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I was looking for some 8TB m2 drives recently and they are still surprisingly expensive, considering you can get 2TB ones on sale for less than $100. But there

I was looking for some 8TB m2 drives recently and they are still surprisingly expensive, considering you can get 2TB ones on sale for less than $100. But there are barely any options too, still a niche market https://pcpartpicker.com/products/internal-hard-drive/#A=6000000000000,22000000000000&c1=di_m2.pcie_40_x4 https://pcpartpicker.com/products/internal-hard-drive/#A=600...

ipqk 3y ago
Those $100 2TB drives are probably because of this: https://www.theverge.com/22291828/sandisk-extreme-pro-portable-my-passport-failure-continued https://www.theverge.com/22291828/sandisk-extreme-pro-portab...
- tehwebguy 3y ago
  I see Samsung 2TB drives on sale for around $100 periodically, are they subject to the same problem?
  - WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
    Samsung drives have been fairly bulletproof, even among their budget offerings. I've recently had an unexpected run of failing WD Blue SSDs and just had a new Sandisk drive (not one from gparent) fail, right after I backed another drive up to it.
- haunter 3y ago
  Not sure. Samsung, WD, SK hynix 2TB drives are regularly on sale around ~$100 https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapcsales/search?sort=new&restrict_sr=on&q=flair%3ASSD%2B-%2BM.2 https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapcsales/search?sort=new&restr...
- chazeon 3y ago
  I also had a problem with Sandisk 2TB portable SSD. But it dies for a few days and comes back. It's wired. I will not keep anything important in that drive after this incident.
  - justinclift 3y ago
    Have you checked if there are available firmware updates for your model?
- splix 3y ago
  Btw, since the thread is about both Samsung and SanDisk now, I can tell a personal experience with both regarding the same kind of issue. I had the exact same problem with SanDisk as explained in The Verge article. I had it in January, before it became a known major issue, so I guess they were not prepared for that. However, the process was smooth enough, and I just filled a ticket with details, received a couple of questions, send it to their service center and received a new one later. It works fine now. But I had a similar situation with Samsung SSD too, it died after a couple of months. But they made it impossible to replace it. The process is so bad that I was never able to get into any support for that case, and never received any meaningful response. So I just gave up eventually, so I guess I just donated few hundred dollars to Samsung.
- Denote6737 3y ago
  Sounds like someone is salty over not following 3-2-1 backups.
- oneTbrain23 3y ago
  I had that Sandisk 3 years ago. Same thing happened to me. Lost a lot of data. Now, I banned anything by Sandisk and even evangelized anything but Sandisk - probably a couple 10mils of Sandisk revenue averted. I'm surprised, 3 years after, Sandisk SSD extreme STILL has same problem. Now probably easier to say "I told you so".
httpz 3y ago
I think with the rise of streaming and cloud storage, the need for large storage devices on a personal level is really declining for most people.
- mikysco 3y ago
  Why the downvotes? This is observably true “for most people”
  - earthscienceman 3y ago
    This is bizarre to me. Cloud storage kills the need for small drives. So for the individual with modest storage needs, the cloud is relatively inexpensive and thought free. But the moment you get over 2TB the cloud gets extremely expensive. So if you're a person who needs to store a lot, large drives make a lot of sense. This to me, it's the opposite of observably true. You would think large drives would be most in demand for personal use.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
      Naive question: Does the decline of smaller local storage undermine economies of scale that benefited larger local storage?
    - WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
      > Cloud storage kills the need for small drives. I'm not sure that cloud storage kills anything. There's reasonable mistrust in it and much of the world lives with unreliable infrastructure..
      - prmoustache 3y ago
        Most people aren't able to self-host and maintain a more reliable infra for various reasons: lack of knowledge, lack of free time, they don't necessarily have 2 different houses, lazyness, etc.
    - catchnear4321 3y ago
wtallis 3y ago
Aside from lack of demand, there are some significant technical reasons that contribute to 8TB M.2 drives being expensive niche products, both stemming from the fact that 8TB of flash is still a lot of chips: PC OEMs prefer M.2 SSDs that are single-sided because many thin laptop designs require that, and many low-end SSD controllers literally don't have the pin count necessary to interface with that many flash chips.
- Salgat 3y ago
  The lack of demand vanishes once prices come down to something reasonable.
  - wtallis 3y ago
    I think this might be an appropriate time to make the economist's distinction between the quantity demanded at current prices vs the overall shape and location of the demand curve. Lower prices would shift the market equilibrium to a different point along the demand curve, but there would still be far less demand for 8TB drives than for 1TB drives. Shifting the demand curve itself upward would require something like a big change in usage patterns causing more consumers to need 8TB of local storage. Without such a shift, consumers will mostly be happy to save money on 1-2TB drives rather than move up to higher capacities they don't need.

