Western Digital has started shipping its first 3TB drives and not a moment too soon. Seagate has already introduced external 3TB drives, but WD is the first company to offer plain 3.5-drives in retail.

WD managed to squeeze 750GB on a single platter and the first 3TB drives will be part of WD's power efficient Caviar Green series. In addition to the 3TB model, the company will also offer a 2.5TB version, in case you don't like nice, round numbers. Mind you, the 2.5TB version seems like a better deal, as its MSRP is £155 versus £195 for the 3TB behemoth.

Of course, bear in mind that both drives are larger than 2.19TB, which means they won't run on all operating systems without some tweaks. You can find out more about the new drives and the 2.19TB SATA barrier here.