The Western Digital warranty options for most of their notebook drives have recently seen a huge cut in their coverage lengths.

Western Digital isn’t alone in its move, however.  Seagate is also reducing many of its drives’ warranties starting in early 2012.  Seagate will be shortening many of its warranties down to as little as one year.  Western Digital is not making as drastic a change with some its plans, but many of its drives too will be heavily reduced.

Western Digital announced that the Caviar Blue, Scorpio Blue and Caviar Green drives will now be issued with a two year warranty down from the three it has received to date.

The reason for the change comes down to reduced competition for the two companies.  Western Digital will be acquiring Hitachi Global Storage Technologies and Seagate recently purchased the Samsung disk-drive division.  It’s believed the reduced competition for the two companies gives them the leeway to be able to make these changes.  The market now appears to be a showdown: seagate vs western digital.

By reducing the Western digital warranty options for many of its drives, the company will be able to increase its bottom-line profits. The extended warranties will apparently be available for many of the models, but they will come with an additional cost to the customer.  For new customers, this means you’ll want to take a careful look at the western digital hard drive warranty you are receiving before you make your purchase.  Seagate rolled out its new changes starting December 31 and Western Digital on January 2nd.

So if you are debating whether to purchase a seagate or western digital drive with a changed warranty, you may want to lean towards the Western Digital model simply because most of its warranty changes are not as drastic as Seagates’.  In the end I wouldn’t necessarily base a purchasing decision purely on a warranty, but it does make you question whether the companies are making the right moves.  After all, a reduction in a warranty could be interpreted as the two companies not trusting their products as much.