Question Spooky sounds from Western Digital HDD (My Book Duo Raid 1 w/ WD Red Plus 2x8TB)

[A Furry Peanut]

So I got WD My Book Duo a long time ago which came with 2x WD Red 4TB. So far no issues. I recently decided to upgrade it to 2x WD Red Plus 8TB. I used WD Drive Utilities' "Drive Status Check", "Quick Drive Test", and "Complete Drive Test" on each of these drives and they both passed all the tests. However, after I set it to RAID 1 and started backing up my data it started making spooky sounds. I know hard drives are mechanical so noise is inevitable, but I've never heard these sounds before so I am a bit worried. So far I've recorded three different sounds its made. Are these sounds normal?

0:00 - 0:10: sound 1

0:10 - 0:40: sound 2

0:40 - 0:51: sound 3

I'm using Acronis True Image for Western Digital for my backup. WD Security, WD Utility, and Acronis True Image for Western Digital are up to date and I am on Windows 11 24h2.

Edit:
System Info
PSU: Lian Li EDGE 1000W 80+ Platinum
MB: ASRock Phantom Gaming X870E Nova WiFi (bios 3.30, chipset 7.06)
CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 7950X
GPU: MSI EXPERT GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER 16 GB
RAM: Corsair Vengeance RGB (4 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL30 Memory
* The RAM was two sets of 2x16 GB DDR5, EXPO has been turned on in the BIOS*

Storage:
Samsung 990 Pro 1TB (20% full)
Samsung 990 Pro 4TB (46% full)
Samsung 990 Evo 1TB (17% full)
Samsung 990 Evo Plus 2TB (13% full).
*Samsung Magician's Full Scan and Extended SMART Self-test also shows no errors*

All of the above parts are around 6 - 24 months old, purchased new and imo I think I've taken good care of them so their condition should still be "good".

Backup Storage:
WD My Book Duo enclosure is probably 5+ years old at this point. Although the 2x8TB WD Red Plus drives were purchased within the last three months.
WD My Book Duo enclosure comes with RAID 0, RAID 1, or JBOD. I don't know if this is a hardware thing in their enclosure or a software thing in their WD Drive Utilities. I'm hoping to use RAID 1 for backup and currently both 8TB Red Plus drives have been formatted so they are effectively empty.

Connected peripherals:
Logitech mouse
Corsair keyboard
Razer speaker
Wifi dongle
2 monitors connected to GPU

OS: Windows 11 Pro 24h2, Build 26100.4652

 

[Ralston18]

Update your post to include full system hardware specs and OS information.

Include PSU: make, model, wattage, age, condition (original to build, new, refurbished, used)?

Disk drive(s): make, model, capacity, how full?

List of all connected peripherals.

= = = =

What is driving the requirement to use RAID 1?

 

[A Furry Peanut]

Update your post to include full system hardware specs and OS information.

Include PSU: make, model, wattage, age, condition (original to build, new, refurbished, used)?

Disk drive(s): make, model, capacity, how full?

List of all connected peripherals.

= = = =

What is driving the requirement to use RAID 1?

ok I have updated my post, hopefully I was able to give more helpful information.

 

[Misgar]

I don't like the sound of those drives either. Very odd.

Would it be possible to remove the 8TB drives from the RAID enclosure and connect them directly to SATA ports in a desktop PC.

If they make the same strange noises, the RAID enclosure is less likely to be bad.

If they run virually silently in the desktop, check to see if the MyBook Duo is guaranteed to work with 8TB drives. It might be limited to smaller capacities with the current firmware.

I'm hoping to use RAID 1 for backup

Repeat after me "RAID is not a backup". It would be better if you kept the two 8TB drives in different systems.

As others will tell you, committing data to a pair of mirrored drives does not guarantee data integrity.

If one drive goes bad, what's to stop the other drive developing similar fauits, especially if they're from the same batch. It's not unknown for drives to fail in a cascade.

If your computer is hit by Ransomware and it encrypts the RAID enclosure, both copies will be affected. If you accidentally delete a folder full of files, both copies will be deleted. If the RAID enclosure's PSU goes bang, it could kill both drives.

A proper "backup" entails keeping multiple copies on different devices/media, with at least one copy disconnected most of the time. An off-site copy guards against fire/flood/burglary.

I keep at least 3 copies of all important files in separate systems, in some cases 6 copies. My isolated backups are on 800GB tapes with the write-protect tab clicked over to "read only".

 

[USAFRet]

Repeat after me "RAID is not a backup". It would be better if you kept the two 8TB drives in different systems.

QFT