Seagate launch 3TB Barracuda XT

[CougTek]

3TB for everyone, including XP users, thanks to DiscWizard. Assuming you're willing to spend 280$ for it.

Seagate is now shipping a 3TB drive that offers users an easy way to overcome the 2TB barrier without purchasing extra hardware or software.

[...]

However, the (3.5-inch) Barracuda XT includes free DiscWizard software, which painlessly allows the OS and device drivers to access a full 3TB of capacity on legacy systems using Windows XP and PC BIOS, as well as on personal computers equipped with newer versions of Windows or the new UEFI BIOS.

The 3TB Barracuda XT also features a 64MB cache, a Serial ATA 6Gb/s interface, and a speed of 7200RPM.

Source

 

[LunarMist]

Does the Wizard create a drive overlay of sorts?

 

[Bozo]

There are a few gotchas

From Seagate:

Compatibility Highlights

• If your system uses the Intel RST driver, your 3TB disk drive may appear to be 800GB. See our support article about the Intel RST driver.
• System memory requirement is 1GB and higher for 32-bit systems and 2GB and higher for 64-bit systems.
• Seagate DiscWizard software installs a device driver to achieve full capacity on Legacy BIOS systems.
• Windows systems with legacy BIOS using DiscWizard will need two partitions on the boot drive to achieve full capacity.
• Windows 7 and Vista native support for 3TB non-booting data drives is with GPT partitions, available on all systems.
• Windows 7 and Vista native support for booting 3TB is on UEFI BIOS systems and using GPT partitions only.

 

[CougTek]

• Windows 7 and Vista native support for booting 3TB is on UEFI BIOS systems and using GPT partitions only.

ie - You need an LGA1155 or newer, which are currently unavailable. However, I don't see a situation where booting from a 3TB hard drive wouldn't be dumb.

 

[LunarMist]

What is this BIOS they keep talking about, the one on system board? Ibn that case, does it all only apply to the ICH drives? What about the normal usage of hard drives on SAS/SATA RAID controllers?