Seagate to sell massive 16TB hard drives soon

Seagate reported earnings earlier this week, and during the conference call, the firm said it plans to release two new massive hard drives within the next 18 months. CEO Steven Luzco confirmed the company plans to launch new 3.5-inch drives, the standard drive you’d pop right into a computer, with massive 14TB and 16TB storage options. PCWorld, which covered the conference call, said Seagate is also currently testing a 12TB drive.

A quick glance at Seagate’s site shows that its current family of hard drives tops off at 10TB, still nothing to scoff at, so it’s pretty impressive that Seagate plans to add another 6TB to that offering. These aren’t cheap hard drives, though. A 10TB drive will set you back about $429 right now, depending on where you buy it, so you can expect to pay a pretty penny for the new high-end 16TB drive whenever it launches. Also keep in mind that these drives usually spin around 7200rpm, so while they’re great for storage dumps and backups, you’re still better off booting Windows or macOS off of a solid state drive (SSD.)

These are cost-prohibitive for now

My guess is that enterprise users looking to slim down existing bays are going to want these new drives, since it let them store more information on fewer drives, usually saving energy if there are hundreds of these running in a single data room. PCWorld said surveillance companies are particularly interested in the drives since they need space to save all sorts of HD video.

I’m sure a few media-heads with terabytes of movies and games are going to swallow up a few of them, too. I certainly wish it was in my budget.