the drive is bulk storage sitting alongside an existing SSD, where capacity per pound is the only thing that matters.
this is the system drive or the only drive in the machine, where the responsiveness difference is visible every day.
| ST1000DM014 | 1TB SSD | |
|---|---|---|
| Model number | ST1000DM014 | — |
| Capacity | 1TB | — |
| Form factor | 3.5" | — |
| Recording technology | SMR | — |
| Rotational speed | 7200 RPM | — |
| Cache | 256 MB | — |
| Workload rate | 55 TB/yr | — |
| Warranty | 2 years | — |
| Status | Current | — |
Recording technology is highlighted because it is usually the actual differentiator, and each value comes from the manufacturer document linked on that model's page. A dash means the maker does not state that field. Prices are live and exclude out-of-stock listings.
The advice that an SSD is barely more expensive than a hard drive was reasonable in the early 2020s and is no longer true. NAND supply was reallocated toward higher-margin products through 2025 and 2026, consumer flash prices rose sharply, and mechanical drive pricing stayed comparatively stable. The ratio widened rather than continuing to close.
So any guidance telling you to just buy the SSD because the difference is small is quoting a market that has moved, and following it means buying less capacity than you need.
At 1TB specifically the picture is more forgiving than at large capacities, because the absolute difference on a small drive is smaller even when the ratio is not. That is what makes this particular comparison closer than a 12TB one.
The case for flash was never mainly about cost per terabyte, and the shortage clarified that. It is about behaviour under random access.
An operating system, applications and anything doing many small reads and writes are transformed by flash in a way that is obvious to whoever is using the machine. Boot time, application launch, updates and general responsiveness under load all change, and they change for everyone regardless of workload.
There are two other properties worth money in specific cases: no moving parts, so a knock while running does not risk mechanical failure, and no spin-up delay on connection. Both matter more in a portable than a desktop.
What flash does not buy you is capacity per pound, and pretending otherwise in 2026 is the specific error this page exists to correct.
For almost every machine the answer is both, sized for their jobs. Enough SSD for the operating system, applications and the working set you touch regularly, for most people 500GB to 1TB, then mechanical capacity generously, because that is the cheap part.
The arrangement to avoid is a small SSD paired with a small hard drive, which leaves you managing space on both and getting the benefit of neither.
If the budget genuinely allows only one drive at 1TB, buy the SSD if a person sits in front of the machine and the hard drive if it is a storage box. That is a cleaner rule than any price comparison.
One part-number note for the mechanical half: the current 1TB BarraCuda is the shingled ST1000DM014. If the drive might later go into an array, the WD10EZEX is conventionally recorded per WD's own list.
The case against the SSD is that at any capacity above about 1TB the premium stops being a rounding error and starts being the reason you bought a drive that is too small. Buying 1TB of flash when you needed 4TB of storage is a worse outcome than buying 4TB of mechanical storage, and the shortage made that trap easier to fall into. The case against the BarraCuda is that as a system drive it is the single largest avoidable source of sluggishness in a modern machine, and no amount of capacity compensates for a computer that feels slow every day.
For a system drive, yes, and the difference is visible daily. For bulk storage, the NAND shortage widened the price gap and mechanical capacity is now considerably better value than it was. The allocation that works is both, sized for their jobs.
Several times more, and the exact multiple moves with the market, which is why our tables compute it live rather than quoting a fixed figure. The durable point is the direction: the gap widened through the shortage rather than continuing to close.
The SSD if a person sits in front of the machine, the hard drive if it is a storage box. Responsiveness is what flash buys and it is what a user notices; capacity is what mechanical storage buys and it is what a file server needs.
Not for desktop storage, where writes are sequential and reads dominate. It matters if the drive might ever go into an array. If that is a possibility, the WD10EZEX is conventionally recorded per Western Digital's own client list.