2TB Western Digital 3.5-inch (WD20EADS) is QUIET?

[__Miguel_]

My two USB external drive enclosures for backups have 750GB drives now. I stayed away from 1TB and 1.5TB because of all the failures. But now they are getting full, and a 2TB in a single enclosure would be awesome! The fact they are slow wouldn't matter to me at all. I look forward to them.

Actually, until USB 3.0 ships, it doesn't really matter how fast the HDD is. Just about every HDD released over the last three or four years is capable of 35MBps minimum sequential reads (mostly the reason why external enclusures exist in the first place), which is the max sustained transfer rate over USB 2.0 (and yes, I know about eSATA, but we're talking about USB).

So big 5400rpm drives are just fine for external enclosures, with the added advantage of lower heat outputs over the faster 7200rpm drives. Of course, backups are always a must, but that's another issue altogether

[EDIT]Ups, forgot to ask you guys something Sorry.

Does anyone know if this drive specifically, and Green Power in general (I'm really thinking about the WD10EADS, so... ) support Staggered Spin-Up? I know Samsung drives support it, but WD has lowered the GP idle drive requirements to those of 2.5'' drives at full power (kinda), and also moping the floor with just about any other 5400rpm drive available (while also being at least as cheap as the others), so it's my current top pick to low power HDD storage...

Thank you in advance.[/EDIT]

[bgiddins]

The WD GP drives support "start up in idle" mode - you do this with jumper pins (not that the drives come with a jumper bridge). Haven't tried it because mine are in an array and I'm not sure what effect on the array it would have.

[__Miguel_]

The WD GP drives support "start up in idle" mode - you do this with jumper pins (not that the drives come with a jumper bridge). Haven't tried it because mine are in an array and I'm not sure what effect on the array it would have.

Thanks for the info. However, does "start up in idle" mean "Staggered Spin-up"?

If it does mean they are Staggered Spin-up compatible, probably the only thing you would notice is the array taking longer to become available, since the drives will spin up one by one, not at the same time. However, if the controller isn't aware of the Staggered Spin-up (any controller worthy of that name should, though ), it may lead to one or more drives dropping out of the array, which generally is not a good idea. Care to try with only one drive (I'm assuming you're using them as RAID5, RAID6, RAID5E/EE, or whatever redundant configuration), possibly only up to the BIOS screen (so the OS doesn't stress out about the array being off-line)?

Assuming you can't/won't (I won't get mad, any info is good), anyone who has a couple of drives not in an array care to try this one? Which jumper should be bridged? (Btw, since just about every single piece of hardware I've bought over the last couple of years comes with at least one extra jumper bridge, I'm OK with that approach ).

Thanks again.

Cheers.

Miguel

[SileX]

Picture here:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showth ... p=13319478

for preorder:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showprodu ... =HD-263-WD

[whiic]

That picture is bullshit: random picture taken from folder containing marketing images. Does it have 4 platters? No. Does WD20EADS have 2000GB platters instead of 500GB? No. Is that even any low-capacity variant of GreenPower? Uncertain. Could be 7200rpm drive also. With single platter, it's not 1st or 2nd generation GreenPower. Either it's 3rd generation 500GB or it not GreenPower at all.

[SileX]

More sites for pre-order:

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... ?wd-20eads

http://www.lambda-tek.com/componentshop ... ID=B179238

[chancy]

Am I the first to post that it’s now official?

Press release:
http://www.wdc.com/en/company/releases/ ... 6C335}

Specs:
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=576

Looks like that non-working link we talked about earlier was a placeholder for an unannounced product

The At-a-Glance PDF is the same as the leaked document we all saw last month, apart from the minor changes to the document properties that dhanson865 and I found.

[SileX]

Yes!

WD introduces 2 terabyte hard drive
http://www.macworld.com/article/138462/ ... green.html

[__Miguel_]

Coverage from Tom's Hardware, TG Daily and Dailytech.

Finally! Now the only thing that's missing is general availability

Cheers.

Miguel

[Spare Tire]

I don't understand western digital naming convention so i'm not sure. But is the WD10EADS 2 platter now that 500GB platter 2TB GP is out? Did they reuse the same name but changed from 4 platter to two? If yes then how will consumers differentiate when they buy!

