Disk drive noise question (WD Caviar black 2 TB) - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 03:05:11 am
content: This is slightly OT but I know we have at least one person here from the disk drive industry.I have a newly purchased WD Caviar Black 2 TB drive that is unbelievably noisy when moving the head around. It clatters like someone beating out a drum tattoo.I'm trying to figure out if is typical for this model drive or whether I have a bad sample and should return it. All I have to compare with are other drives previously installed in the same location which have been much quieter.In the old days I might have looked into the acoustic management setting but apparently it is fixed at the maximum performance setting and cannot be adjusted.I'm wondering if anyone has any comparable experiences to offer?

author: David_AVD
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 03:14:05 am
content: I bought some red drives the other week and they seem nice and quiet. I can ask my son who works for a large computer shop.

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 03:15:45 am
content: Black is the high performance version where as Green is the lowpower/lownoiseBut ive never owned a black so i dunno how noisy they're supposed to be.All my greens are quiet

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 03:18:39 am
content: I got the Black because it has a 5 yr warranty whereas the other drives like Green have 2 yr. I figured that the longer warranty (and higher price) probably implied a more reliable design.(Of course I just realized the price premium could simply be to cover the costs of the longer warranty and the hardware is no different)

author: justanothercanuck
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 04:06:34 am
content: I have several Black 500s, and all I hear is the platters spinning.Code:Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE UPDATED WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate 0x002f 200 200 051 Pre-fail Always - 03 Spin_Up_Time 0x0027 242 234 021 Pre-fail Always - 78664 Start_Stop_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 215 Reallocated_Sector_Ct 0x0033 200 200 140 Pre-fail Always - 07 Seek_Error_Rate 0x002e 200 200 000 Old_age Always - 09 Power_On_Hours 0x0032 065 065 000 Old_age Always - 2578110 Spin_Retry_Count 0x0032 100 253 000 Old_age Always - 011 Calibration_Retry_Count 0x0032 100 253 000 Old_age Always - 012 Power_Cycle_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 19192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0032 200 200 000 Old_age Always - 15193 Load_Cycle_Count 0x0032 200 200 000 Old_age Always - 21194 Temperature_Celsius 0x0022 106 099 000 Old_age Always - 44196 Reallocated_Event_Count 0x0032 200 200 000 Old_age Always - 0197 Current_Pending_Sector 0x0032 200 200 000 Old_age Always - 0198 Offline_Uncorrectable 0x0030 200 200 000 Old_age Offline - 0199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count 0x0032 200 200 000 Old_age Always - 0200 Multi_Zone_Error_Rate 0x0008 200 200 000 Old_age Offline - 0

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 04:19:05 am
content: Quote from: justanothercanuck on June 10, 2013, 04:06:34 amThanks for the data point.Reports suggest the 500's may sound different from the 2 TB version, but I read "noisy" in some accounts, "quiet" in other accounts. Your drives seem to fall into the "quiet" camp.BTW, what tool did you use to read the SMART data?

author: justanothercanuck
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 04:22:00 am
content: Quote from: IanB on June 10, 2013, 04:19:05 amOn linux, "smartctl -a /dev/sda"

author: BravoV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 04:40:36 am
content: If you're on windows , use this ->http://crystalmark.info/software/CrystalDiskInfo/index-e.htmlYep, my WD black also noisier compared to green and seagate.Example ss :

author: rdl
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 04:51:17 am
content: I have two of the FALS series 1 TB Blacks. One is 4 years old, the other is 2 years old. They don't make any noise to speak of. I usually can hear them spin up when they're accessed after being powered down, but there isn't a lot of clicking or clattering noise. Most of the time I don't even notice them. One is in an external case and I only use it for backups. I don't want it running constantly. When I first installed it I'd have to go put a finger on the case and feel for motor vibration in order to tell if Windows was spinning it down after 5 minutes like it was supposed to. I couldn't really tell just from listening.

author: smashedProton
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 05:39:02 am
content: Yes, returning them is probably a good idea. Presumably you have a bad batch? Is it possible that you can mount them on elastic?

author: ron
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 06:18:57 am
content: speedfan is a very useful freeware prog that reads S.M.A.R.T. history among other things.http://www.almico.com/sfdownload.phpI don't trust CrystalDisk.

