Does it matter what hard drive is used for Data drive?

[MBSki 1114]

I'm looking at getting another hard drive and wondering what everyone thinks about which is best (or does it matter) which is used for the data drive. I mainly just want to get the biggest drive I can find. I've been using Seagate Barracuda Pros, but they max out at 14 TB. NAS drives seem to be available with more TB. Any difference in performance between them? Any other large capacity hard drive types that work well for the data drive?

[Carlo 4561]

Hi, I'm partial to the WD RED drives for NAS boxes.  You can get these up to 18 TB right now.

Edited April 15, 2021 by cayars

[MBSki 1114]

18 minutes ago, cayars said:

Hi, I'm partial to the WD RED drives for NAS boxes.  You can get these up to 18 TB right now.

And if I'm going to use it in a PC instead, do you still recommend them? Same performance/speed right? Any caveats to using a NAS drive vs performance desktop drive like Seagate Barracuda Pro?

[Carlo 4561]

https://shop.westerndigital.com/solutions/network-attached-storage/nasware

I use them everywhere for the most part since I don't turn my machines off.

[MBSki 1114]

Awesome, thanks.

[Sammy 790]

I shuck WD EasyStores and Elements all the time with no issues.

[Q-Droid 989]

Get CMR drives, not SMR. Most are now advertising whether they are one or the other.

 

 

[Carlo 4561]

30 minutes ago, Q-Droid said:

Get CMR drives, not SMR. Most are now advertising whether they are one or the other.

Depends really on the file system being ran and how you use the drives.

If you're like me and convert your files to a format you will keep as an archive nearly forever at least until a new version is available (ie DVD to Blu Ray, Blu Ray to 4K) then it won't matter much for pure storage.

For the most part we use storage drives as write once, read many times so the drives don't do a lot of writing. SMR drives are fine in this situation especially if for the same money you get a bigger drive.

Here is a good read on this in a blog post by WD.  BTW and "Red Drive" over 8TB is CMR regardless if Pro version or not.

https://blog.westerndigital.com/wd-red-nas-drives/

[Sammy 790]

As are the "white" drives shucked from external hard drives AFAIK. 

[Q-Droid 989]

37 minutes ago, cayars said:

Depends really on the file system being ran and how you use the drives.

If you're like me and convert your files to a format you will keep as an archive nearly forever at least until a new version is available (ie DVD to Blu Ray, Blu Ray to 4K) then it won't matter much for pure storage.

For the most part we use storage drives as write once, read many times so the drives don't do a lot of writing. SMR drives are fine in this situation especially if for the same money you get a bigger drive.

Here is a good read on this in a blog post by WD.  BTW and "Red Drive" over 8TB is CMR regardless if Pro version or not.

https://blog.westerndigital.com/wd-red-nas-drives/

You are right that it depends on the workload but you have to be careful of who you include in "we". Not everyone has the same thing in mind when they state what they're plans are for the drive.

The writing to SMR is not the issue. It's when data is updated/deleted/rewritten that SMR adds overhead and why archival is the best use case for the tech. Most people would never notice a difference between CMR and SMR until they decide to include the drive in a NAS or pool and see some odd performance.

But now that the makers have been forced to come clean and the larger capacities are still CMR it's clearer for us when shopping.

 

[ginjaninja 605]

40 minutes ago, cayars said:

Depends really on the file system being ran and how you use the drives.

If you're like me and convert your files to a format you will keep as an archive nearly forever at least until a new version is available (ie DVD to Blu Ray, Blu Ray to 4K) then it won't matter much for pure storage.

For the most part we use storage drives as write once, read many times so the drives don't do a lot of writing. SMR drives are fine in this situation especially if for the same money you get a bigger drive.

Here is a good read on this in a blog post by WD.  BTW and "Red Drive" over 8TB is CMR regardless if Pro version or not.

https://blog.westerndigital.com/wd-red-nas-drives/

would agree, if only being used to store media files, then go for cheapest, SMR is fine.

if being used for general purpose, SMR is a big compromise in write performance, and i avoid.

