 7200 RPM.

The 5400 RPM stuff really is only fit for the bin - those you can junk. Smash with a hammer or whatever before disposing of them -- even "The Holy Ghost" couldn't retrieve data if the disk is physically smashed up. !!!

These also work perfectly for security / video cam stuff -- - I wouldn't use any SSD for this purpose -- also depends on how long you need to keep the security video for, how long in a 24 hr period it's actually recording -- decent security stops recording if nothing detected after a user defined period and starts again if motion etc is detected. While the HDD is starting up data is held in a buffer area by the security application and written to the HDD as soon as the HDD is ready. Play back of video is perfectly OK with HDD's -- again DECENT HDD's of course. !!!

Also BTW if you need to hand over video to the Police / a Court or other legal authority I'd rather give them a cheap HDD rather than an expensive (often hugely expensive) large capacity Nvme device).

Cheers
jimbo

jimbo45 said:

The 5400 RPM stuff really is only fit for the bin - those you can junk. Smash with a hammer or whatever before disposing of them -- even "The Holy Ghost" couldn't retrieve data if the disk is physically smashed up. !!!

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Nooo! Hearing that upsets my old and faithful...

jimbo45 said:

These also work perfectly for security / video cam stuff -- - I wouldn't use any SSD for this purpose -- also depends on how long you need to keep the security video for, how long in a 24 hr period it's actually recording -- decent security stops recording if nothing detected after a user defined period and starts again if motion etc is detected. While the HDD is starting up data is held in a buffer area by the security application and written to the HDD as soon as the HDD is ready. Play back of video is perfectly OK with HDD's -- again DECENT HDD's of course. !!!

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Yes, cause even in 2025 - most security cams have 1080p resolution (quite a lot of them have 480p & 720p - cause nobody bothered to upgrade them after over a decade of use).. Apparently, you're suppose to pay 3000$ for its IP66 rating. And they call them Pro CCTV. While 300$ baby cams have 6K - but use SD cards. :)

jimbo45 said:

Hi folks
For some things keeping older spinners is just fine (for multi media, backup, streaming stuff etc) so long as the quality is fine and they have a decent cache and at least 7200 rpm. Don't use for the OS but fine for all sorts of other things so don't dump them just yet.

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are those old HDDs the "legacy" style PATA/IDE or SATA?

i even ran a Win11 {23H2} OS on a PATA/IDE based 160Gb HDD, heeheehee

erpster4 said:

are those old HDDs the "legacy" style PATA/IDE or SATA?

i even ran a Win11 {23H2} OS on a PATA/IDE based 160Gb HDD, heeheehee

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IDE would not be good -- they must be at least SATA to be of any serious use on modern systems.Even a CRAY supercomputer can be "rowed back" to terrible performance if the I/O systems are junk.

Cheers
jimbo

I use my large USB external hard drives for storage, and data, and for stuff that gets deleted, or changed a lot. My SSD is there for some data that doesn't get erased, or changed often, or for programs and apps. A 1-TB SSD is sufficient (for me) for programs and some text data. Large USB 3+, 7,200 rpm "Spinners" are necessary when working with large images, or 4K video, and provide scratch disk space for those programs to work well. And, when a large external HDD is filled up, it's file structure can be recorded to a searchable free program, like Cathy, so in case you need something on any of your retired drives, you can find it and hook it up via USB to get the files. Note, when storing retired drives, store them with all the cables and power supply wiring that came with them. I use large zip-lock bags for storage, and put in a note to correspond with the designation in Cathy.

I still create backup images on HDD as I do not trust SSD for long term storage.
SSD store data as electrical charges which can start losing data or become corrupted the longer they are without power.
I have a HDD dock and the SATA port on the motherboard that it is hooked up to is set for hot swap.

I have more than 15 HDD external disks. I use them mainly to store my movies.

I have a 4TB backup HDD in this machine, and I also have an 8TB NAS with mirrored HDD drives. The other disks in my systems are either NVMe SSD or SATA SSD. Any backup SSD gets a full rewrite at least every month, so I'm not too concerned about it forgetting. They also live in a 65F-75F 40-50% humidity climate controlled space.