author: benemorius
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 06:42:29 am
content: I was never in the disk drive industry and I got out of IT several years ago so I don't know the drive in question, but maybe I can offer a bit of insight.Most (probably all) consumer drives today have adjustable Acoustic Management written in to the firmware to reduce the sound produced by head seeking. It has been my experience that drives come from the factory configured for maximum acoustic reduction, but I wouldn't be surprised if drives marketed for performance were configured differently. You should be able to find a software utility to check the current setting and change it if desired. I had a habit of turning it off on all my drives, presuming (admittedly without due cause) that maximum acoustic reduction means minimum performance, and some of them did get pretty noisy.Also, the mounting hardware can have a huge effect on how much of the sound gets transmitted all the way to your ears. I should certainly hope that rubber mounts are standard these days in all computer chassis, but if your drive is making direct contact with the metal chassis without rubber grommets in between, I'd definitely look in to changing that as a matter of course if you like a quiet PC.

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 07:25:38 am
content: It seems that lately (in the past two years or so) AAM has been disabled in the firmware in new drives (patent issues?). Disk utilities can no longer adjust the setting. The WD Black apparently has AAM fixed at maximum performance.No rubber mounts present, unfortunately. The disk bolts directly into the drive cage. I don't know if there is physically enough room to install any kind of grommet between the drive and the mount point (it's a compact computer case and everything fits in place like peas in a pod).The Seagate drive I had mounted in exactly the same fashion was inaudible, which is what makes me ask questions about this WD drive.

author: David_AVD
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 07:31:32 am
content: The red drives I mounted in my case last week were not on grommets and there is no noise issue.

author: Balaur
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 07:42:00 am
content: Quote from: David_AVD on June 10, 2013, 07:31:32 amYep, I have a 3 2GB WD REDs in a RAID5 and they are very silent.

author: David_AVD
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 07:59:48 am
content: Just asked my son and he says that those drives are not normally noisy and sounds like it's faulty. Take it back for an exchange before you use it too much.

author: amyk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 11:39:54 am
content: Quote from: rdl on June 10, 2013, 04:51:17 amSame experience here. The seeks are very audible but when idling they're not noticeable against the background noise of fans.One thing you can try with the drive is running a sequential read test using software likeMHDD; if it's still noisy or slower than expected, then it's definitely something wrong.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 11:52:35 am
content: Quote from: IanB on June 10, 2013, 03:05:11 amCheap hard drives are extremely noisy. I recently swapped most of my drives with Western Digital Green drives. These are extremely quiet.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 12:57:33 pm
content: Got a WD2002FAEX (2TB Caviar Black) in a USB drive for backups and haven't noticed any unusual noise yet. From time to time the drive performs a surface check if it's idle, sounds like "click-click" with a short pause between each "click-click", but that's all.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 01:06:32 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on June 10, 2013, 11:52:35 amCaviar Black aren't cheap drives, they are optimized for performance and got a 5 year warranty. They got two actuators and two CPUs! I choose hard drives based on the application. For example, I wouldn't put a Caviar Green into a server running 24/7, but a RE4.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 02:27:05 pm
content: Greens are low power 5400 rpBlue is std desktop usage 7200 rpmBlack is hi end 7200 rpmRed is hi end 7200 rpm raidRaptors are 10k rpmTo help you with the noise issue : i need the exact model number of the drive. Just Wd2000 is not sufficient. Its the four letter code after that matters. Or sometimes the entire code.Just for the 2tb black there are like nine different ones....You may have an enterprise drive and those are noisier...

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 03:57:35 pm
content: Quote from: free_electron on June 10, 2013, 02:27:05 pmThanks. Any insight you can offer will be appreciated, since it will be a pain to back up the drive, wipe it and uninstall it to return for replacement.I don't have the model number with me, I will check it when I'm home tonight.

author: nanofrog
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 07:36:52 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 10, 2013, 07:25:38 amFWIW, none of the WD Blacks I've used have been noisy (work as a storage architect, so I've had access to a lot of them over the years). Not what I'd call inaudible (certainly not 0dB), but nearly so in a quiet environment, and what is present isn't annoying. Any background noise, such as a fan or radio on low, and I can't hear them at all.So what you describe lends me to think it's defective, and needs to be sent back.

