Western Digital Desktop RAID

[AlexanderDomin]

Hello all,

I built a new rig for gaming and light content creation last December, and I have been very happy with it so far. As expected, my 256GB SSD did not last very long before it was filled to the brim, so now I'm looking for a mass storage solution that will give me the best balance between performance and noise levels.

Here are my stipulations...
A large SSD is well beyond my budget, so I am looking for an HDD solution. I have never had a problem with a Western Digital HDD that was not directly my fault, so those are my focus. This is primarily for gaming, so I need fast read speeds. Silent performance is very important to me. For RAID purposes, I am not concerned with data parity- all my critical files are on the SSD and anything else can be backed up externally.

Here are my options, considering my budget...
A) A pair of 1TB WD Red or WD RE drives in RAID 0. As far as I am aware, they are just as quiet as the WD Green just optimized for RAID with TLER.
B) A single 2TB WD Black. This would likely be slower and louder than the RAID setup, but also cheaper and safer. I do not think a WD Green would have the throughput that I desire.

So, here are the questions I have...
1) What is the difference between the WD Red and the WD RE? The RE is more expensive, but I cannot find the statistics on noise and throughput. I am leaning toward the Red based on price, but I am concerned that it is designed specifically for NAS and is not suitable for desktop RAID.
2) Which option is preferable, the RAID setup, or a single large HDD? Is the performance increase of RAID 0 justifiable for two economic HDDs, as opposed to three or more?
3) Is there any other insight or opinion that I have not considered here? Any information I can get on this would be helpful.

Thanks again,
Alex

 

[D_Know_WD]

Hi there AlexanderDomin,

I want to start with that mostly your loading times will be affected by the HDD/s speed, not the overall gaming performance.
Here are some answers to the questions you've listed :
1)WD Red is designed for small NAS systems and RAID environments. It is most quiet of the three drives. WD Re is an enterprise level HDD. It is considered to be more reliable, having up to 1.4 million hours MTBF. Also, it will be the better choice when you need performance. Because of these things, it falls in a higher price range. Keep in mind that WD RE is most probably as noisy as WD Black.(I will provide spec sheets below)
WD Reds should be fine in a Desktop RAID.
2)You will get a considerable improvement in loading times if you set up a RAID 0, opposed to just using a single HDD. It is up to you to decide whether it will be economically justifiable.
3)My advise would be that a single WD Black 2TB would be the best choice in your case, as you will need it only for gaming. It will be quieter than a RAID of WD REs and most probably as noisy as a RAID of WD REDs. In addition to that, it will provide good performance as it is specifically designed for gaming. Also, it is considered to be a reliable drive, as it has 5 years of limited warranty.

Specification sheets:
WD Red: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=D3evh5
WD Black: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=OT7XZT
WD Re: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=I805CW

Hope this will help,
D_Know_WD

 

[AlexanderDomin]

Thanks for the very detailed response. Great find on the spec sheets! I totally missed those on the website.

 

[D_Know_WD]

I'm glad I was able to help out.

Cheers,
D_Know_WD