Revisiting the WD Red vs WD Green discussion

[JorgeB]

Besides the platter sizes, is there any other differences in the 750GB vs 1TB platter models?

 

Basically I bought these Greens new from Amazon and it turns out the manufacture date is December 2013. Still unsure whether to keep them but they both passed all the Data Lifeguard tests perfectly. Still waiting on WD to confirm they'll honour the warranty (when I tried to register them on the WD site I get an out of warranty message)

AFAIK it's the only thing, you probably won't notice any difference writing to them, it will make your parity checks take a little longer but only if these are the slowest disks on your server.

[garycase]

Besides the platter sizes, is there any other differences in the 750GB vs 1TB platter models?

 

There will be a VERY small difference in power usage, since there are 4 platters to rotate instead of 3.    And, as already noted, the data transfer rate will be slower with 750GB platters, since there's less data available per rotation.

 

 

Basically I bought these Greens new from Amazon and it turns out the manufacture date is December 2013. Still unsure whether to keep them but they both passed all the Data Lifeguard tests perfectly. Still waiting on WD to confirm they'll honour the warranty (when I tried to register them on the WD site I get an out of warranty message)

 

WD will generally honor the warranty for the specified period as long as you have a receipt that shows the actual purchase date.  But this is generally meant to cover drives which are in the supply chain a few weeks longer than normal [The warranty expiration date accounts for a reasonable time in the distribution chain -- I think it's 60 or 90 days].    In your case it's well over 2 years since the drives were manufactured -- so the 2 year warranty plus a 60-90 day supply chain "buffer" have already passed.  If these are truly NOS drives ("new, old stock") I suspect WD will honor the warranty => but I'd document that NOW before you use the drives.  Print out a current S.M.A.R.T. report, which will show the number of power-on-hours on the drives.    Clearly this should be a very small number if they're indeed "new".    Assuming this confirms the drives are effectively new, you should provide a copy of this to WD to support the fact that these are indeed new drives.    If it does not, you should contact Amazon and inform them about what you received and arrange to return them.

 

[essjay]

Besides the platter sizes, is there any other differences in the 750GB vs 1TB platter models?

 

There will be a VERY small difference in power usage, since there are 4 platters to rotate instead of 3.    And, as already noted, the data transfer rate will be slower with 750GB platters, since there's less data available per rotation.

 

 

Basically I bought these Greens new from Amazon and it turns out the manufacture date is December 2013. Still unsure whether to keep them but they both passed all the Data Lifeguard tests perfectly. Still waiting on WD to confirm they'll honour the warranty (when I tried to register them on the WD site I get an out of warranty message)

 

WD will generally honor the warranty for the specified period as long as you have a receipt that shows the actual purchase date.  But this is generally meant to cover drives which are in the supply chain a few weeks longer than normal [The warranty expiration date accounts for a reasonable time in the distribution chain -- I think it's 60 or 90 days].    In your case it's well over 2 years since the drives were manufactured -- so the 2 year warranty plus a 60-90 day supply chain "buffer" have already passed.  If these are truly NOS drives ("new, old stock") I suspect WD will honor the warranty => but I'd document that NOW before you use the drives.  Print out a current S.M.A.R.T. report, which will show the number of power-on-hours on the drives.    Clearly this should be a very small number if they're indeed "new".    Assuming this confirms the drives are effectively new, you should provide a copy of this to WD to support the fact that these are indeed new drives.    If it does not, you should contact Amazon and inform them about what you received and arrange to return them.

 

Thanks for all that info. I currently have a support case open with WD as I want them to confirm the warranty is valid from their side. Basically I got the 3TB Greens (extended warranty version (+1 year)) for about 20% less than the 3TB Reds and I'm guessing they were on special as possibly on the shelf a couple of years.

 

I'm happy to return them if need be but I'll be waiting a few weeks for replacements.

 

[garycase]

Yes, it sounds like you got what are referred to as NOS units ("New - Old Stock").

 

As I suggested earlier, you should save a current S.M.A.R.T. report from the drives => the low power-on hours will prove they are indeed "new" drives.  I'm sure WD will reset the warranty for you with the sales receipt accompanied by the S.M.A.R.T. reports.

 

[garycase]

... Note:  If the drives aren't currently in your UnRAID server, you can connect them to a Windows PC and get a S.M.A.R.T. report with the free CrystalDiskInfo utility.  [ http://download.cnet.com/CrystalDiskInfo/3000-2086_4-10832082.html ]

 

[essjay]

... Note:  If the drives aren't currently in your UnRAID server, you can connect them to a Windows PC and get a S.M.A.R.T. report with the free CrystalDiskInfo utility.  [ http://download.cnet.com/CrystalDiskInfo/3000-2086_4-10832082.html ]

 

Here's the SMART info using Data Lifeguard. Not really telling me much. I'd expect the power-on hours to be at least 24 as that's how long the tests took

 

[garycase]

Data Lifeguard doesn't show the actual raw values => it just shows the current SMART "value", which gives an indication of the relative health for that parameter.    The max value for Power-On Hours is 100;  as the number of hours increases, that value will drop.  So with a value of 100 you know the number of hours is fairly low; but that doesn't show what it actually is.

 

Install the free Crystal Disk Info utility I noted above, and you'll be able to see the actual value => then save a graphic of that and if you provide that to WD I'm sure they'll honor a 2 year warranty from the date you actually bought the drives.