 

i would go for the biggest drive that offers close to the best cost/TB, especially if your collection is increasing in size and you run in a cool environment as the drive will last longer than your storage/pcs ability to store increasing number of drives. (chucking out disks because you dont have enough bays is best avoided for bang/buck)

[MBSki 1114]

Thanks all. What about Seagate Exos Enterprise drives? Those seem a bit cheaper than the NAS drives 

[ginjaninja 605]

1 minute ago, Q-Droid said:

You are right that it depends on the workload but you have to be careful of who you include in "we". Not everyone has the same thing in mind when they state what they're plans are for the drive.

The writing to SMR is not the issue. It's when data is updated/deleted/rewritten that SMR adds overhead and why archival is the best use case for the tech. Most people would never notice a difference between CMR and SMR until they decide to include the drive in a NAS or pool and see some odd performance.

But now that the makers have been forced to come clean and the larger capacities are still CMR it's clearer for us when shopping.

 

oh yeah would never use smr in a nas/array

[ginjaninja 605]

6 minutes ago, mbarylski said:

Thanks all. What about Seagate Exos Enterprise drives? Those seem a bit cheaper than the NAS drives 

apart from the above considerations and warranty, just go for cheapest/tb...if only used for media i would favour 5400rpm....no evidence but its plausible less stress means greater longevity, and the read speed and latency of the slowest drive will be more than enough (in non array environments)

Edited April 15, 2021 by ginjaninja

[Carlo 4561]

This is just personal and with hundreds of HDDs I've always had the worst experience with Seagate drives.

BTW, concerning SMR drives. I would use this (if you choose) for only media and never for installing Emby on or using for temp data space for things like metadata, transcoding or other features.

I like to think of SMR = Archival drive not part of a RAID setup.

You can't go wrong with CMR drives of the same brand but if you can get 4 to 6 TB more storage with the SMR for the same price and you use it exclusively for storing media you'll never really "feel" the difference in performance.

 

[MBSki 1114]

14 minutes ago, cayars said:

This is just personal and with hundreds of HDDs I've always had the worst experience with Seagate drives.

I used WD Greens when I first set up my media server many years ago, and after they all went bad I switched to Seagate Barracuda Pro's. The Seagates have gone bad too, but they're backed by a 5 year warranty and I've had every bad drive covered under warranty and replaced. I might try WD's this time around, but I'll keep hunting for the cheapest 18 TB CMR and see which one comes out on top.  

[gillmacca01 211]

I stick with the ones recommended for my NAS, and in 5 years, I have only had to replace one drive out of 3

[MBSki 1114]

1 minute ago, gillmacca01 said:

I stick with the ones recommended for my NAS, and in 5 years, I have only had to replace one drive out of 3

And which ones are those?

[Carlo 4561]

Yea, it's like anything else.  If you choose the lowend of one manufacture line, you should compare it to the low end of the other manufacture. Same with high end drives.

@gillmacca01 so you have a 33.33% failure rate then.

[gillmacca01 211]

Originally had WS Red, but replaced one with Seagate Ironwolf

[gillmacca01 211]

1 minute ago, cayars said:

Yea, it's like anything else.  If you choose the lowend of one manufacture line, you should compare it to the low end of the other manufacture. Same with high end drives.

@gillmacca01 so you have a 33.33% failure rate then.

Yes and no. Luckily, when I have a fault drive in my NAS, it will still allow you to read from it, but will not write anything.

So in theory, the drive that was failing, I could have continued to use for a lot longer, as long as I didn't want to write to it (it was getting close to capacity, so was planning on replacing it anyway)

[MBSki 1114]

I just ordered the Seagate Exos x18. $400 for 18 TB. Considerably cheaper than the WD and Seagate 18 TB NAS drives.