What's the Difference Between Enterprise and Consumer Hard Drives?
As manufacturers like Western Digital, Seagate, and Toshiba continue to create more specialized lines of hard drives, a lot of people have questions about what they should purchase: an Enterprise/Server level hard drive versus a normal consumer hard drive.
SabrePC breaks down a few of the differences between these two kinds of hard drives to help make your decision making easier. (All hard drives purchased from SabrePC carry a 5 year limited warranty through us.)
Enterprise Hard Drives
- Engineered for being on 24/7 for continuous use
- Typically have higher read/write specs
- Typically have more tolerance for Drive Writes Per Day (DWPD)
- Typically have more support for RAID features
Consumer Hard Drives
- Typically cheaper cost (Drive capacity per dollar)
- May have similar RPM speeds that will allow for efficient access to data
- Typically have lower noise levels since the user will be next to the drive during usage
- May have a lower life expectancy if usage is 24/7
On a side note, at the time of this writing, we are experiencing a shortage of hard drives that are available to us due to market conditions and global logistics. So, please check our Hard Drive page for the latest "In Stock" situation.
For any bulk/volume purchases, please contact us for to discuss best pricing and any available discounts.
Sample Comparison Chart | Enterprise | Consumer |
Features | ST16000NM001G | ST16000NE000 |
Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF, Hours) | 2,500,000 | 1,200,000 |
Max Sustained Transfer Rate OD | 261 MB/s | 250 MB/s |
Super Parity | Yes | No |
Get More Helpful Insights
You can find other articles and comparisons about hardware components or full-blown custom AI solutions on the SabrePC blog. Keep a lookout for more helpful articles that will be on the way soon.
If you have any questions or want to suggest some other topics for us to focus on, please feel free to contact us.