author: benemorius
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 08:29:42 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 10, 2013, 03:57:35 pmWell, I don't know how you're currently thinking to do it, but it could be a lot less of a pain than you think if you do it from an Ubuntu live image on a USB flash drive or CD or equivalent. It only takes one command to back up your data to the new drive since the two drives are identical, and one command to wipe the old drive.In the event that you end up replacing the drive, here's all you need to do:copy data bit-for-bit from sda to sdb: (assuming sda is the old drive and sdb is new)Code:dd if=/dev/sda of=/dev/sdb bs=4moverwrite sda 3 times with random data, then one last time with zeros to hide the deliberate wiping:Code:shred -vz -n3 /dev/sdaThe worst (scariest?) part is figuring out which drive is which, but actually that's made very easy thanks to SATA drives being hot-swappable. Just boot it up with only one drive attached and examine the attached drives to locate that drive like so:Code:lsblkThen connect the second drive and repeat the above command to find the new addition.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 08:50:19 pm
content: Quote from: benemorius on June 10, 2013, 08:29:42 pmWriting the disk once is sufficient. The magnetic domains of modern hard disks are so small that you don't need to worry about possible leftovers. But that method doesn't erase the complete disk. Bad sectors which were replaced by spare ones won't be owerwritten since they are invisible to the OS. But there's a solution:http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/people/Hughes/SecureErase.shtml.

author: benemorius
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 09:07:51 pm
content: I quite agree. shred's default is 3 and I put the option there just to make it obvious how to change it.http://www.hostjury.com/blog/view/195/

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 11:29:57 pm
content: Quote from: benemorius on June 10, 2013, 08:29:42 pmOK, but...I won't have both drives at the same time. I have to wipe and remove the old drive, take it back to the shop to get a replacement, bring the new one home, put the data back on the new one.So I have to back up the noisy drive somewhere (make a system image), replace the drive, restore the image. I can find somewhere to put the image no doubt, but the most convenient options I have are USB external drives, and copying the data over USB takes hours...

author: David_AVD
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 11:43:28 pm
content: Ian, we use Clonezilla to save/restore HDD images. Free and works well.

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 11:46:02 pm
content: Thanks for the suggestions on copying. But it is not so much about the tools as about the time and inconvenience...

author: David_AVD
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 11:47:29 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 10, 2013, 11:46:02 pmIt probably worth more to you to just buy a new HDD, copy bad to good, then return the bad one for exchange. Yes, you'll have a spare 2T HDD, but that's cheaper than your time surely?

author: benemorius
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 10, 2013, 11:58:43 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 10, 2013, 11:29:57 pmJust buy the new drive first and take it home, then take the old drive back when you're done. It will solve that problem, plus it's sometimes easier to do it this way anyway depending on the store. A few of the big chains even force you to exchange stuff this way. If you ask for an exchange they won't do it; they give you a refund and then tell you to go get another one and take it to the regular checkout.I have a habit of doing exchanges this way just for the sake of not having to keep track of the original receipt. It also beats the pants off of doing warranty replacements directly with manufacturers.

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 12:03:42 am
content: Quote from: David_AVD on June 10, 2013, 11:47:29 pmI have already done that once. Prior to getting this WD drive I had installed a Seagate drive, but it failed after two months, needing warranty replacement. Rather than wait, I went out and bought the WD drive, copied the Seagate to the WD, and planned to return the Seagate drive for replacement under warranty...

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 12:06:15 am
content: Quote from: benemorius on June 10, 2013, 11:58:43 pmI could do that, but I'm trying to find out if I go back to the shop and pick up a new WD Black off the same shelf (likely same batch, same production run), will it be just as noisy as the one I'm returning?

author: nanofrog
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 12:06:53 am
content: Quote from: IanB on June 11, 2013, 12:03:42 amOne failure that soon is bad, but two... Ouch.

author: justanothercanuck
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 12:23:48 am
content: Quote from: IanB on June 11, 2013, 12:06:15 amIf you have more than one store handy, you could buy the replacement from another store, which should alleviate the batch problem. Or you can wait a few weeks, as HDDs sell like hotcakes, and they'll probably deplete their stock soon and need restocking.Or a third option, get really chummy with the guy at the sales counter, maybe if you're lucky, he'll check the date codes and give you a different batch drive. When I bought the drives for my RAID array, he purposely gave me two from one batch, and two from another, just in case they were DOA (or pretty much DOA).

