SAS Hard Drives on Amazon.co.uk: What They Need and What They Cost per TB

SAS hard drive price on Amazon.co.uk: new drives ranked per TB

This table ranks the new SAS hard drives we match on Amazon.co.uk by pounds per TB, lowest first. It holds 83 rows at this refresh. The lowest is WD RE4 4TB 3.5 inch Enterprise SAS Hard Drive at £30.06/TB, which is £120.25 for the drive. The lowest total outlay is a separate figure, £41.08, because a small drive can cost less overall and more per TB.

A row qualifies because the listing's own interface field reads SAS, not because its line name suggests it. There is no class filter, so 2.5-inch drives and older SAS models rank beside current 3.5-inch ones. Check the capacity and the product name before you treat the top row as a bargain. The Recording column prints a technology only where we hold a document for it, and says not sourced everywhere else.

A listing with no interface recorded cannot match, even where its title says SAS, so a drive missing here is not proof that Amazon.co.uk has none.

Refurbished SAS drives in the UK: start with the used table

Used offers for SAS hard drives sit in their own table, 18 rows at this refresh, with Western Digital WD WUH721818AL5204 18TB SAS 7.2K RPM 512M 0F38353 512e/4Kn S... (used) lowest at £20.50/TB. The table's conditions are New and Used, with no separate refurbished label. So a search for a refurbished SAS hard drive starts here, and the Amazon.co.uk listing behind each row is where a seller describes the drive in its own words.

16TB, 20TB and 24TB SAS drives on Amazon.co.uk

Exact-capacity searches behave differently from the main tables, because each rests on far fewer listings. At 16 TB the SAS query returns 0 in-stock rows at this refresh, new and used together, so we print the number and no table. If it rises above zero, those rows appear in the two tables above, each with its own condition and price. Seagate's Exos sheet lists the 16 TB SAS parts as ST16000NM007H (standard), ST16000NM005H (SED) and ST16000NM006H (SED-FIPS), so those are the strings to look for in the Part number column.

At 20 TB the table holds 2 rows, lowest £52.90/TB. Seagate's 20 TB SAS parts are ST20000NM007H, ST20000NM005H and ST20000NM006H. The fewer the rows, the more one listing leaving stock can change the lowest figure, so treat it as a reading of these rows, not a market price.

At 24 TB the table holds 2 rows, lowest £44.16/TB. Seagate describes the 24TB Exos X24 as a helium 7,200 RPM nearline drive based on CMR, offered with SATA and SAS, in a press release dated 18 October 2023, and its UK support page carries separate product manuals for each interface. The part number in the row settles which one you are looking at. The Exos sheet lists ST24000NM002H as the standard SATA model and ST24000NM007H as the standard SAS model, with ST24000NM005H (SED) and ST24000NM006H (SED-FIPS) also SAS.

The WD part number settles it too. The Ultrastar DC HC590 data sheet prints one pattern, WUH722624ALxxyz, for its 24 TB SATA and SAS versions, and its key decodes the xx segment: E6 means 512e SATA 6 Gb/s and 52 means 512e SAS 12Gb/s.

Buyers not tied to SAS can widen the field through 20TB hard drives and 24TB hard drives before settling on an interface.

SAS hard drive vs SATA: one drive sold both ways

The cleanest test of what the interface changes is one drive sold in both versions. WD's data sheet for the 24 TB Ultrastar DC HC590 gives exactly that, and the port row comes from Seagate's Exos sheet.

The link rate doubles and the sustained rate does not move. On this drive, then, the SAS label buys a faster link and not a faster disk, and on WD's own figures it costs 0.3 W more at idle. Among the additions on Seagate's sheet are a second port and the 520 and 528-byte sector formats. These are maker figures, not our tests. Both Amazon.co.uk tables sit together on SAS vs SATA, filtered to enterprise-class 3.5-inch drives only.

What a SAS drive needs before you buy one

• A SAS controller. Seagate states that SAS drives cannot be plugged into SATA controllers, and that SATA drives may be plugged into SAS controllers. The rule runs one way only.
• The right part. Seagate's sheet splits its 12 TB to 24 TB SAS drives into standard (Instant Secure Erase), SED and SED-FIPS models, each with its own part number.
• A sector format your system accepts. Seagate's SAS table lists 512, 520 and 528 bytes under 512e, and 4,096, 4,160 and 4,224 bytes under 4Kn. WD's HC590 lists 512 under 512e and 4096 under 4Kn. We hold no document on what any particular server requires, so ask its maker.

We have not found a document showing that an adapter, converter, dock or USB reader gets a SAS drive working on other hardware, so this page names none. Named server compatibility is the same: the rule above concerns controllers, and your server's own documentation decides the rest.

What the maker sheets state for SAS hard drives

Seagate's Exos sheet prints the same figures at every SAS capacity from 12 TB to 24 TB: helium sealed, CMR, a maximum sustained rate of 285 MB/s at the outer diameter, 6.5 W average at Idle A, 9.8 W and 8.2 W maximum operating power for random read and write at 4K/16Q, 2,500,000 hours MTBF and 0.35% AFR at full 24x7 operation. On those rows capacity changes nothing, which leaves price per TB as the visible difference.

Below 12 TB, the same sheet lists standard 512e/4Kn SAS models at 10 TB, 8 TB, 6 TB, 4 TB and 2 TB: ST10000NM018B, ST8000NM018B, ST6000NM020B, ST4000NM025B and ST2000NM018B. It also lists 10,000 RPM 12 Gb/s SAS Exos models at 2.4 TB (ST2400MM0129), 1.8 TB (ST1800MM0129), 1.2 TB (ST1200MM0129) and 600 GB (ST600MM0099).

Toshiba's MG Series page gives a range from 1 TB to 24 TB and says the series comes with SATA and SAS interfaces, with every member rated at 550 TB/year. WD lists all four HC590 variants as CMR. For any other row, trust the Recording column over the word CMR in an Amazon title, which is a seller's claim. Line-by-line coverage sits with Seagate Exos, WD Ultrastar and Toshiba MG Series.

Refurbished SAS drives: statutory rights are not the maker's warranty

Two protections get confused here. Statutory rights come from the Consumer Rights Act 2015 and attach to goods a consumer buys from a trader. A limited warranty comes from the maker, on its own terms.

• Right to reject: the short-term right to reject faulty goods bought from a trader runs for 30 days.
• Satisfactory quality: the test takes the price and the description into account where relevant, so a discounted refurbished drive is judged with both in mind.
• Business buyers: the Act defines a consumer as an individual acting wholly or mainly outside their trade, business, craft or profession. A company buying SAS drives for its own server is not covered by consumer rights in the same way.

On the warranty side, Seagate's Exos sheet prints a 5-year limited warranty in every 12 TB to 24 TB SAS column, while its UK support page labels only some Exos X24 models that way, including ST24000NM007H and ST16000NM007H. Toshiba gives the MG Series a 5-year limited warranty, with commitments assuming the workload rating is not exceeded. We have not found a document stating whether either warranty follows a drive sold used, so ask the seller before you rely on it. Refurbished enterprise hard drives widens the used field beyond SAS.