Is a 600 RMB New HC620 14TB Drive Worth Buying?

Fri, 17 Mar 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Listing Notes

Main listing keywords included:

3.5-inch hard drive
not usable on Windows, Linux (Ubuntu) only
made in Thailand
brand new

Received Drive Photos and Initial Check

Packaging and appearance looked new. Manufacture date was 2021.

SMART check showed power-on hours = 0 at first boot.

Later recheck on 2023-03-28 (CrystalDiskInfo on Windows 10): Power-on count was 1 and power-on hours still 0.

On Windows, the device could be detected but could not be normally partitioned/formatted for regular usage.

Installation

Physical connector and form factor are standard, so installation is straightforward.

How to Use (Host-Managed/Zoned Disk)

Reference: https://zonedstorage.io/docs/linux/fs

Common filesystems such as ext4/xfs are not suitable here; use zoned-capable filesystems like Btrfs or F2FS.

Btrfs setup

Install tools:

`1`	`sudo apt install btrfs-progs`

Find device:

`1`	`fdisk -l`

Format with zoned option:

`1`	`sudo mkfs.btrfs -O zoned -d single -m single /dev/sda`

Mount:

`1`	`sudo mount /dev/sda /mnt/t`

F2FS setup

Install tools:

1
2

sudo apt-get update -y
sudo apt-get install -y f2fs-tools

Find device:

`1`	`fdisk -l`

Format:

`1`	`mkfs.f2fs -m /dev/sdb`

Mounting Notes

Mounting by UUID/label may fail for some setups (especially with specific zoned+Btrfs combinations).

A reliable method is mounting by disk ID (/dev/disk/by-id/...), usually using WWN:

`1`	`/dev/disk/by-id/wwn-0xxxxxxxxxxxx /mnt/hc620_14T btrfs auto 0 0`

Summary

Pros

The drive looked truly new (possibly old inventory but unused).
Price was very low for capacity.
Suitable as secondary/backup storage in Linux.

Cons

Not practical for normal Windows usage.
Linux support works but feels niche and less plug-and-play.
Host-managed behavior is not ideal for generic NAS scenarios.

References

HC620 product manual
Zoned storage intro

Additional Buying Notes

This kind of low-price HC620 drive is best treated as a special-purpose Linux storage disk rather than a normal desktop hard drive. Confirm that your workload, filesystem, and backup plan can tolerate host-managed/zoned behavior. For ordinary Windows desktops or simple NAS setups, a standard CMR drive is usually easier and safer.

Before putting the disk into real service, run a long SMART test, check the power-on count again after several reboots, and do a sustained write/read test on the chosen Linux filesystem. A cheap large-capacity disk is only useful when its limitations are understood and the data on it is backed up elsewhere.

14tb-Hdd on KnightLi Blog