Seagate Backup Plus 4TB Drive - Cheap 2.5" 4TB drives

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Patrick

Patrick

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First off, credit to @Deslok for first thinking of this. I am recreating the thread with a title for ease of searching.

This is a quick guide to what we saw with shucking a Seagate Backup Plus 4TB external drive to get a $125 2.5" Seagate ST400LM016 drive (5400rpm 15mm notebook HDDdrive.) Full guide will be published on the main site in the next day or two but I wanted to get something for forum members sooner.

What to get
$124 on Amazon (I had free same day Prime shipping): http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Portable-External-Storage-STDR4000100/dp/B00ZTRXFBA/

Seagate Backup Plus 4TB STDR4000100 closed.jpg


Warranty Check
It looks like these internal drives do not carry warranties if sent in separately.

Ease of Dis-assembly
No screwdrivers required. Very easy to take apart but likely to damage enclosure while doing so. I am going to work on another drive to give a different method a try. I still think Seagate will know if you try to re-assemble.

What is Inside
Seagate ST4000LM016 is inside. Here is a link to the product page. This is $208 currently on Amazon or 667% more than the external drive.

Seagate 4TB ST4000LM016 drive liberated.jpg


Other Surprises
The USB 3.0 to SATA adapter is very small and looks very handy, especially if you primarily use SATA SSDs or 2.5" SATA hard drives that do not require external power.
Seagate Backup Plus 4TB STDR4000100 USB 3 to SATA.jpg

Main Site Post
Main site post here: Seagate 4TB 2.5" SATA drives for 61% off by shucking externals which has more information.
 
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P

PigLover

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When I search the bare drive (ST4000LM016) I get $139.88 on Amazon.

I'm not sure voiding the warranty is worth $15 (unless of course you are buying 8+ drives, at which point the 9th drive for self-warranty use is 'free').

Sent from my SM-G925V using Tapatalk
 
Patrick

Patrick

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PigLover said:
When I search the bare drive (ST4000LM016) I get $139.88 on Amazon.

I'm not sure voiding the warranty is worth $15 (unless of course you are buying 8+ drives, at which point the 9th drive for self-warranty use is 'free').
Click to expand...
That $139 drive if you look at the feedback says it is only 16MB cache and not the drive listed in the title. Even the Google shopping widget has prices from $195-217 for the internal drive.
upload_2016-4-20_16-28-40.png

Also just noticed that the drives on the ebay listing are 30 day warranty from the seller so they are basically no warranty drives from Seagate (no chance to reunite with the external enclosure and RMA.)
 
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Deslok

Deslok

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My bad, good catch Patrick on the disparity, cdw carries them too if someone needed a large volume of them you can usually negotiate a discount.
 
Patrick

Patrick

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And working with Xeon D in Ubuntu:
Code: 
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo lsblk
NAME   MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda      8:0    0   3.7T  0 disk
├─sda1   8:1    0   128M  0 part
└─sda2   8:2    0   3.7T  0 part
sdb      8:16   0  74.5G  0 disk
sr0     11:0    1  1006M  0 rom  /cdrom
loop0    7:0    0 962.1M  1 loop /rofs
 
E

Evan

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Jan 6, 2016
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Love that seagate don't do what WD and just out the usb controller straight into the drive logic board :)
Think I may just replace a few of my full 2tb 2.5" drives with some of these.
Low power for sure and now they have decent capacity.
On the other hand there is the throught of @Patrick just to make a notebook into a NAS.
 
Deslok

Deslok

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Patrick said:
And working with Xeon D in Ubuntu:
Code: 
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo lsblk
NAME   MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda      8:0    0   3.7T  0 disk
├─sda1   8:1    0   128M  0 part
└─sda2   8:2    0   3.7T  0 part
sdb      8:16   0  74.5G  0 disk
sr0     11:0    1  1006M  0 rom  /cdrom
loop0    7:0    0 962.1M  1 loop /rofs
Click to expand...
Wait you can see the 128m cache can you use it separate from the drive?
 
Patrick

Patrick

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So here is something interesting. The official Seagate spec linked above says the model has 128MB cache. This drive says 16MB unless this is the wrong command.
Code: 
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo hdparm -i /dev/sda

/dev/sda:

 Model=ST4000LM016-1N2170, FwRev=0003
 Config={ HardSect NotMFM HdSw>15uSec Fixed DTR>10Mbs RotSpdTol>.5% }
 RawCHS=16383/16/63, TrkSize=0, SectSize=0, ECCbytes=0
 BuffType=unknown, BuffSize=16384kB, MaxMultSect=16, MultSect=16
 CurCHS=16383/16/63, CurSects=16514064, LBA=yes, LBAsects=7814037168
 IORDY=on/off, tPIO={min:120,w/IORDY:120}, tDMA={min:120,rec:120}
 PIO modes:  pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4
 DMA modes:  mdma0 mdma1 mdma2
 UDMA modes: udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 udma5 *udma6
 AdvancedPM=yes: unknown setting WriteCache=enabled
 Drive conforms to: Reserved:  ATA/ATAPI-4,5,6,7

 * signifies the current active mode

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$
 
Deslok

Deslok

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Patrick said:
So here is something interesting. The official Seagate spec linked above says the model has 128MB cache. This drive says 16MB unless this is the wrong command.
Code: 
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo hdparm -i /dev/sda

