WD Red for External HDD. Recommended or not?
WD Red for External HDD. Recommended or not?
Hello.
I am looking to get started my journey with small steps.
I am thinking to get started with 4tb WD red as external 3.5 HDD drive and dump all the data I need there. Afterwards as the budget will allow me, I am thinking to purchase more HDDs and build NAS.
My questions are: will WD red will be good for external HDD for starters and would it work for NAS in the future?
Most WD reds are CMR are perfectly fine. Look op the individual partnumber to be absolutely sure, as there are some that are indeed SMR.
I used a shitload of WD 4TBs. The WD40EFRX since 2016 in 24/7 usage. They were my go to's before the 12TB (WD120EFBX) and 14TB (WD140EFGX)
@4.5W, 28dB and CMR, they are cool, quite, fast and durable little disks. They run what seem to be forever.
But do your due diligence beforehand as there is a wide spread in specs even within the same series within WD.
WD Red is three lines since 2020.
WD Red are all SMR and available up to 6TB.
WD Red Plus, introduced in 2020, are the original Red and available up to 14TB
WD Red Pro, introduced in 2014, have always been CMR and are available up to 22TB
There are plenty of old WD reds that are CMR. Even the links in your links confirm that 🙄
Typically you can get the external HDD cheaper than a internal drive + a enclosure, so I'd just buy it as one unit.
I'd aim for > 10TB as there aren't any drive managed SMR drives of that size I know of.