Seagate Expansion 2TB USB 3.0 3.5" Desktop External Hard Drive STEB2000100

Pros: I still think this is a good drive but I dropped a star for heat problem.

Cons: No fan for cooling down this drive in my opinion is going to create problems in stability in the future. I just copied a 100 gig file over to this drive and it reached 50c. I just added a fan to the top of enclosure and it is idle at 29c now.I will update at a later date with more updates.

Overall Review: Still a good price for the size of this drive.

Pros: First off, it has a nice design that blends into your desk without sticking out like a sore thumb. It is extremely quiet even while transferring files. My older Freeagent drive is noticeably louder because it clicks and then spools up...this one makes no noise at all that I can hear. As far as speed, writing a large video file to the drive using USB 3.0 port bounces between 190MB/sec and 210MB/sec. Transferring the same file back to my SATA 6.0Gb/sec internal drive it bounces between 300MB/sec and 350MB/sec. If this drive holds up, it is way faster than any other external mechanical drive I have owned.

Cons: The only con I can come up with is the USB 3.0 cord is only 3 feet long...your computer better be directly under where you place this on your desk, or it won't reach!

Overall Review: Seems to be a very solid, fast-performing drive.

Pros: Plug and play simple setup Internal drive: Seagate ST2000DM001 which uses 1 TB platters The activity light is a dull blue that isn’t bothersome or overly bright while in use The setup.exe file on the drive loads a page to register your drive with Seagate very easily and quickly. Performance results: Crystal Disk Mark: • Sequential: Read = 190.0 MB/s, Write = 146.9 MB/s • 512k: Read = 64.21 MB/s, Write = 95.23 MB/s • 4k: Read = 0.752 MB/s, Write = 6.547 MB/s • 4k QD32: Read = 0.638 MB/s, Write = 7.896 MB/s ATTO Disk Benchmark: • Read: 190.88 MB/sec • Write: 155.32 MB/sec HD Tune • Minimum: 88.0 MB/s • Maximum: 153.26 MB/s • Average: 109.9 MB/s • Access Time: 14.7 ms • Burst Rate: 122.2 MB/s Power Consumption • Idle – 5.2 Watts • Load – 8.6 Watts Maximum Temperature while testing: 107.6 °F

Cons: The drive makes a noticeable and possibly annoying humming sound when powered on. No rubber feet on either side for horizontal placement only vertical. One year warranty isn’t very good considering if you bought the internal drive this unit utilizes it would have a 2 year warranty. Wish they used a regular USB type B instead of a micro type B as the micro version is very weak, flimsy and easily broken compared to the non-micro version. As others have stated a power button would be a nice change to this device as it just powers on once you plug in the USB cable. So if it stays at one computer it’s always going to be on with your computer which may or may not be desirable.

Overall Review: Overall this external drive offers very good performance for reads and writes in a pleasant looking and small package. I would definitely recommend this drive if you have a USB 3.0 connection as it gets the job done well at an affordable price. *All tests were conducted three times to ensure accuracy and repeatability of results.

Pros: The Seagate Expansion 2TB USB 3.0 drive is a fantastic unit. With digital photos, games, movies, tv shows, mobile device backups, and much more to store on modern-day machines, it's nice to know that you can plug in a drive as additional storage or for redundancy of data as is my case. This drive is advertised as working with Windows 8/8.1 but it's a USB controller connected to an HDD so it will work with any machine with a USB port regardless of OS. The drive runs cool to the touch even when running my Mac OS X Time Machine backups. I also transferred 1.2TB of data in bulk between my machine and then copied all of the data onto other redundant storage --the transfer was exceptionally quick. I was actually surprised how fast the drive read and wrote over USB 3.0 since it is a standard spindle drive and not an SSD. The unit is simple, plug it in, format to desired file system, and off you go. I've reformatted this unit 5 times now (Mac OS Journaled, Mac OS Journaled Case Senstive, exfat, FAT, and NTFS) and each iteration worked as expected. I ran CCleaner's free space cleaning on the device and it performs as well as internal drives on most of my other machines. Would definitely buy a higher capacity drive in the future should the need arise. A+, Seagate!

Cons: No native ability to upgrade/replace drive. I'm sure you could pop the unit open and put in a new HDD if you wanted to increase capacity or replace it with solid state storage but that's a known factor going into purchasing this unit and not worth taking away any stars. The only real complaint I have is the size of the power plug. The transformer is enclosed in the plug itself which means the plug becomes a huge monstrosity taking up multiple slots on my power strip. Having the plug either be modular (think laptop power supply) or formatted like a slim plug adapter (eg. macbook pro charger/netgear power plugs) such that the unit would only take up one space and just would end up being tall, this would be much better.

