Dell 342-2340 3TB 7200 RPM Serial Attached SCSI 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare Drive

Pros: Almost 1/2 of the cost of buying them from Dell directly. Wish they were 15k rpm like the smaller, <1tb drives.

Cons: I ordered 4 of these drives for a R710. 2 were dead out of the box. I put them in the server and the perc controller didn't see 2 of them. Swapped them to a different slot for the other drives, and still the same 2 drives were not picked up. Put the old drives in the server and all was ok. I did notice that the other 2 drives had different labels, so maybe they came from a different batch or bad firmware. No LEDs came on for these drives. Currently waiting for them to be RMAed and swapped. Meanwhile I have a down server. Adding more insult i paid for overnight shipping because I needed them in a hurry.

Pros: High capacity Enterprise, near-line storage compatible with Dell servers. Equipped with Hot-plug, removable drive tray specifically for Dell servers.

Cons: According to the Dell tech I spoke with (after observing that my Dell T310 server equipped with a PERC 6/i adapter was reporting that the drive "failed"), the drive is not compatible with that particular PERC adapter. Symptoms include inserting drive, powering on (or hot-plugging the drive) green flashing light, then a very brief period of a solid green light, then continuous flashing amber light. If your server is so equipped, the LED display on the front of the case will also glow amber.

Overall Review: According to the Dell person I spoke with, the PERC 6/i adapter (in my T310 server) only supports drives up to 2.2TB. If you are purchasing this 3TB drive, I strongly recommend contacting Dell to verify compatibility with your server (particularly older servers) prior to purchase.