[line]

We may not be able to, at least not for a while. Just as we're currently unable to tell a 3-platter WD10EACS from a 4-platter one unless the submodel is disclosed, we may not be able to specify a 2-platter revision of either the WD10EACS or the WD10EADS (which started off as a 3-platter drive) unless Western Digital gives it a new model name.

Sure, you could look at such parameters as submodel, manufacture date, weight and Sustained Transfer Rate but your average supplier can only do so much to help you with them.

[__Miguel_]

Well, I might have some insight to that one.

Take a look at this PDF, fresh from the WDC website about the new GP drives:

1) First things first, it seems there WILL be a 1.5TB WD15EADS, and also the "WD10EDVS", for PVRs. Which is nice.

2) There are a few mistakes on the PDF, namely the cache references for the 500GB drives.

3) WD never publishes the number of platters their HDDs have. So you must make "educated guesses" (I just love that Transformers reference... ) based on what we know, and the figures given to us.

So, we know for a fact that the WD20EADS is a 4-platter drive (only Hitaschi makes 5-platter models these days). We also know that power draw is roughly the same for drives with the same number of plates, albeit with less capacity, and decreases with the number of platters.

Which means right now WD is apparently selling:

1) A 4-platter, 8-head 2TB model (500GB/platter);
2) A 4-platter, 7-head 1.5TB model (500GB/platter; it can also be a 4/8, short-stroked, though);
3) Two 3-platter, 6-head 1TB models (334GB/platter);
4) Two 3-platter, 5-head 750GB models (334GB/platter, and can also be 3/6 short-strocked);
5) Two 2-platter, 4-head 640GB models (334GB/platter);
6) Two 2-platter, 3-head 500GB models (334GB/platter, and again can also be 2/4 short-strocked).

This is what I get from the spin-up power figures. We all know an extra platter WILL be harder to start, so if those power figures are right, there ar no 2-platter GPs yet.

Btw, I know it's a little OT, but do you know the generation of the RE2 GPs? And if the 2TB version will be available to them?

Cheers.

Miguel

[bgiddins]

2) A 4-platter, 7-head 1.5TB model (500GB/platter; it can also be a 4/8, short-stroked, though);

...wouldn't this be a 3-platter model - maybe with 6 heads???

[chancy]

2) A 4-platter, 7-head 1.5TB model (500GB/platter; it can also be a 4/8, short-stroked, though);

...wouldn't this be a 3-platter model - maybe with 6 heads???

That would have been my expectation too, but if you read back through this thread, Miguel generally knows his stuff. If you look at the PDF, the 1.5 and 2TB drives have identical specs (apart from capacity, of course).

1) First things first, it seems there WILL be a 1.5TB WD15EADS, and also the "WD10EDVS", for PVRs. Which is nice.

2) There are a few mistakes on the PDF, namely the cache references for the 500GB drives.

Actually, I think all the model numbers in the PDF are correct. The 8MB cache “VSâ€

[__Miguel_]

2) A 4-platter, 7-head 1.5TB model (500GB/platter; it can also be a 4/8, short-stroked, though);

...wouldn't this be a 3-platter model - maybe with 6 heads???

Well, I would I likes that very much, but unless the power figures WD stated on the PDF are utterly wrong, or somehow WD managed to bend the laws of physics and make 4 platters as hard to spin up as 3, I don't think so. But I might be wrong, and hopefully I am

Also, I just realized that, if I'm not wrong, the 1.5TB drive WILL be short-stroked, since there is no way of making a "round" 1.5TB drive from 500GB platters without actually removing one of them.

But keep in mind this is somewhat standard in industry: new capacity point platters also have an optimization curve on yields, so it is very likely we'll see regular 3-platter 1.5TB, 2-platter 1TB and 1-platter 500GB drives in a near future (probably just around when WD decides that 334GB/platter should die, or only be confined to 320GB and 640GB drives... lol).

Just look at what happened to the Samsung F1s: at first, the only ones out in the wild were the 1TB and 750GB models, the 750GB drive still being a 250GB/platter drive (most reviews I've read about this one have very odd performance and power results for a 334GB/platter drive), then (after about 6 months or so) trickling down to the 640GB and 320GB drives.

That would have been my expectation too, but if you read back through this thread, Miguel generally knows his stuff. If you look at the PDF, the 1.5 and 2TB drives have identical specs (apart from capacity, of course).

Thanks for the compliment. Luckyly, I won't need to fit through doors over the next few hours, because right now it would be impossible... lol

But keep in mind I only based my "guesstimates" from the spin-up power draw figures, and if those are wrong, then I'll be wrong too.

