Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

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Moogle Stiltzkin
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Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by Moogle Stiltzkin »

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On the SOHO / SMB NAS front, the Seagate Exos series, despite its enterprise background, continues to make a strong case across multiple capacity points. The 16TB version is actually available for much lower (around $498) than the $605 direct from Amazon quoted above. The only places where the WD Red could edge out as a better choice are scenarios where the power consumption needs to be kept low. The 6TB WD Red is also the lowest-priced 6TB currently in the table. The IronWolf NAS models deliver slightly better performance compared to the WD Red due to the 7200RPM nature, but, have correspondingly higher power consumption numbers. On the SMB / SME NAS front, the IronWolf Pro pretty much edges out the WD Red Pro in pricing across the board (except for the 6TB version). This is despite the bundled data recovery service in the IronWolf Pro pricing.

Based on the above analysis, the recommendations for the NAS drives are clear - WD Red when performance is not as important as overall power consumption, and the Seagate Exos Enterprise drives otherwise. This is assuming that the user has adopted the 3-2-1 backup rule and doesn't foresee the need for a data recovery service (DRS). The IronWolf Pro NAS and the BarraCuda Pro both bundle the DRS. This needs to be taken into account while considering the pricing difference against other drives in the same capacity class.
https://www.anandtech.com/show/12075/best-consumer-hdds


wd, seagate, toshiba. that pretty much sums it up :shock:
Last edited by Moogle Stiltzkin on Wed Sep 04, 2019 1:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
NAS
[Main Server] QNAP TS-877 (QTS) w. 4tb [ 3x HGST Deskstar NAS & 1x WD RED NAS ] EXT4 Raid5 & 2 x m.2 SATA Samsung 850 Evo raid1 +16gb ddr4 Crucial+ QWA-AC2600 wireless+QXP PCIE
[Backup] QNAP TS-653A (Truenas Core) w. 4x 2TB Samsung F3 (HD203WI) RaidZ1 ZFS + 8gb ddr3 Crucial
[^] QNAP TL-D400S 2x 4TB WD Red Nas (WD40EFRX) 2x 4TB Seagate Ironwolf, Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-509 Pro w. 4x 1TB WD RE3 (WD1002FBYS) EXT4 Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-253D (Truenas Scale)
[Mobile NAS] TBS-453DX w. 2x Crucial MX500 500gb EXT4 raid1

Network
Qotom Pfsense|100mbps FTTH | Win11, Ryzen 5600X Desktop (1x2tb Crucial P50 Plus M.2 SSD, 1x 8tb seagate Ironwolf,1x 4tb HGST Ultrastar 7K4000)


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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by Moogle Stiltzkin »

since hgst got bought out, i've switched to buying wd reds. in fact i bought 2 x 4tb wd reds this year :}

i did consider the seagate ironwolf (ihm is interesting), but i opted for the wd red
linuxgeex -

Western Digital WD6002FRYZ 6TB Enterprise 7200 RPM 8.9/9.1 Watts Random Read/Write; Idle: 7.1 Watts

Western Digital WD60EFAX Red 6TB NAS 5400 RPM 3.1/4.8 Watts Random Read/Write; Idle: 0.6 Watts.

A typical home NAS sits idle 99% of the time, so 5 Red drives will typically draw 30W less power than the Enterprise drives. That requires quite a bit more active case cooling.

Spindle speed is significant - 5 x 5400 drives are a lot quieter than 5 x 7200, and 3.6khz at twice or more the wattage is certainly going to be more noticable than the 2.7kHz at half or less.
kpb321 -

I surprised we don't even get a mention for a fairly popular way of getting drives for a NAS. The Western Digital Easystore external hard drives are pretty regularly ~120-130 for a 8tb drive and ~160 for a 10tb drive. It's easy to remove the drives from the case and they are SATA drives that seem to be white label versions of the WD red pro drives. Technically WD says you are voiding the warranty by taking it out of the enclosure. Legally, the void if broken type stickers aren't enforceable so you may still be able to get it replaced under warranty as long as you still have the enclosure to put it back in. They could still try to deny your claim based on the sticker but as I said that alone isn't enforceable. For less then half the price a questionable or even no warranty still seems like a pretty good deal.
stephenbrooks -

I find if I'm considering buying a large HDD, I need to have it backed up at least once (e.g. to a NAS or another drive in the same system). In reality I'd end up wanting at least 3 drives, so the highest capacity options are too expensive. Something more like a 8TB primary and 3x4TB drives in RAID5 NAS for redundant backup.

Cost per TB can be as low as $25 for all capacity tiers (4TB-14TB) shown except 16TB.

