Review on 💾 Seagate Expansion Desktop 4TB External Hard Drive HDD – USB 3.0: High-Capacity Storage Solution for PC Laptop (STEB4000100) by Frank Ridl

This has been my first try at Seagate (mainly the HGST type) in a long time. Inside this case is a Seagate Archive hard drive, which the OEM sells for $249. So at $179 it's a steal. (Read more about the backup drive on the Seagates website) The USB 3.0 interface was fast. Tested blank drives formatted in HFS and ExFAT showed consistent read/write speeds of 180-190MB per second. After the hard disk was 90% full, large files reached a maximum reading and writing speed of 100MB/s, smaller files reached about 64MB/s writing and 80MB/s reading. Respectable. 6 of them worked 24/7 for a week and had no problems. All files have been moved and verified. And I ran a full sector scan on one of them with no problems using SoftRAID for OSX. The cases are plastic, so they're not the best for heat dissipation, but the drive itself is housed in a metal bracket inside the case, which helps. The case for some reason has ventilation holes from the bottom, not the top, and holes on the back but nothing on the front. I kept a little fan of theirs as I copied and reviewed 24/7 for several days. Running 24/7 probably isn't best unless they have refrigeration or are in a very cold room. But I don't think most people will use them to their full potential throughout the day. I would buy them, take the drives out of the cases and put them in the NAS. I'm curious to see how they will hold up over the long term.