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 12:40:53 am
content: Some drive reviews at Best Buy for WD Caviar Black 2 TB:"It's a bit noisy compared to my old drive""Very noisy - it's noticeably louder than the slower drive it replaced""Very noisy at start up""drive is pretty loud""Audible during operation"Hmm. Do I detect a trend here?

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 06:35:12 am
content: Quote from: free_electron on June 10, 2013, 02:27:05 pmThe model number is WDBAAZ0020HNC-NRSN.I tried a second sample. It also has a lot of head positioning noise.

author: amyk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 11:07:37 am
content: Have you tried a sequential read to see how noisy that is? A good drive shouldn't have much noticeable seek noise when reading sequentially.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 12:47:29 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 11, 2013, 12:40:53 amI think we should deal with this a little bit more engineering-like and talk about dBA. Please don't get me wrong, but loudness is a very subjective experience. The datasheet of a Caviar Black WD2002FAEX states:Average acoustics (dBA)Idle mode 29 dBAPerformance seek mode 34 dBAQuiet seek mode 30 dBAWhispering is about 30 dBA, just to have a value to compare with. Is your disk (much) louder?

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 01:24:11 pm
content: The WD Green drives I have are 8dB quieter (which means over 4 times less noise). Another thing to watch out for is vibrations of the computer casing. The latter was my biggest problem.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 03:17:39 pm
content: Quote from: madires on June 10, 2013, 08:50:19 pmSure... They are also extremely hard (magnetic remanence)..You will have to use truly random data... If you use one of the many prbs generators and we find the seed it can be recovered without too much problems.There are forensic tools that can do that. They probe the location where the drive index is located. That contains known data. The tools simply probes all prbs mechaisms and seeds. Granted, it can take some time but a GPU driven cracker can try the 512 byte block very quickly. There exist rainbow tables . Once the seed and prbs chain is known the data can be extracted on a spinstand.Second safest way to sanitize a disk is to shred it. Third safest way : drill a big hole through all platters , then bend the chassis with the platters. That prevents em from landing a head on the platters. The burrs would eat the heads immediately.What's the first one you ask ? Heat the platters above the curie point. At that moment all is lost. But it'll have to be pretty hot.... The guys at Ontrack managed to recover 99% of data from a harddisk that was onboard the space shuttle columbia when it exploded.... You have to see the damage to the drive... Unbelievable how they pulled it off...http://istcolloq.gsfc.nasa.gov/fall2008/presentations/pederson.pdf

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 03:51:40 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 11, 2013, 06:35:12 amThats a box kit number. There can be one of multiple drives in the kit. I need to know the number on the drive itself...In any case, it's a ramploader with possibly a twin pivot arm. They are bit noisier. Whenever the headstack moves you should hear a krr like sound.These drives are reliable. The 2tb is the end for that platform. . This drive platform was intended for 500gb to 2tb. It can't go beyond. There is an overlapping platform that does 1 to 4 terabyte.Having the end of the platform means that drive has been around for a while so it should be rock solid mechanical and firmware wise.Keep in mind that the blacks have TLER disabled these days and it can't be enabled. So do not use them in RAID configs !It all depends how sensitive you are to the drive noise. I'm almost certain i have some of these at home. When the computer sits under a desk you should not be able to hear the krr sound over normal ambient sound ( if the drive is mounted on rubber grommets ). If the drive sits in a usb enclosure you will hear it. Those enclosures are really good acoustical amplifiers....When you power on or off the drive there will be a tsjhlick sound. That is the heads retracting off the platter and moving into the parking garage. ( they completely retrack off the platters, go up a special plastic ramp and the arm lands in a detent. The heads do not touch anything , they are hanging off the arm . The tip of the arm is lodged in the detent ( we call it the garage ).Such a drive is very robust for transportation. They make excellent removable drives. At powerup we spin up the plaaters first. Once we have stable airflow in the drive the headstack is unparked and injected onto the platters. The airflow generates a soft landing.Contrary to popular belief there is a big airflow in a modern drive. The fast spinning platters actually create enough drag that air molucules are being moved. This creates a high pressure layer above the platter and that is where the head floats.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 04:08:29 pm
content: Quote from: free_electron on June 11, 2013, 03:17:39 pmThere's another method called degaussing.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 04:44:26 pm
content: yes there is. Ever seen such a degausser ? they're about 10K$ and its not guaranteed to work on all drives.they're good for tape , not for drives.harddisks : shred em. much cheaper. a few whacks with a large hammer en a bench drill accomplishes the same.