My recipe above would be well-served with 1x 8TB Toshiba X300 ($197) and 3x 4TB IronWolf NAS (or WD Red, both $100), for a total of $497.
Samus
Consolidation has been happening for better or worse in the storage industry for decades. I read somewhere awhile back there were, at one point, over 200 manufactures in the magnetic storage industry.

Quantum bought Connor, Maxtor bought Quantum, Seagate bought Maxtor - mostly to get Quantum's DLT patents...they shelved practically all Maxtor technology and killed the brand, Seagate bought Samsung's magnetic storage division too I believe, Hitachi bought IBM storage, Toshiba and Hitachi signed a technology sharing agreement, WD bought HGST - complicating the whole Toshiba situation and resulting in some inherent IP licensing, then you have the oddball drives like Fujitsu who make their OWN exclusive platters through Fuji heavy industries which is really ridiculous to think about...I guess WD bought Komag awhile back but I don't think anything came of it as WD doesn't make platters they use Showa Denko and Komag just seemed to go away...

It seems Toshiba and WD drives both use a lot of Hitachi technology - they operate and feel very similar even down to the noises they make. You take them apart and see the motors and platters are all the same brands...Showa platters, JVC actuators, Nidec motors, TDK heads...even the cases have the same footprint and controllers are all off the shelf chips from LSI (Seagate), Addonics (Fujitsu) and Marvell (WD\Toshiba). I've even seen the same Hitachi-developed SMOOTH ASIC on WD and Toshiba controller PCB's.

Long story short, we are down to what, 4-5 manufactures. It's like to stay that way. What I am worried about is these hard drive cartels buying up SSD\NAND manufactures. WD bought Sandisk, Toshiba bought OCZ (which got them Indilinx) and Seagate bought LSI (which got them Sandforce) and so on...
KarlKastor -

M, I don't agree with your last part. We have 4-6 big Players in NAND Manufacturing: Micron with Intel, Toshiba with SanDisk (now WD), Samsung and Hynix.

The only acquisition was Sandisk by WD. And Toshiba by a consortium.
To buy a Flash-Controller manufacturer isn't a big thing. We have a lot and it's easy for new players to enter the market.
Toshiba bought OCZ but since then no controller came off that. Sandforce 3 was canceled.
Hynix bought LAMD and no new controller any more.

We have controllers from Intel, WD and Samsung itself. Big 3rd party players like SMI, Phison and Marvell. Where Marvell is a bit loosing ground. And some smaller ones like JMicron (now Maxiotek) and new to the game Realtek. Of course there are some enterprise controller in the market like Flashtec too.

SSD manufacturer itself have no IP from interest. They relabel SSDs or build them on their own with help of referenz models. Kingston does their own drives and bin their NAND themselves, but that isn't rocket science and the same with some OEM manufacturers.
It's the NAND manufacturer that counts. And to a small part controller manufacturer.

https://www.anandtech.com/show/14077/to ... r-and-hamr
Last edited by Moogle Stiltzkin on Thu Sep 05, 2019 12:13 am, edited 2 times in total.
NAS
[Main Server] QNAP TS-877 (QTS) w. 4tb [ 3x HGST Deskstar NAS & 1x WD RED NAS ] EXT4 Raid5 & 2 x m.2 SATA Samsung 850 Evo raid1 +16gb ddr4 Crucial+ QWA-AC2600 wireless+QXP PCIE
[Backup] QNAP TS-653A (Truenas Core) w. 4x 2TB Samsung F3 (HD203WI) RaidZ1 ZFS + 8gb ddr3 Crucial
[^] QNAP TL-D400S 2x 4TB WD Red Nas (WD40EFRX) 2x 4TB Seagate Ironwolf, Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-509 Pro w. 4x 1TB WD RE3 (WD1002FBYS) EXT4 Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-253D (Truenas Scale)
[Mobile NAS] TBS-453DX w. 2x Crucial MX500 500gb EXT4 raid1

Network
Qotom Pfsense|100mbps FTTH | Win11, Ryzen 5600X Desktop (1x2tb Crucial P50 Plus M.2 SSD, 1x 8tb seagate Ironwolf,1x 4tb HGST Ultrastar 7K4000)


Resources
[Review] Moogle's QNAP experience
[Review] Moogle's TS-877 review
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by P3R »

Only looking at the purchase price is shortsighted as over time, the cheapest disks are likely to become more costly.

