I've seen lots of complaints by customers on various retailer websites regarding a 30% failure rate of WD Reds and Greens and refunds that take several years to process. This is outrageously high and I find it hard to believe that any manufacturer would allow such problems to go uncorrected. Just wonder if maybe this problem hasn't been over exaggerated by customers mad about new drives that are defective? Has anyone using WD drives noticed a high level of failures and very poor customer service?

I've had the opposite experience. I only use WD drives and have numerous 2TB, 3TB and several 4TB green drives and have never had a defective drive in the bunch. I had a large UnRAID failure last year that fried 4 drives and was able to do advanced RMA with WD and had the drives in a few days.

 

I can't speak to the reds, but even outside of UnRAID I've always bought WD, and have several other blacks and greens -all without issues.

 

I would say I've bought 10 drives this year alone (either 3TB or 4TB WD greens) and likely at least that many last year between my UnRAID system and those I've built for others and had no issues to date.

I've had the opposite experience. I only use WD drives and have numerous 2TB, 3TB and several 4TB green drives and have never had a defective drive in the bunch. I had a large UnRAID failure last year that fried 4 drives and was able to do advanced RMA with WD and had the drives in a few days.

 

I can't speak to the reds, but even outside of UnRAID I've always bought WD, and have several other blacks and greens -all without issues.

 

I would say I've bought 10 drives this year alone (either 3TB or 4TB WD greens) and likely at least that many last year between my UnRAID system and those I've built for others and had no issues to date.

 

Thanks. I think people (myself included) tend to only review purchases when there is a problem and they are mad. Then the problem gets exaggerated out of proportion. I've mostly been using HGST Deskstars but the WD drives are a little cheaper so was thinking about switching.

I've seen lots of complaints by customers on various retailer websites regarding a 30% failure rate of WD Reds and Greens and refunds that take several years to process. This is outrageously high and I find it hard to believe that any manufacturer would allow such problems to go uncorrected. Just wonder if maybe this problem hasn't been over exaggerated by customers mad about new drives that are defective? Has anyone using WD drives noticed a high level of failures and very poor customer service?

 

Where is this 30% failure on Reds?  Don't shop or use NewEgg for reviews, they don't packages their drives correctly.  Look at the difference between the reviews at NewEgg and the reviews at Amazon.

Clearly a 30% number is exaggerated beyond all proportion -- and I'm sure "years to get a refund" is equally ridiculous.

 

The WD Reds are VERY reliable drives, and even the Green series are very good.  Many of the drives that folks report having issues with during initial testing are simply due to poor packaging by the shippers ... Newegg used to be particularly bad about this, although they've improved a LOT in the last few months.

 

I buy nothing but WD Reds and Seagate NAS units these days ... and both are exceptionally reliable and have excellent performance.

 

I've seen lots of complaints by customers on various retailer websites regarding a 30% failure rate of WD Reds and Greens and refunds that take several years to process. This is outrageously high and I find it hard to believe that any manufacturer would allow such problems to go uncorrected. Just wonder if maybe this problem hasn't been over exaggerated by customers mad about new drives that are defective? Has anyone using WD drives noticed a high level of failures and very poor customer service?

 

Where is this 30% failure on Reds?  Don't shop or use NewEgg for reviews, they don't packages their drives correctly.  Look at the difference between the reviews at NewEgg and the reviews at Amazon.

That use to be the case but the last 3 shipments of multiple drives I've gotten from them have been packaged as well as Amazon does.  Hopefully they will keep it this way.

Here's a random example of some of the bad reviews. Not sure where this person learned math.

 

This review is from: WD Red WD40EFRX 4TB IntelliPower 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" NAS Internal Hard Drive -Bulk

Pros: None so far.

 

Cons: 1 of 4 was bad. The replacement was also DOA. So far overall 40% failure rate

 

Other Thoughts: I cant believe that WD has so much failure rate these days. Waiting for another replacement order now.

Here's a random example of some of the bad reviews. Not sure where this person learned math.

 

This review is from: WD Red WD40EFRX 4TB IntelliPower 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" NAS Internal Hard Drive -Bulk

Pros: None so far.

 

Cons: 1 of 4 was bad. The replacement was also DOA. So far overall 40% failure rate

 

Other Thoughts: I cant believe that WD has so much failure rate these days. Waiting for another replacement order now.

That review was from newegg and was from March so still in the bad packaging period of time.  I would bet the problem with the drive was because of the shipping problems newegg had between Black Friday and March.  Since the first of this month they have been packaged much better and I've not had a DOA yet.  Before then I had a 50% failure rate due to that bad packaging.

Not sure where this person learned math.

 

Not sure what you're referring to -- but his comment about "... So far overall 40% failure rate" is exactly correct for his situation.  He had one drive out of 4 bad; then a bad replacement.  So he's had 2 out of 5 drives bad = 40% 

By the way, I agree with Bob -- Newegg's packaging was horrendous in the last couple years => drives were poorly wrapped in bubble wrap and loosely thrown into boxes, where they could bounce all over the place during transit.    No wonder there was a relatively high DOA rate (I never had anything close to the 50% Bob noted, but I've had far more DOA drives than I should have).

 

But in recent months, Newegg has been using a custom-fitted hard plastic drive holder; and has package them much more securely in the boxes.    I haven't had a single bad drive since they switched to this packaging.    I probably buy 50 drives/year for myself and others, so my sample if relatively limited -- but enough that I think I'd notice any really bad trends.

 

We've digressed from a discussion of WD quality to a discussion of the packaging of the drives - but I DO think that most of the issues folks have had with these drives are in fact packaging-related issues ... WD's drives are in fact quite good, and in particular the NAS units (Reds) are exceptionally reliable.

 

And as for your other question ...

Has anyone using WD drives noticed ... very poor customer service?

 

Absolutely NOT -- in fact, exactly the opposite.  WD is VERY good a replacing drives in a very timely manner ... their advance RMA process works VERY well; and even the standard RMA is very quick.  And in many cases they actually send you a better drive than you returned !! (i.e. larger)

 

Not sure where this person learned math.

 

Not sure what you're referring to -- but his comment about "... So far overall 40% failure rate" is exactly correct for his situation.  He had one drive out of 4 bad; then a bad replacement.  So he's had 2 out of 5 drives bad = 40% 

That's true I didn't read it closely enough. Just saw the 1 out of 4 and 40%.

Thanks for the replies. I'm sure the customer reviews are less than accurate just because very few people (including me) take the time to post a review "Ordered 5 drives and they all arrived with no damage."

 

Thanks for the replies. I'm sure the customer reviews are less than accurate just because very few people (including me) take the time to post a review "Ordered 5 drives and they all arrived with no damage."

 

I agree. I order WD hard drives just about every time and have never had any issues. I am also to lazy to write a review saying "YAY my hard rives work" because I expect them too... I don't like to write reviews that are "fluff" and just saying your hard drives work seems like fluff to me.