[SOLVED] WD Gold 2TB 3.5" Internal HDD

[THRobinson]

Hey guys... I have a Seagate Barracuda (st2000dm006) under 4yrs old and already has bad clusters and causing me issues.

Looks like there are a lot of levels of drives to choose from and from what I'm reading I think I need to move up to an Enterprise level drive.

Price/reviews have me looking at the WD GOLD 2TB WD2005FBYZ... however, on Amazon.ca I looked at the 1-star reviews and read

"All 8 WD Gold 2TB drives shipped with buggy firmware that could only run the drives at half of the specified speed. These drives are rated for Sata III 6.0 Gbps, but were running at 3.0 Gbps. The firmware could not be patched. This cost us a lot of time and money to troubleshoot, and to go through the RMA process with WD (including paying for shipping one way, and time to remove the drives from the server, package and transport them to our local FedEx shipping center), and countless headaches along the way "

This still an issue?

 

[fzabkar]

The maximum sustained interface transfer rate is 200 MB/s. That wouldn't saturate a 3Gbps link, let alone 6Gbps.

WD Gold EX1000M Datacenter Capacity HDD Technical Reference Manual, WD2005FBYZ & WD1005FBYZ :
http://wfcache.advantech.com/www/certified-peripherals/documents/96hd1tb-st-wd7ke1_datasheet.pdf (page 15)

 

[USAFRet]

That is not buggy firmware, that is a physical limitation of spinning drives.

You will never get close to SATA III speed. That is there in the marketing text, just because.
As stated above, you won't even saturate SATA II.

 

[fzabkar]

This is what a particular Seagate model reports via its serial diagnostic port during spin-up:

https://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=41534&mobile=desktop

Spin Up
RECOV Servo Op=0900 Resp=0005
(P) SATA Reset
PASS
6Gb Max Speed lowered to 3Gb for Intel bug

It would appear that some Intel SATA controllers have some kind of 6Gbps bug.

 

[THRobinson]

Hmm... so basically like running a USB2.0 device on a USB3.0 port... yeah it works on USB3.0 but it ain't gonna go that fast.

Should I look at something else?

Again, the 25% of my drive not for storage is constant read/write almost 24/7 so, I think a basic desktop drive like my current Barracuda won't be an ideal choice. I think enterprise is the way to go? Maybe? Should I look at another brand? I'm on a bit of a budget so hoping to keep it around the $150CAD price like the WD GOLD 2TB I was looking at.

 

[USAFRet]

Hmm... so basically like running a USB2.0 device on a USB3.0 port... yeah it works on USB3.0 but it ain't gonna go that fast.

Should I look at something else?

Again, the 25% of my drive not for storage is constant read/write almost 24/7 so, I think a basic desktop drive like my current Barracuda won't be an ideal choice. I think enterprise is the way to go? Maybe? Should I look at another brand? I'm on a bit of a budget so hoping to keep it around the $150CAD price like the WD GOLD 2TB I was looking at.

Spinning HDD is spinning HDD.
It will never be as fast as SATA III.

Be careful of thinking "Enterprise" is automatically better. Right now, I have a 16TB Toshiba Enterprise on its way back to Tosh for warranty replacement. 7 months old.

Of my last 3 dead HDDs....1x Seagate, 1x WD, 1x Toshiba.
There is no singular brand that is more, or less, immune to a particular drive dying. And they are all around the same annualized fail rate..maybe 1-2%.

 

[THRobinson]

Hmm... true... I have a few drives a decade old, use to be my primary HDD, then removed and put into another PC when I upgraded and now used daily on another computer. This Seagate lasted less than 4yrs. Same with my media player before I switched to a 2-drive NAS.

I understand that things fail when they fail, but, chances of failure I hope are slimmer given the 550tb/yr workload, vs I think my Seagate was around 80tb/yr or something?

I'd rather another Barracuda because $60CAD vs $150CAD... though I guess mine isn't available anymore. I think mine was 1 platter not multiple. ST2000DM006 versus what I'm finding now, the ST2000DM008.

 

[USAFRet]

Hmm... true... I have a few drives a decade old, use to be my primary HDD, then removed and put into another PC when I upgraded and now used daily on another computer. This Seagate lasted less than 4yrs.

Time line of those 3 deaders...
Seagate - Some years
WD - 5 weeks
Toshiba - 7 months

Other drives I have are 10-15 years old...a couple 20+.
Other drives between 1-7 years old, and still running just fine.

 

[THRobinson]

Hmm... I'm starting to think specs are to be ignored... I should focus on the fact that my Seagate had a 2yr warranty, and the WD Gold has a 5yr. 😀

 

[USAFRet]

Hmm... I'm starting to think specs are to be ignored... I should focus on the fact that my Seagate had a 2yr warranty, and the WD Gold has a 5yr. 😀

YES!
The warranty period is a MAJOR consideration.

 

[THRobinson]

Well, getting worse so pulling the trigger on the WD BLUE...

I figured regardless which I buy, likely it'll die after the warranty is gone anyways. The WD BLUE has 256mb cache vs what I have now which is 64mb so maybe a small improvement.

Really came down to price versus warranty.

Current sale price of the WD BLUE 2TB is $60, and the WD GOLD 2TB is $140 (Canadian).

So, basically paying $30/yr for 2yr warranty on the Blue, and $28/yr warranty on the Gold. No real guarantee one will outlast the other... and if both die after warranty gone, who cares, basically looking at the same price for the drive. And if it lasts 4yrs like mine did, the price in 4yrs will probably be cheaper.