WD Reds aren't best known for their reliability and if it fail when it's 3 years and 1 day you're out of luck. The only thing that one can be sure of is that with a WD Red (or any other 3-year warranty disk) is that you'll have a disk for 3 years. As NAS Pro and enterprise disks come with a 5 year warranty, you know that you'll have a disk for 5 years. So when comparing disk pricing, what makes sense is to divide the purchase price with the number of years with warranty. That will usually show 5-year warranty disks being the least costly. In addition to the longer warranty, those disks usually have better URE and MTBF specifications (that doesn't apply to the WD Red Pro though that stand out with their low specifications and high price!).

Plain WD Reds run cool, silent and don't use much power. if those are the most important metrics and absolute top performance and longetivity aren't, then WD Red is a good buy.

It's very uncool to post clueless comments like the one recommending a NAS internal backup disks in this forum without commenting the bad advice. Internal backup disks are close to useless and a waste of resources. Backup disks should always be a separate system (in it's simplest form a USB-connected external disk or a cloud service).
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by Moogle Stiltzkin »

you mean stephen's reply? i thought he would use that 8tb in a separate external usb storage of some sort. or at least thats what i would do for my own backup plan.

if there are holes and things to add on fine. i agree there was stuff left unsaid that should be said, backup on separate system. and as for price being cheapest i agree to some extent; on a different forum i pointed out that the toshiba N300 as attractive as the price is (they were cheaper in than the wd and seagate when i checked my local seller), may actually be noiser, run hotter and uses more electricity :S but there's no need to be a jerk about it which is VERY uncool :/

i'm still assessing my own wd red 4tb, is less than a few months old (i'll get back to you in 5 years :lol: although it's hardly helpful with that small a pool sample :( ). but i haven't seen vast catastrophic failures rates mentioned afaik? :'
https://www.backblaze.com/blog/backblaz ... s-q1-2019/
NAS
[Main Server] QNAP TS-877 (QTS) w. 4tb [ 3x HGST Deskstar NAS & 1x WD RED NAS ] EXT4 Raid5 & 2 x m.2 SATA Samsung 850 Evo raid1 +16gb ddr4 Crucial+ QWA-AC2600 wireless+QXP PCIE
[Backup] QNAP TS-653A (Truenas Core) w. 4x 2TB Samsung F3 (HD203WI) RaidZ1 ZFS + 8gb ddr3 Crucial
[^] QNAP TL-D400S 2x 4TB WD Red Nas (WD40EFRX) 2x 4TB Seagate Ironwolf, Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-509 Pro w. 4x 1TB WD RE3 (WD1002FBYS) EXT4 Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-253D (Truenas Scale)
[Mobile NAS] TBS-453DX w. 2x Crucial MX500 500gb EXT4 raid1

Network
Qotom Pfsense|100mbps FTTH | Win11, Ryzen 5600X Desktop (1x2tb Crucial P50 Plus M.2 SSD, 1x 8tb seagate Ironwolf,1x 4tb HGST Ultrastar 7K4000)


Resources
[Review] Moogle's QNAP experience
[Review] Moogle's TS-877 review
https://www.patreon.com/mooglestiltzkin
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by janwer »

I'm done with Seagate. Never will buy them again.
I'm happy with HGST. Next maybe WD.
TVS-951x 16GB RAM, 3x 0,5 TB SSD RAID5, 5x 8 TB RAID5
TS-431P2 8GB RAM, 4x 3 TB HGST RAID5
Unraid 8GB RAM, 10x 3TB HGST
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by P3R »

janwer wrote: Fri Sep 06, 2019 8:45 pm I'm done with Seagate. Never will buy them again.
Why?
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by janwer »

I lost data on Barracuda 7200.11. They all died after 2-3 years. My other Seagate discs have very high error count. I never have so bad experience with other HHDs. Now using mostly 3TB HGST HUS and HUA because they are good and cheap. No problems.
TVS-951x 16GB RAM, 3x 0,5 TB SSD RAID5, 5x 8 TB RAID5
TS-431P2 8GB RAM, 4x 3 TB HGST RAID5
Unraid 8GB RAM, 10x 3TB HGST
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by P3R »

janwer wrote: Sat Sep 07, 2019 12:16 am I lost data on Barracuda 7200.11.
It's always the responsibility of the owner to make sure data isn't lost. It can never be blamed on failing hardware.
They all died after 2-3 years.
Yes the cheapest desktop disk on the planet haven't been very reliable for some years now. It's also a terrible choice in NASes so it's good that you've stopped buying them.

There are no indications that Seagate NAS (Ironwolf) and Enterprise disks are less reliable than the competition. Ironwolf usually give more for the money compared to WD Red and Ironwolf Pro is both cheaper and have much better specifications than the direct competitor WD Red Pro so it may be expensive for you to avoid Seagate.

