Thoughts/Opinions on WD RED Pro 18TB drives vs Seagate or Toshiba?

I recently learned of the WDDA issue with the WD drives. While I do not run a NAS/RAID environment, I like NAS drives for their 24/7 durability. As the holiday sales are coming up, I would like to get some informed opinions/thoughts on the best drives to get in the 18Tb range (not sure I want to go higher at this point). I'm looking to replace some of my older, smaller 5TB & 8TB drives.

Thanks!

--- DS

4 comments

Someone just stumbled on the deal at WD.com, I see. :)
There is no best. Buy what you can afford, look for sales, look for drives with a good warranty, avoid SMR if your use case requires, and back up your data. Trying to find the "best" drives is a fools errand
If I live to be a 100 I'll still never forget just how many Seagate drives have prematurely died in my setups. I won't say never again, but it would take something drastic for me to ever pull the trigger on buying Seagate again. Almost no issues with Western Digital since I switched over.
- I've only had 1 WD drive fail on me, and no Toshibas (some of which are going on 6 years running). I have had multiple prior Seagate failures, but have heard they have supposedly gotten better. I also do not like some of the "shady" things that WD has been consistently doing. I have read reports that the Toshiba's tend to be louder, and that there can be issues with the warranty.
  
  I ordered a Toshiba N300 PRO, so we'' see how it does and I'll check out the warranty before anything.
  
  --- DS