1) First things first, it seems there WILL be a 1.5TB WD15EADS, and also the "WD10EDVS", for PVRs. Which is nice.

2) There are a few mistakes on the PDF, namely the cache references for the 500GB drives.

Actually, I think all the model numbers in the PDF are correct. The 8MB cache “VSâ€

[chancy]

Sorry about that, I was referring to the model numbers besides the cache values on the 500GB drives, which instead pf "5000" have "6400". I was sleepy when I wrote this, so it came out wrong. Sorry about that.

Oh, I see it now, sorry for the misunderstanding. I wonder if they’ll quietly update the PDF.

Sorry again, my fingers slipped up. I meant to say WD10EAVS, but I mixed it up with the regular EADS, and out came that weird hybrid. I don't know anything about those two other models you referred, I'm assuming they are 1st-gen GPs, right?

My bad again! When you mentioned PVRs I thought you meant the AV-GPs, which are listed as Consumer Electronics Drives and directly marketed for PVRs and HTPCs. Never mind about those.
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products ... anguage=en

[__Miguel_]

My bad again! When you mentioned PVRs I thought you meant the AV-GPs, which are listed as Consumer Electronics Drives and directly marketed for PVRs and HTPCs. Never mind about those.
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products ... anguage=en

No, it wasn't your bad, I really was referring to that kind of PVR. Only the model number came out completely wrong... lol

The WD10EAVS does seem an AV-GP, it might replace the ones you were talking about. After all, the WD10EADS is currently the 1TB drive with the lowest power draw I know of, it wouldn't make sense for WD to keep a supposedly low-power (lower than the "regular" version, at least...) drive with higher power consumptions than the normal, non-power-optimized drive. It's just plain silly to me

So, now that's out of the way, the only thing missing is widespread availability Any info on that? Hehehe

Cheers.

Miguel



P.S.: OMG! I just remembered something... 3 of these, plus a 2.5'' system drive (5V only, I wouldn't need to worry about Staggered Spin-up, like I am worrying now... lol) would be just about PERFECT for that WHS NAS I am thinking about...

[bgiddins]

P.S.: OMG! I just remembered something... 3 of these, plus a 2.5'' system drive (5V only, I wouldn't need to worry about Staggered Spin-up, like I am worrying now... lol) would be just about PERFECT for that WHS NAS I am thinking about...

Dream NAS - Chenbro ES34069 mini-ITX hotswap chassis with 4 x 2TB, coupled with a 32GB SSD as an OS drive, and an Atom based mini-ITX board running FreeNAS or Ubuntu Server with mdadm RAID 5. You'd get 6TB of storage with some drive failure protection.

By the time I need more storage though, hopefully we'd be at 3TB disks or bigger - my array is only 11% full

[__Miguel_]

Dream NAS - Chenbro ES34069 mini-ITX hotswap chassis with 4 x 2TB, coupled with a 32GB SSD as an OS drive, and an Atom based mini-ITX board running FreeNAS or Ubuntu Server with mdadm RAID 5. You'd get 6TB of storage with some drive failure protection.

Wait, do you actually have one of those built?

Oh, right, 2TB drives were just launched... You had me drooling for a while... hehehe

I see two problems with that configuration (besides the obvious hediously large price tag... lol): noise output and the fact right now you CAN'T find a regular mini-ITX Atom board with more than 2 SATA ports... Sure, you can go with an industrial board I saw a while back over at [H], but that would skyrocket the price to astronomical levels. Until Ion launches, I don't think it will be easy to find such a thing at affordable levels. AND a PCI 4-port SATA controller seems a little "heh" on the bandwidth...

Thankfully, you have some choices on the ultra low-power arena besides the Atom (albeit more expensive than your normal Atom board), WITH at least 4 SATA ports on the PCB: NVIDIA IGPs (or the 690G/740G chipsets), coupled with an underclocked and undervolted low power Athlon X2 or Intel E5xxx/E7xxx CPU.

I don't know how the 9x00 series behaves on power consumption, but the 8x00 series is great (check the review a while back right here on SPCR). And Intel 45nm parts are wicked even on stock idle power draw.

Also, do keep in mind those cages are anything BUT noiseless, and are hard as hell to decouple from the chassis...