/dev/sda:

Model=ST4000LM016-1N2170, FwRev=0003
Config={ HardSect NotMFM HdSw>15uSec Fixed DTR>10Mbs RotSpdTol>.5% }
RawCHS=16383/16/63, TrkSize=0, SectSize=0, ECCbytes=0
BuffType=unknown, BuffSize=16384kB, MaxMultSect=16, MultSect=16
CurCHS=16383/16/63, CurSects=16514064, LBA=yes, LBAsects=7814037168
IORDY=on/off, tPIO={min:120,w/IORDY:120}, tDMA={min:120,rec:120}
PIO modes:  pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4
DMA modes:  mdma0 mdma1 mdma2
UDMA modes: udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 udma5 *udma6
AdvancedPM=yes: unknown setting WriteCache=enabled
Drive conforms to: Reserved:  ATA/ATAPI-4,5,6,7

* signifies the current active mode

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$
Click to expand...
Seagate Backup Plus Portable 4TB USB 3.0 Drive Review
anandtech found the same thing with crystal disk info Seagate Backup Plus Portable 4TB USB 3.0 Drive Review
 
C

cperalt1

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Feb 23, 2015
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Don't know if it makes a difference I use capital I.

Code: 
sudo hdparm -I /dev/sda

/dev/sda:

ATA device, with non-removable media
    Model Number:       Hitachi HDS722020ALA330                 
    Serial Number:     
    Firmware Revision:  JKAOA3EA
    Transport:          Serial, ATA8-AST, SATA 1.0a, SATA II Extensions, SATA Rev 2.5, SATA Rev 2.6; Revision: ATA8-AST T13 Project D1697 Revision 0b
Standards:
    Used: unknown (minor revision code 0x0029)
    Supported: 8 7 6 5
    Likely used: 8
Configuration:
    Logical        max    current
    cylinders    16383    16383
    heads        16    16
    sectors/track    63    63
    --
    CHS current addressable sectors:   16514064
    LBA    user addressable sectors:  268435455
    LBA48  user addressable sectors: 3907029168
    Logical/Physical Sector size:           512 bytes
    device size with M = 1024*1024:     1907729 MBytes
    device size with M = 1000*1000:     2000398 MBytes (2000 GB)
    cache/buffer size  = 29999 KBytes (type=DualPortCache)
    Form Factor: 3.5 inch
    Nominal Media Rotation Rate: 7200
Capabilities:
    LBA, IORDY(can be disabled)
    Queue depth: 32
    Standby timer values: spec'd by Standard, no device specific minimum
    R/W multiple sector transfer: Max = 16    Current = 16
    Advanced power management level: disabled
    DMA: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2 udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 udma5 *udma6
         Cycle time: min=120ns recommended=120ns
    PIO: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4
         Cycle time: no flow control=120ns  IORDY flow control=120ns
Commands/features:
    Enabled    Supported:
       *    SMART feature set
            Security Mode feature set
       *    Power Management feature set
       *    Write cache
       *    Look-ahead
       *    Host Protected Area feature set
       *    WRITE_BUFFER command
       *    READ_BUFFER command
       *    DOWNLOAD_MICROCODE
            Advanced Power Management feature set
            Power-Up In Standby feature set
       *    SET_FEATURES required to spinup after power up
            SET_MAX security extension
       *    48-bit Address feature set
       *    Device Configuration Overlay feature set
       *    Mandatory FLUSH_CACHE
       *    FLUSH_CACHE_EXT
       *    SMART error logging
       *    SMART self-test
            Media Card Pass-Through
       *    General Purpose Logging feature set
       *    WRITE_{DMA|MULTIPLE}_FUA_EXT
       *    64-bit World wide name
       *    URG for READ_STREAM[_DMA]_EXT
       *    URG for WRITE_STREAM[_DMA]_EXT
       *    WRITE_UNCORRECTABLE_EXT command
       *    Segmented DOWNLOAD_MICROCODE
       *    Gen1 signaling speed (1.5Gb/s)
       *    Gen2 signaling speed (3.0Gb/s)
       *    Native Command Queueing (NCQ)
       *    Host-initiated interface power management
       *    Phy event counters
       *    NCQ priority information
            Non-Zero buffer offsets in DMA Setup FIS
       *    DMA Setup Auto-Activate optimization
            Device-initiated interface power management
            In-order data delivery
       *    Software settings preservation
       *    SMART Command Transport (SCT) feature set
       *    SCT Write Same (AC2)
       *    SCT Error Recovery Control (AC3)
       *    SCT Features Control (AC4)
       *    SCT Data Tables (AC5)
Security:
    Master password revision code = 65534
        supported
    not    enabled
    not    locked
        frozen
    not    expired: security count
    not    supported: enhanced erase
Logical Unit WWN Device Identifier: 5000cca222c083de
    NAA        : 5
    IEEE OUI    : 000cca
    Unique ID    : 222c083de
Checksum: correct
 
T

thayerz00r

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Mar 27, 2016
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Thanks for the writeup/photos, Patrick and inspiration, Deslok.
I think I'll head to the local brick and mortar (Best Buy) and grab a few for kicks!
 
Patrick

Patrick

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Yea BB was $3-6 more than Amazon so not too bad for instant gratification.
 
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