Seagate today announced its highest capacity conventional magnetic recording (CMR) hard drive at the NAB 2023 conference. The long-awaited IronWolf Pro 22TB has hit the retail market. $399.99 (opens in new tab)That’s well below the drive’s suggested retail price of $599.99.
SSDs are getting faster and larger, but hard drives are still the most affordable medium for storing large amounts of data. Seagate’s IronWolf Pro drives for Network Attached Storage (NAS) and Direct Attached Storage (DAS) devices are his one of the most popular options on the market. The manufacturer expands the IronWolf Pro lineup to 22 TB, giving consumers even more storage for their valuable data.
The IronWolf Pro 22TB (ST22000NT001) comes in a traditional 3.5 inch form factor with a SATA III connector for communicating with the host system. A helium-filled hard drive consists of 10 platters and 20 attached heads. With a spindle speed of 7,200 RPM, the IronWolf Pro 22TB uses 512MB of cache to deliver sustained transfer rates of up to 285 MB/s. Additionally, this drive boasts a user workload rate of up to 550 TB per year. The IronWolf Pro 22TB is 7.5% faster than the WD Red Pro 22TB and has an 83.3% higher WRL.
The IronWolf Pro 22TB equips the IronWolf Pro 22TB with a Rotational Vibration (RV) sensor to reduce vibration. The drive idles at 20 dBA, but the noise level jumps to about 26 dBA during active seek operations. On paper, it’s quieter than the WD Red Pro 22TB. However, the IronWolf Pro 22TB oscillates between 30 dBA and 34 dBA noise levels, making it audible under heavy workloads.
The IronWolf Pro 22TB idle and active power consumption is 6W and 7.9W respectively. Idle power consumption is almost double that of WD Red Pro 22TB. IronWolf Pro 22TB’s active power consumption is also 16.2% higher.
| Header Cell – Column 0 | WD Gold 22TB | Iron Wolf Pro 22TB | WD Red Pro 22TB | WD Purple Pro 22TB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| maximum. Sustained Transfer Rate (MB/s) | 291 | 285 | 265 | 265 |
| Cache (MB) | 512 | 512 | 512 | 512 |
| Workload Rate Limit (WRL) | 550 | 550 | 300 | 550 |
| Idle mode (dBA) | 20 | 20 | 20 | 20 |
| Seek mode (dBA) | 32 | 26 | 32 | 32 |
| Idle power (W) | 5.7 | 6.0 | 3.4 | 5.6 |
| Active power (W) | 7.1 | 7.9 | 6.8 | 6.9 |
Seagate is a little behind the 22 TB party. The 22 TB drives in Western Digital’s Purple Pro (surveillance), Gold (enterprise), and Red Pro (NAS) portfolios have been on the retail market since last year. The IronWolf Pro 22TB has an official suggested retail price of $599.99, similar to its rivals.However, Newegg currently offers the IronWolf Pro 22TB $399.99 (opens in new tab), down from the regular list price of $479.99. It’s unclear if the retailer got the pricing wrong or if he’s running a special promotion to coincide with the launch of the IronWolf Pro 22TB.
At $399.99, the IronWolf Pro 22TB is only $70 more than the 20TB model ($329.99 (opens in new tab)). This means you are paying $18.18 per terabyte. This is great if you need plenty of storage. At current prices, the IronWolf Pro 22TB is cheaper than its direct competitor, the WD Red Pro 22TB. $498.88 (opens in new tab)Like its competitors, Seagate backs the IronWolf Pro 22TB with a 5-year limited warranty.