However, that would still be a sweet rig (though I have a couple of ideas that might be more noise-friendly, albeit the lack of hot-swap capabilities - not that it matters, I'd rather use WHS, which is not very fond of those things ), and a colossal storage server. Rock on!

Cheers.

Miguel

[Sidrack Marinho]

Newegg just added the 2 TB drive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822136344

No sign from the 1.5 TB model.

Don't purchase before you can see some real reviews!!!!

And it's too way expensive. The Seagate (1.5 TB), even if it's not reliable (too much defective units) it's available for US$ 130. In the first month of release, it was priced US$ 215/200. So, let's wait at least 3 months, until we can get proper reviews and a much better price...

[__Miguel_]

Exactly.

2TB drives right now are for people THAT desperate for space

Cheers.

Miguel

[tutu]

Newegg just added the 2 TB drive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822136344

Is it in stock? Just wondering when it will actually be available.

[line]

Yes. If you can click Add to Cart, it's in stock.

[tutu]

Yes. If you can click Add to Cart, it's in stock.

Thanks, thats good news. Now just have to wait for someone in the UK to get stock. As well as hope it doesn't suffer from any problems like the WD sticky up above. I have a Samsung F1 1TB at the moment (as a data drive) and it is quite fast and quiet in my setup.

[__Miguel_]

Yes. If you can click Add to Cart, it's in stock.

Thanks, thats good news. Now just have to wait for someone in the UK to get stock. As well as hope it doesn't suffer from any problems like the WD sticky up above. I have a Samsung F1 1TB at the moment (as a data drive) and it is quite fast and quiet in my setup.

Ok, that means it should only take about one month now to get here to Portugal. Not bad

I don't think neither the 2TB nor the 1.5TB 500GB/platter versions will have the same problems as the older GPs. If you look at the enhancements the newer firmware brings for the 1st-gen RE2 GPs, you'll see the "low power spinup" mode, which was not available before, AND which is also present on the 2TB model.

At the very least, we'll be able to control the head unload aggressiveness, which doesn't seem possible on pre-update GPs.

All in all, great news, if it turns out true.

Now, since that thing is already available, where are the reviews? They're already late...

Cheers.

Miguel

[tonyw]

Hi guys, just found a preview of the new Western Digital 2.0 TB drive... can't wait!

http://hothardware.com/News/WD-2TB-Cavi ... e-Preview/

[__Miguel_]

Hi, guys.

Good news: the first reviews started appearing. They're not from the "usual" sites, but those will probably appear in a short time.

So, as of now, I've managed to find four: Trusted Reviews, Extremetech, Reg Hardware and finally Tweak Town.

It seems the WD20EADS a little slower than the 1TB Caviar Black, which is not that bad. However, still not a match for the similar-priced VelociRaptor (I know, I'm being mean here... lol), whose MINIMUM read speed is faster than the WD20EADS AVERAGE read speed.

As usual, no noteworthy (for SPCR readers, that is) sound, vibration and power consumption tests were made, so we still don't know if this thing is silent or not, and how much it costs to run... (And, of course, if the "dreaded" load/unload issue has been rectified).

So, Mike, if you're reading this, you know what we expect from you when you finally review one of these, ok? Oh, and try and see how that new low power spinup mode works, ok?

Cheers.

Miguel

[bgiddins]

It seems the WD20EADS a little slower than the 1TB Caviar Black, which is not that bad. However, still not a match for the similar-priced VelociRaptor (I know, I'm being mean here... lol), whose MINIMUM read speed is faster than the WD20EADS AVERAGE read speed.

Well, that's exactly as expected... these are drives built around power efficiency, not performance

Without starting another debate about IntelliPower, they're basically a 5400RPM drive. Caviar Black is 7200RPM, and VelociRaptor is 10000RPM (ignoring platter density).

Think bulk storage, not a primary partition.

[__Miguel_]

Well, that's exactly as expected... these are drives built around power efficiency, not performance

I know, I was just poking at it, that's it. I think it's a great drive. To be able to average above 70MBps is just plain impressive, since the thing is ginourmous. And if you just average the first 1TB of data transfer, it's a different beast altogether...

Without starting another debate about IntelliPower, they're basically a 5400RPM drive. Caviar Black is 7200RPM, and VelociRaptor is 10000RPM (ignoring platter density).

