Question HDD failed after 2.5 years: Which new HDD to pick?

[WhatIsAMobo]

My Seagate Barracuda 2TB (st2000dm008) is failing after 2.5 years of use. Its a shame because its one of the biggest drives I got on my PC and I have HDD going for twice as long than this drive and hopefully continue to do. CDI shown a Current Pending Sector Count and Uncorrectable Sector Count of 20 each: https://imgur.io/yByjzFe

People suggested to backup my files and thats what I ve been doing, but the Ext Hard Drive I ve got had less than 800 GB left and the failing drive has over a TB being used. So I m being selective and looking how to make budget to have more backup options.

I ve thought of buying a WD Red Pro (4TB at least). Was suggested to me because it was CMR, had 7200 RPM and I should be able to continue with similar performance compared to my failing drive. What do you guys think? I know these drives are meant for an NAS, not a desktop, and to be run 24/7.

My question is: will a WD Red Pro survive the daily shutdown of a Desktop PC? I turn it on and off basically everyday, when I wake up and when I go to sleep. I ve been reading about it and I couldnt find a consensus on whether it was ok to buy one of these for desktop or not.

I ll be reading your thoughts! Thanks in advance.

 

[USAFRet]

There is no universal - "This drive is better than all the others and will never ever die"

ALL drives are subject to fail.
My most recent was a 14TB Toshiba Enterprise. Died at 7 months old.
Went from perfectly fine to 14,000+ bad sectors in about a week.

All you can do is maintain a good backup routine, and replace a dead drive when it happens.

 

[WhatIsAMobo]

There is no universal - "This drive is better than all the others and will never ever die"

ALL drives are subject to fail.
My most recent was a 14TB Toshiba Enterprise. Died at 7 months old.
Went from perfectly fine to 14,000+ bad sectors in about a week.

All you can do is maintain a good backup routine, and replace a dead drive when it happens.

Which one would you recommend in your personal opinion? I use it to store videos, programs and many many games that I dont mind running them on a HDD.
As a second question: Would a CMR HDD at 5400 RPM be faster than a SMR HDD at 7200 RPM?

 

[USAFRet]

Which one would you recommend in your personal opinion? I use it to store videos, programs and many many games that I dont mind running them on a HDD.
As a second question: Would a CMR HDD at 5400 RPM be faster than a SMR HDD at 7200 RPM?

CMR, ignore rotational speed.
SMR should be for cold storage only.

The WD Red should be fine.

 

[NeoMorpheus]

I had terrible luck with WD reds in my NAS and even worse with their customer service (they claimed the drives were counterfeit and after that, they simply stopped responding).

So I started buying IronWolfs and never had an issue.

 

[WhatIsAMobo]

CMR, ignore rotational speed.
SMR should be for cold storage only.

The WD Red should be fine.

Despite frequent shutdowns? I m worried because there wasnt consensus on whether shutting down constantly a NAS drive was good or no. Because that is what would mean being part of my Desktop PC.

 

[WhatIsAMobo]

I had terrible luck with WD reds in my NAS and even worse with their customer service (they claimed the drives were counterfeit and after that, they simply stopped responding).

So I started buying IronWolfs and never had an issue.

How long have you had these Ironwolfs? Do you constantly access your files? Thats the use I wanna give it. I access games, videos, images and programs.

 

[USAFRet]

Despite frequent shutdowns? I m worried because there wasnt consensus on whether shutting down constantly a NAS drive was good or no. Because that is what would mean being part of my Desktop PC.

Should be fine.

Like the other person, I also have some 4TB IronWolfs in my NAS.
Just over 6 years of 24/7.

But should be fine in your system.

 

[NeoMorpheus]

How long have you had these Ironwolfs? Do you constantly access your files? Thats the use I wanna give it. I access games, videos, images and programs.

I never turn the NAS off and its accessed regularly, but not that heavy use though.

I have it for a couple of years now and no issues whatsoever .

The monthly reports hasnt report not even one bad cluster.

 

[Eximo]

I bought a 4TB WD Red Plus (CMR) just over a year ago. Primarily media storage but in a system online 24/7. I do let the drive spin down when it wants to so it gets frequent start/stops.

Zero issues to report. Replaced my old 3TB WD Green drive that has been in there about 7 years. You just never know with hard drives.

Back in the early 2000s I had WD drives breaking on me every six months for about two years straight. Switched to Seagate until SSDs started hitting the market at reasonable (at the time) prices.

 

[WhatIsAMobo]

Should be fine.

Like the other person, I also have some 4TB IronWolfs in my NAS.
Just over 6 years of 24/7.

But should be fine in your system.

Then if NAS HDDs arent an issue for Desktop machines, I will consider them even more! Like I said, save a lot of data, thats accessed constantly. Programs, images, tons of videos from projects and ShadowPlay, and games I dont mind running on HDD speeds. I bet they should have more *chance* of lasting longer than this SMR Seagate Barracuda HDD, right?

Something I now recall, and idk if you guys ever heard it (never found a similar sound on Youtube) my HDD emitting a "pulse like" sound. It was like a low pitch pulse (as low as if you were to say the word "pulp"), and it would sound twice whenever I tried to access to folders with several files (before accessing the files/folder, it would sound twice before showing the content). I almost sure it was the Seagate Barracuda one, because it was always the folders on that drive.
Now each time I turn the computer I hear one of those pulses. I ve never heard an HDD make a sound like that. Despite them being there from the start, in my previous CDI runs the drive seemed perfectly fine. Wonder what could ve been.

I appreciate so far all the insight and shared thoughts. I m gonna evaluate prices between SG Ironwolf and WD Red Plus/Pro (always making sure is cmr)
Is it worth it Ironwolf Pro over regular Ironwolf?

 

[WhatIsAMobo]

I never turn the NAS off and its accessed regularly, but not that heavy use though.

I have it for a couple of years now and no issues whatsoever .

The monthly reports hasnt report not even one bad cluster.

You have regular Ironwolfs or the pro version? I think I might go for the Pro version solely because of 5 year warranty.

 

[NeoMorpheus]

You have regular Ironwolfs or the pro version? I think I might go for the Pro version solely because of 5 year warranty.

Regular IronWolfs.

 

[faalin]

Ive had 3 6tb WD red's, 1 a red 2 red pro's since 2018. This year i upgraded them to 6 18tb WD red Pro's, my computer gets left on 24/7 as well.

I do have 4 8tb ironwolfs in my ubiquiti NVR since 2020