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Western Digital quetion
Hi,
Does anyone have comments about the quality/reliability difference between WD Black and WD Blue? Their ads say the Blue line is for everyday perforamnce and the Black line is for power computing. Usually, whne I buy an HD, I choose "power computing" on the assumption that those should be more reliable and have a longer time before it fails. Thanks, John |
#2
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Western Digital quetion
Yes wrote:
Does anyone have comments about the quality/reliability difference between WD Black and WD Blue? Their ads say the Blue line is for everyday perforamnce and the Black line is for power computing. Usually, whne I buy an HD, I choose "power computing" on the assumption that those should be more reliable and have a longer time before it fails. Blues run at 5400 RPM. Blacks run at 7200 RPM. Faster spin means reduced seek time hence faster data transfer speed. However, faster spin means more heat produced. Blacks run hotter than blues. Blacks also have a larger range for a built-in buffer. If you use blacks because you want better performance, make sure you mount the drive so it can be properly cooled. Don't mount other drives next to it. Don't have cables that block the air flow around it. Don't have fans competing against each other for airflow through the case. Blues have a 2-year warranty. Blacks, which you pay more up front, have a 5-year warranty. Manufacturers have long learned to provide a warranty that extends far enough into the MTBF (Mean Time Between Failures) for a product, so the warranty is short of the MTBF. That way, the product won't fail until after the warranty expires. They don't want the expense of replacing a failed product, so they aren't going to warranty much beyond the MTBF. A longer warranty usually means a longer surviving product. It's in their interests to market the warranty to draw sales, but not incur the costs of replacement. See some comparison of color models at: https://www.windowscentral.com/weste...al-hdd-your-pc https://www.partitionwizard.com/clon...-vs-black.html Found using a Google search on "wdc blue versus black hdd". |
#3
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Western Digital quetion
VanguardLH wrote:
Yes wrote: Does anyone have comments about the quality/reliability difference between WD Black and WD Blue? Their ads say the Blue line is for everyday perforamnce and the Black line is for power computing. Usually, whne I buy an HD, I choose "power computing" on the assumption that those should be more reliable and have a longer time before it fails. Blues run at 5400 RPM. Blacks run at 7200 RPM. Faster spin means reduced seek time hence faster data transfer speed. However, faster spin means more heat produced. Blacks run hotter than blues. Blacks also have a larger range for a built-in buffer. If you use blacks because you want better performance, make sure you mount the drive so it can be properly cooled. Don't mount other drives next to it. Don't have cables that block the air flow around it. Don't have fans competing against each other for airflow through the case. Blues have a 2-year warranty. Blacks, which you pay more up front, have a 5-year warranty. Manufacturers have long learned to provide a warranty that extends far enough into the MTBF (Mean Time Between Failures) for a product, so the warranty is short of the MTBF. That way, the product won't fail until after the warranty expires. They don't want the expense of replacing a failed product, so they aren't going to warranty much beyond the MTBF. A longer warranty usually means a longer surviving product. It's in their interests to market the warranty to draw sales, but not incur the costs of replacement. See some comparison of color models at: https://www.windowscentral.com/weste...al-hdd-your-pc https://www.partitionwizard.com/clon...-vs-black.html Found using a Google search on "wdc blue versus black hdd". It's possible the WDC Black has a two-stage actuator, which means it resists the vibration coming from other drives in the PC a little better. WDC Black 6TB, the spec sheet for mine says 9.1W read/write. A similar pair of Blue 6TB are 4.8W and 5.3W (5400RPM). Or about half the power of the WDC Black. It's not quite as loud as it used to be. In the 4TB era, both companies managed to make some "thumpers", which would excite the PC case with the low frequencies involved. The drives now don't seem to be quite as bad, and maybe their seek has been turned down a bit. Paul |
#4
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Western Digital quetion
On Tue, 16 Jun 2020 01:44:07 -0000 (UTC), "Yes"
wrote: Does anyone have comments about the quality/reliability difference between WD Black and WD Blue? Their ads say the Blue line is for everyday perforamnce and the Black line is for power computing. Usually, whne I buy an HD, I choose "power computing" on the assumption that those should be more reliable and have a longer time before it fails. Wrong. Reliability, run-time length before what fails? A mechanical drive may be shingled;- not shingled has different characteristics, new technology and arguably less popular on an empirical bases. Western Digital, sometime ago, shifted its marketing strategy, rather placed impairments between a sense of precision possible in mechanical drives and what advertising otherwise means to Western Digital. Whether a shingled drive is received, or not, is one of consequences, WD technology does not longer directly place on their drive serial/manufacturer numbers in direct correlation. Probably, among the first to that trend was an enterprise class-action lawsuit over drives WD was timing-out prematurely for "hibernation" states;- that the nomenclature was and while there meant that WD subsequently released a program patch to address the drive firmware for optionally prolonging a time-out sequence;- that later the nomenclature was not there meant subsequent drives, after the lawsuit, WD did not longer identify for direct end-user inferences for making the "right choice" as an informed consumer. Rather like asking which one, of possible hard drive purchases, is most of all right among a barrel, if at all, of rotten apples. How that usually translates is into what warrantee reputability means to either a failure or dissatisfied situation, a purchaser "contracts" for a part of the purchase price. I see all my HDDs as failing, as an illustration, from 1T and 2T, or one or two odd 1.5T class drives. The only one I do not see failing, perhaps, is a single Western Digital 640G drive that has been running 24/7 and is over 20-years-old. A back-up or mirror of a drive is the minimum thickness of cushion between the rear and an hard surface of road when drives do fail. Datum is not economic: What is priceless need mean nothing to a drive manufacturer;- as they will fail, surely to be assured. (Figure storage remotely for a branch science of computer entropy -- the tendency for datum to randomize or lose integrity, at some precept from its fundamental corollary, which is of course an intelligible, more or less ideal, system back-up.) |
#5
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Western Digital quetion
A black drive doesn't have shingles. A blue 3.5" may be shingled for 2+TB
and 2.5" shingled for 1+TB, so avoid blue |
#6
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Western Digital quetion
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#7
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Western Digital quetion
Yrrah wrote:
VanguardLH : Does anyone have comments about the quality/reliability difference between WD Black and WD Blue? Their ads say the Blue line is for everyday perforamnce and the Black line is for power computing. Usually, whne I buy an HD, I choose "power computing" on the assumption that those should be more reliable and have a longer time before it fails. Blues run at 5400 RPM. Blacks run at 7200 RPM. Not always. There are exceptions: https://www.westerndigital.com/products/internal-drives/wd-blue-hdd#specifications Yrrah The small capacity tells you those are boot drives. And they can't (or won't) make them smaller than that. As the platters are 1TB, 1.5TB, 2TB (shingled). You would think the production pipeline would have a lot more variation, but that's not how it seems to work in practice. I got one 500GB drive here, where a 1TB platter was used, and the drive is short-stroked. That means both sides of the platter are used, but only the first half of the platter gets used. The area nearer the hub is not used. And the transfer rate has less variation from outside to inside. Paul |
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