Overall Review: Overall I'm very happy with the unit. I currently just leave it as extra storage on my CloudStation NAS which seems to be the best use for me. The CloudStation has 2.0TB as well, so this is a simple redundant drive. I would definitely recommend these units to friends and family looking to expand storage capacity on a laptop or otherwise.

Pros: * Performs as fast as internal Hard Drive * Quiet Operation * Inconspicuous Design

Cons: * Only a 1 year warranty * Lack of power button * Proprietary USB cable

Overall Review: The Seagate STEB2000100 appears to be a solid offering from Seagate. Packaging was good. It has a plain exterior which blends in and the LED light is not to bright. There is venting that allows for decent cooling, I personally never saw over 45C temps during testing with extended file transfers. Performance is very similar to my 2TB Seagate internal drive. Pushing a couple dozen large 8-12GB files, both drives sustained average 95-105 MB/sec transfer speeds. Synthetic benchmarks show performance similarities: SEAGATE STEB2000100 External Drive: * MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s] Sequential Read : 181.839 MB/s Sequential Write : 129.614 MB/s Random Read 512KB : 51.059 MB/s Random Write 512KB : 74.765 MB/s Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.487 MB/s [ 118.8 IOPS] Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 7.384 MB/s [ 1802.7 IOPS] Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 0.592 MB/s [ 144.5 IOPS] Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 0.927 MB/s [ 226.3 IOPS] Test : 1000 MB [I: 0.4% (7.0/1863.0 GB)] (x5) SEAGATE 2TB SATA3 Internal Drive: * MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s] Sequential Read : 176.721 MB/s Sequential Write : 169.357 MB/s Random Read 512KB : 48.094 MB/s Random Write 512KB : 65.060 MB/s Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.377 MB/s [ 92.1 IOPS] Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 0.850 MB/s [ 207.5 IOPS] Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 0.861 MB/s [ 210.2 IOPS] Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 0.866 MB/s [ 211.4 IOPS] Test : 1000 MB [D: 11.3% (209.7/1863.0 GB)] (x5) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Overall, I am pleased with the drive. My only complaints are the short warranty period, lack of a power button and the proprietary USB connection that plugs into the drive instead of a standard USB 3.0 for both ends. The price of $89 is fair for the capacity and performance.

Pros: Great drive. Seagate reliability. Fully compatible with Dish Network DVRs for external storage. The Seagate STEB2000100 *does* come with its own external power supply. It does *not* rely on the USB cable for power. (For those who are wondering, that's a requirement for Dish Network compatibility.)

Cons: No cons. I suppose no matter how good a mechanical hard drive is there will always be some duds, but the two I bought are working flawlessly.

Overall Review: I hope Seagate keeps making these. Dish Network boxes won't recognize external drives over 2 TB (I assume because of the problem that older computer BIOS have recognizing larger drives).

Pros: I’ve had quite a few of the earlier models of these drives deployed for years without any problems. Even though they’re Fanless, they run cool. Hopefully the new Vertical standing models with the different venting will also.

Cons: None

Overall Review: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Response from Seagate Support re the Server2008/Win7 Backup 4K Sector Issue: I understand your concern because the Windows Backup utility is not compatible with drives using 4K sectors. It is correct, we do not offer a utility to convert a drive from 4K to 512e. The incompatibility is an issue with the software and one that Microsoft chooses not to fix until later releases of the Operating System. If you are concerned about compatibility with the native backup, I would recommend our newest line of Expansion drives. These units are 512e out of the box, for customers who have Windows OSs, with the backup utility that could not save to 4K drives. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I have since deployed these new series Model STEB2000100 2TB units on a Server 2008R2 system, they are 512e and the built-in Windows Server Backup is working flawlessly. Also, I have just purchased a pair of the 3TB units Model STEB3000100 (as I presume they’re 512e too) for another 2008R2 system and if I encounter any problem with those & Windows Server Backup I will update this review accordingly.

Pros: Quiet operation LED isn't bright - no distraction Plenty fast through USB 3.0

Cons: No power button Could use a longer USB cable since it runs off AC power

Overall Review: I don't have any problems with this drive. I was aware of the cons when purchasing. Basically it just works and I don't have to worry about it.