Western Digital has announced a new hard drive line, specifically for NAS use with 1, 2 and 3TB capacities.The new WD RED line ( http://wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=810 ) has been developed for use in home and SOHO NASes in partnership with the leading SOHO NAS manufacturers.This way WD gets their product portfolio distributed as follows:Consumer Grade:WD Green - Silent, energy saving hard drives.WD Blue - Regular desktop & mobile computing hard drivesWD Black - Extreme performance desktop & mobile computing hard drivesWD Red - NAS specific use (3 yrs. warranty, 24/7 phone support)Server/Corporate Grade:WD RE4 - Server drivesSSD:WD SiliconDriveExtreme Computing:WD VelociRaptorAV Set-top boxes and Video Streaming servers:WD AV-GPWD AV25The new Red drives have been approved by netgear for the following models already:ReadyNAS Ultra 2 Plus RNDP200UReadyNAS RNDU4000-100NASPro 6 (6 Bay)ReadyNAS DuoYou can see this info by going to WD page -> Internal Storage -> NAS and then at the WD Red page click on Compatibility to see approved models from all vendors.

WD officially doesn't support RAID user cases in more than 2-bay devices,Here is a Link from WD that shows their stance on this.http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/det ... figuration

I'm looking forward to these drives.I have a new ReadyNAS NV+ v2 coming to be once I select some drives. Hope these come to Edmonton fairly soon.I don't see why these wouldn't be put on the respective HCLs fairly soon, short of needing a RAIDiator update.

evan wrote:WD officially doesn't support RAID user cases in more than 2-bay devices,Here is a Link from WD that shows their stance on this.http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/det ... figurationWell, that certainly seems to be counter to the supposed purpose of this new line, doesn't it? It does explicitly include the new Red line in the multi-bay disclaimer (updated yesterday as shown at the top of the linked post), though the corresponding linked article about the RE drives leave out the Red line disclaimer.Suspect what this is really is the tacit acknowledgement that I've been looking for: that these drives don't have any sort of rotational vibration safeguard. I was pretty interested at first, but I guess I'll stick with the more expensive RE series and continue my much slower progression from my Seagate 1TB drives without rotational vibration protection toward RE series 2TB drives rather than splurge on some of these new Red drives (not that they would show up on the HCL any time soon anyway?)...

I don't think there's any contradiction between the pages.In the product page they pitch the fact that the Red drives are factory balanced in order not to create rotational vibration, and thus being specifically featured for multi-drive environments. Lower in the page they even state in big letters:Ideal for.Specifically designed and tested for small office and home office, 1-5 bay NAS systems. Then in the FAQ they state that Green, Blue and Black should not be used in a NAS with more than 2 drives.Lower in the FAQ they also state that Green, Blue, Black and Red should not be used in Enterprise Grade NASes using Enterprise HBAs and for Critical enterprise applications. So, if you are running a NAS in a Bank, Airport, Hospital or any other critical activity you should prefer the RAID-Enterprise (RE) line of drives as they have time-limited error recovery (TLER), are tested extensively in 24x7 RAID applications, and include features like enhanced RAFF technology and thermal extended burn-in testing and the kitchen sink (well, that part about the kitchen sink may not be in WD's page 8) ).So, basically, joining all the info together you get:You have a Home/Small Office NAS up to 5 bays -> Caviar RedYou have an Enterprise/Critical Operation NAS -> RE4

WD Red SpecificationsCapacities1TB: WD10ERFX - Host to/from buffer: 150MB/s2TB: WD20ERFX - Host to/from buffer: 145MB/s3TB: WD30ERFX - Host to/from buffer: 145MB/sSATA 6Gb/s interface64MB DDR2 CacheIntellipower low-power spindle1TB drive plattersOperating Temperature: 0-70CNon-Operating Temperature: -40-70CMTBF: 1,000,000 hoursNon-recoverable read errors per bits read: <1 in 1014Power2TB/3TB: read/write 4.4W, idle 4.1W, standy/sleep .6W1TB: read/write 3.7W, idle 3.2W, standby/sleep .6WAcoustics:2TB/3TB: idle 23 dBA, seek 24 dBA1TB: idle 21 dBA, seek 22 dBA3 year warranty with phone supportReview here > http://www.storagereview.com/western_digital_red_nas_hard_drive_review_wd30efrx

WD introduces new, NAS-Specific Hard Drive line

26 Replies

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mdgm-ntgr
NETGEAR Employee Retired
Jul 16, 2012
anhloc are you sure you have the v2 (charcoal chassis). The v1 (silver chassis) is not compatible with drives larger than 2TB in capacity.
anhloc
Aspirant
Jul 17, 2012
I do. I wouldn't get the drives otherwise.
PapaBear1
Apprentice
Jul 17, 2012
He's just checking, some new users confuse the v2 series and the v1 series.

Grab them when you see them. Newegg had them on Friday and were out on Saturday. I clicked on their notify button to send me an e-mail when they were back in stock. They sent me the e-mail around noon yesterday while I was away, and last evening they were out again. Looks like WD has a winner.
PandaMarketer
Aspirant
Jul 22, 2012
mdgm wrote:
anhloc are you sure you have the v2 (charcoal chassis). The v1 (silver chassis) is not compatible with drives larger than 2TB in capacity.

I have a v1 Duo. I have 1.5's in there. I just got SMART errors on disk 2. I wanted to get a 3TB drive. Now you say it won't support larger than 2TB. Can I know the source of this information? Thanks.
mdgm-ntgr
NETGEAR Employee Retired
Jul 22, 2012
There is no GPT support on Sparc. With MBR partitioning 3TB drives are typically recognised as <1TB in capacity. You will notice that 2TB drives are the max qualified for Sparc systems in the HCL and that the limitation is mentioned in the 4.1.9 Release Notes (http://www.readynas.com/RAIDiator_4_1_9_Notes) under Limitations.

3TB drives work fine in the Duo/NV+ v2 (ARM) and the NVX/Ultra/Pro (x86 - RAIDiator 4.2.16 or later is required to support 3TB disks)
ffohwx
Aspirant
Aug 19, 2012
Has anyone tried one of the RE4 drives in a Duo (v1) yet? I see it isn't on the HCL yet for the Duo. Due to budget constraints, I couldn't get 2 disks for my Duo when I got it about a year ago, and now I can finally get the 2nd disk. I have a 1 TB RE3 in it now, and I'm looking at the 1 TB RE4 for use as my 2nd disk. The price for the matching RE3 drive and the new RE4 is about the same, as the RE3 isn't available with my Amazon Prime free shipping. Would it be better to match the drives and just get the RE3?
StephenB
Guru - Experienced User
Aug 19, 2012
Since the RE3 is on the HCL, and is available for the same price, I would go with the RE3. It's a known quantity, since you already have one.

You should update your backup before installing it though (always a good idea when adding/replacing drives).
ffohwx
Aspirant
Aug 19, 2012
Thanks! I'll probably go with the RE3 then.
cbreving
Aspirant
Aug 31, 2012
I noticed the 2 TB WD20EFRX is on the HCL for the Duo v2, but it does not appear for the Duo v1.

Is this correct or an oversite?
mdgm-ntgr
NETGEAR Employee Retired
Aug 31, 2012
Those two products are very different. Compatibility with Duo v2 tells you nothing about compatibility with the v1 and vice versa.

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WD introduces new, NAS-Specific Hard Drive line

26 Replies

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