Seagate Expansion 8TB External HDD product image

Seagate Expansion 8TB External HDD

Nerd Approved:
(4/5)
Review by Joshua Morris on
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Review

I keep two of these 8 TB Expansion drives on my desk for Time Machine backups and media archiving. They use Seagate’s Barracuda Compute drives internally, so sustained transfers over USB 3.0 land around 180 MB/s—plenty for incremental backups and Plex libraries. Setup is plug-and-play on macOS and Windows, and the enclosure powers down when the host sleeps, saving wear. The plastic shell isn’t silent, but vibration is minimal if you set it on a foam pad. I shucked one drive for my NAS and the SATA drive inside works great in a hot-swap bay. For cold storage or extra scratch space, these externals remain one of the best $/TB deals around.

✓ Pros

  • ✓Excellent $/TB for backups and media libraries
  • ✓Plug-and-play on Windows and macOS
  • ✓Spin-down when idle saves power and wear
  • ✓Drives can be shucked for NAS use

✗ Cons

  • ✗Audible seek noise—consider a pad to damp vibration
  • ✗Speed limited to HDD throughput

Specifications

Capacity8 TB
InterfaceUSB 3.0 (5 Gb/s)
DriveSeagate Barracuda Compute 5400 RPM (shuckable)
Power12V external adapter
Date First AvailableApril 7, 2021

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