http://www.microcenter.com/product/430783/4TB_355400RPM_SATA_32MB

 

Looks like in store or shipped (for extra $6.00). Great drive, great deal!

Have a microcenter about 10min from my place, plan on picking one of these drives up. Georgia has 2 no tax days coming up on Aug 1 and 2, so the timing of the price on the drive is perfect.

That's a very good deal on an excellent drive.  Only problem is it's only 4TB 

(With 6TB WD Reds out, that's all I'll buy from now on)

 

That's a very good deal on an excellent drive.  Only problem is it's only 4TB 

(With 6TB WD Reds out, that's all I'll buy from now on)

 

If only my budget allowed for 6tb drives! Using 4tb drives in a box to backup my unraid box.

... Using 4tb drives in a box to backup my unraid box.

 

An excellent plan.  That's the one thing I DO buy less expensive drives for ... when I need more backup space, I go with the lowest cost/TB high-quality drives ==>  i.e. I still buy WD Red, Seagate NAS, or Hitachi drives -- but, for example, this drive at only $33/TB is clearly a better buy for backups than a 6TB WD Red at $50/TB.    But for my primary arrays, I only buy the highest capacity drives currently available at a reasonable cost.

 

Is it ok to run one of these as a parity drive?

Is it ok to run one of these as a parity drive?

 

Sure, as long as it meets the requirements of being >= the size of any other drive in your system.

Ok. I asked because I read that you want at least a 7200rpm on the parity drive.

Not necessary.  It will provide a slight bump in performance if you have multiple writes on different drives being done simultaneously (i.e. different systems accessing your server at the same time) ... but in most cases it'll make no difference.    And for long activities like parity checks or drive rebuilds, the speed is limited by the slowest drive anyway ... so a 7200rpm parity drive will make no difference.

 

I agree with garycase, these are great drives. I would not have posted the link if I did not use them myself. I bought another couple of them and luckily got my local Fry's to pricematch.

 

For me the speed difference between these and 7200rpm drives has not been noticeable. They have the advantage because of spinning slow of lower power use and less heat generation.

What you want in a box with many drives close together.

 

Mark

 

I agree with garycase, these are great drives. I would not have posted the link if I did not use them myself. I bought another couple of them and luckily got my local Fry's to pricematch.

 

For me the speed difference between these and 7200rpm drives has not been noticeable. They have the advantage because of spinning slow of lower power use and less heat generation.

What you want in a box with many drives close together.

 

Mark

 

The other thing to keep in mind is that the higher density of the drive platters make today's 5400 RPM read data faster than the 7200 RPM form the prior generations.

 

The other point about 7200 RPM drives as parity - if you are going to invest in some 7200 RPM drives, parity should be one of them. Writes will only be as fast as the slowest drive, and if parity is always the slowest, it will always be the limiting factor.

Looks like 3 year warranty. Some other places, newegg, and bhphoto have sold it before for more. Some reviews on amazon as well. Reviews are fairly positive. 0S03359 is the model number I think. Will verify tomorrow once I pick it up.

 

5400rpm is alright for a storage drive, not sure about parity drive. I'll be using it another n40l box to just backup my unraid drives.

The no tax holiday here in georgia, filled the dang store up with people. Didn't have the patience to sit in line for half hour. I'll pay the taxes and get it tomorrow.