Seagate launches 8TB hard drive for around 250 euros

Seagate has launched an 8TB hard drive. The hard drives, which bear the Archive label, are available with and without hardware encryption and can reach speeds of up to 190MB/s. The introductory price is relatively low at around 250 euros.

The 8TB 3.5″ drives are equipped with a SATA-600 connection and have 128MB cache. The rotation speed is at 5900rpm. Seagate offers a drive with type number ST8000AS0002 without hardware encryption and the ST8000AS0012 that can encrypt stored data. According to the manufacturer, the drives can achieve read and write speeds of up to 190MB/s with an average throughput of 150MB/s.

Seagate equips the 8TB drives with six platters. So-called shingled magnetic recording technology is used to increase the storage capacity. This means that the storage capacity per platter can be increased by an average of 25 percent. The drives burn 7.5W when running and 5W when idle.

Although Seagate is not the first manufacturer with 8TB drives, the price tag can be called relatively low: the hard drives have been spotted in German web shops with prices around 250 euros, approximately 0.032 euros per GB; HGST’s 8TB drive, for example, costs 773 euros. The manufacturer provides a three-year warranty on the drives.