Yes I like HGST as well, have had great experience with Deskstar and Ultrastar. You can still find HGST-technology in WD enterprise disks, if you can afford them.

Only a few years before the Seagate DM failure many people were burned by WD Green and said they would never buy WD again... :wink:
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by janwer »

I don't agree.
My disks I think was bought in 2008 or 2009. Then in 2012 same story happen again! https://www.backblaze.com/blog/3tb-hard-drive-failure/
So it's not single incident but big statistical difference or trend. Seagate in my opinion can't be trusted.

For data hoarding I buy 3TB HGST drives and use them in Qnap and Unraid. Soon I'll have to switch to bigger drives in my Qnaps because of bay count limits. Unraid let me just add cheap drives and is perfect for low cost storage.
TVS-951x 16GB RAM, 3x 0,5 TB SSD RAID5, 5x 8 TB RAID5
TS-431P2 8GB RAM, 4x 3 TB HGST RAID5
Unraid 8GB RAM, 10x 3TB HGST
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by P3R »

janwer wrote: Mon Sep 09, 2019 6:56 pm I don't agree.
My disks I think was bought in 2008 or 2009. Then in 2012 same story happen again! https://www.backblaze.com/blog/3tb-hard-drive-failure/
So it's not single incident but big statistical difference or trend.
Yes, that's exactly what I told you in my previous post here about the terrible DM-models:
P3R wrote: Sat Sep 07, 2019 1:43 am Yes the cheapest desktop disk on the planet haven't been very reliable for some years now.
janwer wrote: Mon Sep 09, 2019 6:56 pmSeagate in my opinion can't be trusted.
This is where your thinking go wrong. The quality of the cheapest desktop disks say nothing about the quality of the better models from any disk manufacturer.

I guess you're not experienced enough to know that all disk manufacturers (except Toshiba I think as they haven't been in the business very long) have had their lemon models.

Many people hated WD for the problems they had with WD Green but WD Black, WD RE or any of the other models were no worse becuase of the WD Green problems.

Hitachi (later HGST) had a disastrous Deskstar model that was so bad that it became nicknamed "Deathstar" but that disk model didn't make all their other models bad.

Yet you think you can judge the quality of all Seagate models by looking at the infamous DMs... :roll:
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by OneCD »

Some time back, there existed the terrible Quantum "Bigfoot", which kept me busy for months replacing HDDs due to a firmware error on the controller card (resulting in the "tick-of-death").

Quantum sold their HDD division to Maxtor, who were later acquired by Seagate. Oh, there's another flimsy knife-in-the-back for Seagate. :wink:

ImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImageImage
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by janwer »

There is another argument - price.
I pay 13$ for 1TB buying 3TB HGST 7200 rpm enterprise drives. I have few refurbs from 2013 with zeroed SMART data but new batch drives are in factory seal and manufactured in september 2017. I think they are factory new. Enterprise class, build like tank, heavy and hot. Without cooling they reach 50°C in cool basement. With cooling 33-38°C.

Cheapest Seagate drives in Poland cost me 2,5-3 times the price for TB. I can buy bigger 6 or 8TB and that's the only advantage.

If I stick to HGST drives price difference is QNAP almost for free. 4x3TB HGST is 150$. 12TB Seagate is 370$. Difference is 220$ and TS-431P2 cost here 300$.

For 36TB Unraid savings are 660$ which is enough for new MB and CPU or electricity for five years to continuously run this disks.

Why buy compromised Seagate when best brand, with proven low failure rate enterprise HGST drives cost 2,5-3 times less?
TVS-951x 16GB RAM, 3x 0,5 TB SSD RAID5, 5x 8 TB RAID5
TS-431P2 8GB RAM, 4x 3 TB HGST RAID5
Unraid 8GB RAM, 10x 3TB HGST
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by P3R »

@janwer, You're confusing things here. I'm not trying to convince you to stop buying HGST. Buy those refurbished disks as long as you can if you like them.

I'm pointing out the flawed logic in you making claims about the quality of all products from a brand based on the well known mediocre quality of their absolute low cost product line (that specifically shouldn't be used in NASes anyway).
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
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Re: Best Consumer Hard Drives: Q3 2019 by Anandtech

Post by janwer »

What better information about reliability we have if not statistics from Backblaze and similar? There we can see there is corelation between brand failure rate. This can be used to estimate probability of failure of given brand.
Flawed logic would be to ignore it.
TVS-951x 16GB RAM, 3x 0,5 TB SSD RAID5, 5x 8 TB RAID5
TS-431P2 8GB RAM, 4x 3 TB HGST RAID5
Unraid 8GB RAM, 10x 3TB HGST
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