author: Unknown
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 05:07:18 pm
content: Quote from: free_electron on June 11, 2013, 03:17:39 pmRecovering the seed from any cryptographic random function is computationally extremely expensive. Brute forcing a random function with a 128-bit key (pretty standard these days) will require about 1038attempts, something not feasible in the near future, even with dedicated hardware. A rainbow table would take at least 1027TB. That's impossible, even for storage vendors. And then what. You know the seed and can predict the blocks I wrote to the disk. The seed might have been the time of day I erased it, and you could have easily read all the data I wrote to the disk.Is there any published report of someone recovering any significant amount of data from a modern drive that was overwritten with zeroes once, even in a controlled setting? Apart from the Peter Gutmann paper that was published in the days of MFM/RLL drives and caused all the repeated overwrite nonsense? Even the author of that paper came out and said it did not apply to modern drives, other people claim that his claim was nonsense even with MFM drives.This guyattempts to recover a few bits of data with an electron microscope and fails. Even if this would work, the problem is that there are too many damn bits on a modern drive. The problems with extremely sensitive methods is that their field of view is extremely small and they're slow.Note that none of the recovery companies (I think there's Ontrack and Seagate these days) claim to be able or have recovered any drives that were fully overwritten. For example, in the paper you linked to the platters were not overwritten and in fair state. Note also that these were old technology drives. They mention that this would have been much harder with modern drives.The only chance you have is bad sectors that got remapped somewhere between writing sensitive data to them and erasing the drive.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 11, 2013, 05:11:23 pm
content: Quote from: free_electron on June 11, 2013, 04:44:26 pmWould love to see the face of the shop assistant when IanB returns his whacked Caviar Black

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 03:43:06 am
content: Quote from: free_electron on June 11, 2013, 03:51:40 pmUh ohHere's what's on the drive:

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 08:41:52 am
content: Quote from: madires on June 11, 2013, 12:47:29 pmIt's not always the volume of sound that counts, it is the quality and character of the sound. Hearing a disk chattering away can be annoying if it rises above other sounds and intrudes on your hearing.I have attached a recording of the sound the disk makes while working. For reference, consider that other disks installed in the same location could not be heard at all.

author: David_AVD
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 09:34:55 am
content: That does sound damn annoying.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 09:42:38 am
content: Quote from: IanB on June 12, 2013, 08:41:52 amThe recording is very helpful! The sound is typical for the Caviar Black, nothing to worry. One thing you could try is to mount the disk using a dampening kit, in case the mounting frame amplifies the noise.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 09:51:11 am
content: Quote from: David_AVD on June 12, 2013, 09:34:55 amThere's a large gap between silent drives and high performance drives. You can't have both with classic drives! And 2TB SSDs are neither common nor inexpensive :-)

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 10:01:19 am
content: Quote from: madires on June 12, 2013, 09:51:11 amIt's not performance I'm looking for but reliability. This drive has a 5 year warranty, other drives do not. And since the Seagate drive that preceeded it failed after two months I have lost faith in that one.Every bit of engineering intuition tells me that smoother movements and less jolting will lead to lower stresses and less wear on components. I can't understand why the drive firmware does not allow the AAM tuning that used to be possible.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 10:47:26 am
content: Quote from: IanB on June 12, 2013, 10:01:19 amIn the last years the disk manufactures reduced warranties for the desktop market. Just the enterprise drives still got 5 years and the Caviar Black is the only desktop drive with 5 years too, AFAIK. Most desktop drives start failing after 3-4 years if used in a business PC. That's also the upgrade cycle of business PCs. Nice coincidence? Not at all, desktop drives have to be cheap. Unfortunately the result is that only loud high-performance disks got 5 years warranty. Ok, the Caviar Black is not realy high-performance, but its performance tops the other desktop disks. Seagate has nice server/RAID disks too but most of their desktop disks aren't worth the money. Saw too many of them failing.QuoteI would think the same way. Take enterprise SAS disks for example. They're expensive, loud, fast and have to deal with much more read/write operations than a desktop drive but don't fail any earlier. They are designed for that. WD and Seagate could build silent desktop disks with a very high reliability but they don't because they think that there's no market or the market would be too small.PS: I got some 10+ years old SCSI drives in some vintage SUN SparcStations.