ipqk 3y ago

Those $100 2TB drives are probably because of this: https://www.theverge.com/22291828/sandisk-extreme-pro-portable-my-passport-failure-continued https://www.theverge.com/22291828/sandisk-extreme-pro-portab...

tehwebguy 3y ago
I see Samsung 2TB drives on sale for around $100 periodically, are they subject to the same problem?
- WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
  Samsung drives have been fairly bulletproof, even among their budget offerings. I've recently had an unexpected run of failing WD Blue SSDs and just had a new Sandisk drive (not one from gparent) fail, right after I backed another drive up to it.
haunter 3y ago
Not sure. Samsung, WD, SK hynix 2TB drives are regularly on sale around ~$100 https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapcsales/search?sort=new&restrict_sr=on&q=flair%3ASSD%2B-%2BM.2 https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapcsales/search?sort=new&restr...
chazeon 3y ago
I also had a problem with Sandisk 2TB portable SSD. But it dies for a few days and comes back. It's wired. I will not keep anything important in that drive after this incident.
- justinclift 3y ago
  Have you checked if there are available firmware updates for your model?
splix 3y ago
Btw, since the thread is about both Samsung and SanDisk now, I can tell a personal experience with both regarding the same kind of issue. I had the exact same problem with SanDisk as explained in The Verge article. I had it in January, before it became a known major issue, so I guess they were not prepared for that. However, the process was smooth enough, and I just filled a ticket with details, received a couple of questions, send it to their service center and received a new one later. It works fine now. But I had a similar situation with Samsung SSD too, it died after a couple of months. But they made it impossible to replace it. The process is so bad that I was never able to get into any support for that case, and never received any meaningful response. So I just gave up eventually, so I guess I just donated few hundred dollars to Samsung.
Denote6737 3y ago
Sounds like someone is salty over not following 3-2-1 backups.
oneTbrain23 3y ago
I had that Sandisk 3 years ago. Same thing happened to me. Lost a lot of data. Now, I banned anything by Sandisk and even evangelized anything but Sandisk - probably a couple 10mils of Sandisk revenue averted. I'm surprised, 3 years after, Sandisk SSD extreme STILL has same problem. Now probably easier to say "I told you so".

httpz 3y ago

I think with the rise of streaming and cloud storage, the need for large storage devices on a personal level is really declining for most people.

mikysco 3y ago
Why the downvotes? This is observably true “for most people”
- earthscienceman 3y ago
  This is bizarre to me. Cloud storage kills the need for small drives. So for the individual with modest storage needs, the cloud is relatively inexpensive and thought free. But the moment you get over 2TB the cloud gets extremely expensive. So if you're a person who needs to store a lot, large drives make a lot of sense. This to me, it's the opposite of observably true. You would think large drives would be most in demand for personal use.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
    Naive question: Does the decline of smaller local storage undermine economies of scale that benefited larger local storage?
  - WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
    > Cloud storage kills the need for small drives. I'm not sure that cloud storage kills anything. There's reasonable mistrust in it and much of the world lives with unreliable infrastructure..
    - prmoustache 3y ago
      Most people aren't able to self-host and maintain a more reliable infra for various reasons: lack of knowledge, lack of free time, they don't necessarily have 2 different houses, lazyness, etc.
  - catchnear4321 3y ago

wtallis 3y ago

Aside from lack of demand, there are some significant technical reasons that contribute to 8TB M.2 drives being expensive niche products, both stemming from the fact that 8TB of flash is still a lot of chips: PC OEMs prefer M.2 SSDs that are single-sided because many thin laptop designs require that, and many low-end SSD controllers literally don't have the pin count necessary to interface with that many flash chips.

Salgat 3y ago
The lack of demand vanishes once prices come down to something reasonable.
- wtallis 3y ago
  I think this might be an appropriate time to make the economist's distinction between the quantity demanded at current prices vs the overall shape and location of the demand curve. Lower prices would shift the market equilibrium to a different point along the demand curve, but there would still be far less demand for 8TB drives than for 1TB drives. Shifting the demand curve itself upward would require something like a big change in usage patterns causing more consumers to need 8TB of local storage. Without such a shift, consumers will mostly be happy to save money on 1-2TB drives rather than move up to higher capacities they don't need.