Toshiba HDD - who makes them now? Is it Hitachi?

[tgfyhre]

I'm looking to buy some new 3.5" hard drives for external storage and backup. Right now there are some good prices on Toshiba drives like this:

Amazon.com: Toshiba 4TB SATA 6Gb/s 7200rpm, 128MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Hard Drive (PH3400U-1I72): Computers & Accessories

I'm considering both the 3TB or 4TB. I've read conflicting information about Toshiba. Some say they aquired Hitachi (WD got their 2.5" division and Toshiba got their 3.5" division). Others say that's incorrect, and Toshiba just got one of Hitachi's plants in China (one that got hit by the flooding). Then others say that isn't true either.

So what's the real story? I've read lots of information that consistently say how reliable the Hitachi drives were in recent years, so it would be nice to think the Toshiba drives are using Hitcahi technology. I also hear a lot about how unreliable Seagates are. I just hear way too many bad things about Seagate these days to trust them now, so going forward, I'd like to use another brand. I can't afford enterprise drives, so it's really just retail drives for home use I'm looking at. I know there's a million threads discussing hard drives, but I'd like to know really where Toshiba drives come from these days and if they're considered reliable compared to Seagate.

This article is also interesting, as they compare drive reliability using their own tracking.

https://www.backblaze.com/blog/a-look-at-backblazes-toshiba-hard-drives/

 

[tgfyhre]

No info at all on Toshiba drives?

There seems to be a lot of confusion out there on what tech Toshiba is using in their drives. I've heard Western Digital and I've also heard Hitachi. Can anybody offer any info on Toshiba drives?

 

[Indianatone]

I know Toshiba make their own SSD drives as Toshiba is a huge memory manufacturer and they do indeed make their own hard drives. In January 2009, Toshiba acquired the HDD business of Fujitsu.[11][12]
If it helps you any I have 3 256GB SSD Toshiba drives and 1 3TB external drive which has been flawless. I have had many (4) Seagate drives fail just out of warranty and my neck has been saved by the HD Sentinal program several times. Nowadays I buy Western Digital, Toshiba SSD and Kingston SSD drives.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toshiba

 

[tgfyhre]

So then Toshiba mechanical hard drives are actually Fujitsu drives? Are those considered reliable drives? I don't know anything about Fujitsu drives.

 

[Andyrids]

Every Seagate 3.5 I had has failed rapidly... Older Toshiba's were temperamental (not sure what they are like now) Western Digital is all I use since a long time apparently the read write times on them is a tiny bit slower than others but in my opinion it's not noticeable and the reliability far out-weight's that anyway... Currently using WD 7,5000 750gb Black one's and using the Blue's for backups, Black is worth the bit extra money.

 

[tgfyhre]

Does anybody have any experience with owning newer Toshiba desktop drives? What is their track record? I bought 2 thinking that they were using Hitachi technology (I thought they had acquired some of Hitachi's tech), but I guess they're using Fujitsu, not Hitachi?

 

[Indianatone]

I have one Toshiba 3 TB drive as an external backup device and it has been fine. Like all hard drives they fail. As long as you have a backup of the data then you will be OK. The only certain thing in life is death and taxes along with hard drive failure.