author: Unknown
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 11:38:18 am
content: From what I recall, a number of years ago most manufacturers removed AAM features because of patent issues. This was way back when there were still more than two manufacturers of desktop drives.I doubt that there are many mechanical differences between different lines of desktop and 'desktop raid' drives. The SAS drives definitely use different parts, but I think the main differences between for example the WD blue, black and red are firmware (TLER, and what used to be AAM). It just doesn't make sense from a cost perspective to make different parts for very similar drives.The average reliability of hard drives is pretty much a wash between manufacturers. Some series are better than others, but that is mostly independent of manufacturer. The variance due to variation between samples, models, batches and handling is huge, however. Note for example the handling instructions from manufacturers, and look how retail computer stores treat them. A manufacturer wouldn't except a dead drive for warranty in the packaging that many stores ship the drives in. Seeing real trends in reliability requires large sample sizes, and even then you have to account for confounders (for example the large Google study published about ten years ago, which lead people to the conclusion that warmer running drives were more reliable).I find it much simpler to assume the hard drive is going to fail sooner or later, and plan accordingly.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 12:56:04 pm
content: Quote from: alm on June 12, 2013, 11:38:18 amAh, the good old times :-)QuoteThat's a very interesting question! We should ask Dave for a WD teardown special :-) But we also need an expert for the mechanics.QuoteYep, they all had and have bad batches. Seagate had a nice firmware problem with a complete drive family. After some time the drives suddenly stopped working and would't be detected by the BIOS anymore. Either you sent the drive to them for a firmware update or you did it yourself (via a simple serial interface, FTDI-style). Most distributors I've dealt with sent disks in a proper box. Are you talking about the study that also showed that SMART helps just in about 50% of all cases to predict a failing disk?QuoteSwapping desktop drives every 4 years worked fine for me so far. Replacing a disk in time is much simpler and less expensive than waiting for a real problem to occur. Some disks run fine for a few years more as USB drive or in a low-usage PC (without any important stuff).

author: Unknown
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 01:03:30 pm
content: Quote from: madires on June 12, 2013, 12:56:04 pmYep. I don't remember if the temperature - reliability correlation was something that the authors concluded or if it was just hobbyists drawing that conclusion. I know it was reported on some websites as 'high temperatures make drives more reliable', although this was likely caused by a confounding factor like rotational speed: at that time, older drives were 5400 rpm, and 5400 rpm drives run cooler than 7200 rpm drives.

author: Balaur
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 01:10:59 pm
content: Quote from: madires on June 12, 2013, 12:56:04 pmYep, thanks to theinfoavailable on the internet and the guys that all the hard work, I was able to help a friend with his disk. Was quite a fun and easy fix.BTW, I cannot stress too much the importance of a sane, automated, maintenance-free, remote, backup strategy. I've decided to use RAID5 for my home stuff, but it doesn't help you for Seagate-like issues, intrusions or even worse problems. I have a small RAID1 LinkStation NAS at work that acts like a remote backup site, worst case.Best regards,Dan

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 01:37:26 pm
content: Quote from: Balaur on June 12, 2013, 01:10:59 pmrsync is your friend. And the next step is a hot stand-by data center :-) I simply rsync my local machines to USB drives from time to time. For remote machines I setup a script to backup all important stuff and scp it to a local PC.

author: Unknown
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 01:44:19 pm
content: History is also critical for backups, otherwise it's just delayed mirroring. Sometimes data gets corrupted or deleted, and you may only notice it a few days (or weeks) later.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 03:34:14 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 12, 2013, 08:41:52 amThat sounds right for a FAEX . Nothing wrong.If you really want reliability get a WD2000FYYZ. Or a WD200MFYYZ .Those are the enterprise verseions of the faex ( different firmware , extra test and burn-in).