IntelliPower is just plain funny. 5400rpm is seen as somewhat of a "yucky" spindle speed (5400rpm notebook drives are usually considered slow), so WD and other manufacturers took the easy way out: "let's NOT market spindle speed, let's hype it up and call it 'revolutionary'" Oh, well, at least they showed everyone slow spindle drives don't actually NEED to be horrible performers.

Btw, the VelociRaptor has some points in common with the WD20EADS, namely the price, power draw (for a 10k rpm drive) and most likely sound (not vibration, though) values. So, while not a fair comparison by most standards, they ARE comparable.

Now, if just anyone would listen to what I've been saying for years, now THAT would be nice... Just make the bloody drive able to change at least between two spindle speeds. I don't care if a head park or a complete stop of disk activity must be performed, just do it. Make it APM controlled, it's there for a reason, right? It's not like we have lack of APM states right now... (from 256 possible, we currently use like 3 or 4, right?)

Btw, I think Seagate has made something like this. I remember reading something over at Tom's Hardware (if memory serves me right) about a 2.5'' notebook drive that somehow lowered power draw by A LOT when streaming DVD data from the HDD (continuous low-bitrate data stream). I remember at the time having the distinct feeling the thing lowered the spindle speed... But I digress.

Think bulk storage, not a primary partition.

Yep, and when you say "bulk storage", I think four of these on an 8TB, WHS-based (maximum capacity WHS accepts, AFAIK), low power (like, sub-50W idling, sub-100W full blast) NAS. Hehehe

Cheers.

Miguel

[SileX]

HERE IS A SUMMARY (EXCERPTS) OF ABOVE REVIEW LINKS:

Western Digital 2TB Caviar Green Drive Preview
A quick glance at the numbers here show this new big-boy Caviar Green drive from WD offering more than competitive performance versus the likes of Samsung's Spinpoint F1 and Seagate's Barracuda 7200.11 -- both 7200RPM-based products. HD Tach shows an average read speed of 90MB/s and average writes at 80MB/s.
http://hothardware.com/News/WD-2TB-Cavi ... e-Preview/

2 TB Hard Drive Preview: Western Digital WD20EADS
These benchmarks were run on an engineering sample, so we're not assigning a rating yet. But we're pretty impressed with the overall performance, lack of heat, and relatively quiet operation. The new WD20EADS is really terabytes for the masses: affordable, capacious, and efficient.
http://www.extremetech.com/print_articl ... 483,00.asp

Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB hard drive
This certainly pays off in terms of the sound and vibration levels. The Green has a reasonable idle noise level of 25dBA that only steps up to 29dBA under load. Those noise ratings fall between a typical 7200rpm drive and a really quiet 5400rpm unit, which is a testament to WD as packing four platters into a drive is a sure-fire way to raise noise levels.
http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2009/01/27 ... _green_2tb
All we know is that we can hardly wait for a 2TB Caviar Black with 7200rpm spindle speed.
Verdict
WD’s new 2TB Caviar Green is surprisingly fast yet it's also very quiet. Besides, what self-respecting power PC owner doesn't want a 2TB drive?
http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2009/01/27 ... page5.html

Western Digital Caviar Green 2 TB Retail Desktop Drive
The power saving features that Western Digital has incorporated into their Green Series products is very impressive. For enthusiasts it doesn’t matter too much if your storage drives use 3 watts less power than a competing product when you are already using 250 watts for your graphics card, 160 from your processor and who knows how much more power from your array of VelociRaptors. Having 2TB of storage in an external enclosure that doesn’t require active cooling is a positive, no matter what kind of user you are. And I am sure in time WDC will take advantage of the new drives and make some popular My Book products with the new technology.
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/1738/1 ... index.html

Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB
Verdict
Western Digital is first to the 2TB party and it has made an impressive entrance. While it's no performance demon, the WD Caviar Green 2TB has all the power saving credentials that we now crave, is quiet, and is sensibly priced.
http://www.trustedreviews.com/storage/r ... een-2TB/p3

AND ONE MORE:

Got my WD 2TB! Pics and benchmarks inside.
One other thing I have to admit, this drive is quiet and cold. Even in the random seek tests, I can't hear it over my case fans. (although that's not saying much) I thought the original benches showing 26c were just because the drive was still cold from shipping. But it's been running for 2 hours now, idling at 24c. It went up to 27c during the write test. For reference, room temperature is 21c and the drives have a 120mm fan blowing directly across them. My Velociraptor idles at 41c.
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?p=1 ... 1033667758