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 03:41:39 pm
content: Quote from: alm on June 12, 2013, 11:38:18 amOh yes it does ! Sas and sata drives are the same mechanics. Its just backend controller . But there are big mechancial differences. If you buy a 2tb drive , some have 4 platters, some 2 platters... The motors are different.... Rampload / no rampload. Type of platter used. Type of head used. Dual stage actuator or not ...They are nickle and diming everywhere ! Western digital builds over a million drives a day ! This is beyond massive scale...

author: Leon
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 05:25:13 pm
content: Quote from: alm on June 12, 2013, 11:38:18 amThere are many WD 3.5" lines:- Red- Blue- Black- AV-GP- RAIDIf you compare these, you'll notice there are hardware differences between the lines, and big ones at that. Fi the weight difference between the cheaper and more expensive drives is obvious. The amount of drives produced implies even slight cost savings add up.This leads me to your statement the reliability is a wash between manufacturers. This certainly is incorrect. If you look at SAS drives the Seagate drives are excellent. But for instance Toshiba should in general be avoided. I don't know about the very latest Toshiba generation, but the 3 generations before it had fail rates that are way higher than even WD RAID drives while give the reliability figures this should be the other way around. When looking at laptop drives, again Seagate had a very good option: the ASG series. Their fail rate was exceptionally low. But the WD current blue and black series is very good also. For the desktop, I would recommend an SSD drive (Samsung is our current favorite, in the past it was Intel) along with fi. a WD AV-GP drive for mass storage.In our experience, the AV series and the RAID series are the most reliable versions. The Red version is too new to draw conclusions: we don't have long term data yet on those. Short term results on the Red series are good however. My advice: use the drives in the setting for which they were designed. We use the AV-series in PC's that are built for 24x7 operation, and the RAID version for server usage. The AFR is very, very low.Early replacement of drives is a futile attempt: you can't be certain the new drive you put in the system isn't a lemon. Backups, backups and more backups are the way to safeguard your data. Not only does this protect against drive failure, but it also helps you against virus outbreaks and even simple human error. Be sure you are ready when someone says: "I deleted a file last month which I really need" or "I just found out my files are infected"

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 06:06:41 pm
content: Quote from: alm on June 12, 2013, 01:44:19 pmSure, but for my personal usage at home that's sufficient. For a company the setup would look completely different.

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 06:35:39 pm
content: Quote from: free_electron on June 12, 2013, 03:34:14 pmThanks for the reassurance. It makes me feel happier.But let me suggest that for home use (quiet room, can hear a clock ticking) then this level of noise is intrusive. If people could hear the disk before purchase I bet the level of sales would drop.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 07:39:00 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 12, 2013, 06:35:39 pmBlacks are not for home desktop. blue is home desktop. black is for workstations.

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 08:07:32 pm
content: Quote from: free_electron on June 12, 2013, 07:39:00 pmThen I think perhaps the marketing folks have a problem with their segmentation. I would say that if the computer sits in my study, by my desk where I work, and remains on from morning to night, then it is a workstation.

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 12, 2013, 08:57:40 pm
content: Quote from: free_electron on June 12, 2013, 07:39:00 pmActually, that is not how the drive is marketed:

author: amyk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2013, 11:38:27 am
content: That sound is rather "hollow" and I think it's a bit mellower than the FALSs... which to my ears is a bit harsher and has a bit more solid feel to it. Of course, mounting probably could change the noise drastically, especially if it makes the case resonate.

author: madires
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2013, 01:08:36 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 12, 2013, 08:57:40 pmA workstation is a powerful desktop :-) And just left of the Black is the Green with "quiet operation" but no 5 year warranty. I found the right drive for you:http://ocz.com/consumer/vertex-4-sata-3-ssd.Very quiet, fast and 5 years warranty. What do you say?EDIT: OCZ doesn't seem to be a good buy:http://www.behardware.com/articles/881-7/components-returns-rates-7.html

author: Leon
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2013, 07:50:52 pm
content: Quote from: madires on June 13, 2013, 01:08:36 pmActually, the Vertex 3 and 4 have fairly low fail rates. Certainly better than some of the Intel models, which often die for no obvious reason. My current choice for an SSD however would be a Samsung 840 Pro.

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2013, 08:46:44 pm
content: Quote from: Leon on June 13, 2013, 07:50:52 pmI tried a Samsung 840 in my netbook. It ran for 1 hr, then went kablooey. Drive scrambled, all data unreadable. I'm not sure I trust SSDs yet.

author: Leon
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: June 13, 2013, 09:38:21 pm
content: Quote from: IanB on June 13, 2013, 08:46:44 pmThe normal 840 uses TLC memory, which is much less reliable. In general, fail rates of SSDs aren't higher than those of HDDs. Recovery of data is a lot harder on SSDs however.