Mindovermaster Moderator Posted January 3, 2018 Moderator Share Posted January 3, 2018 I'm not like that other guy... I'm looking at new stuff. I currently have 2 x 3TB External USB3 WD MyBook HDDs. Recently, the controller card blew on one of them (means gone bad, no longer works) I now switched the controller card, and I can get everything back. I'm backing it all up to my 1.5TB HDD. Yet the drives are green drives... (thought they were reds) So, All that is well, but... I need a place to put these files on these 2x HDDs. I'm not sure if I should trust external drives anymore. Should I buy several drives and just RAID 5 them? Or just have single drives in multiple Synology devices? Or several HDDs in a 4-bay? Or is there some other configuration possible? What shall I do? Budget is around $250ish. (choices are endless, mates...) Just what will be the cheapest, but will be worth it? Draconian Guppy 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Circaflex Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 (edited) 27 minutes ago, Mindovermaster said: I'm not sure if I should trust external drives anymore. Care to explain? Hard-drives, are hard-drives; generally when an external goes bad, it is actually the USB controller board that goes. Your chances of failure are all the same. RAID5 isn't a backup solution. A proper backup is having the files in two separate locations. Disk failure can still leave you without your data. Any level of RAID has a likelihood of catastrophic failure, none are a substitute for even the most basic backup strategy. For $250 dollars, you'll be hard-pressed to find any sort of 4-bay or Synology device, with drives. For your budget, just stick to something simple. Pickup two more external drives and replace them. A proper solution would be, picking up two 6TB external drives so you have a true backup (your two 3TBs can fit on one and the other is a direct clone, kept out of use unless performing a backup of the other external), but I don't think your budget will allow for that. Do you want a NAS? If so, Synology would be an option. But remember, a NAS alone is not a proper backup either. You could buy a NAS, re-purpose your two hard-drives from the externals (if they pass hardware diagnostics), install those in your current tower and those backed up to the NAS would be a proper backup. I guess, do you just want a temp data storage area, or what exactly were the externals used for? Without knowing what you want to do, how you want to use it, offering a solution is difficult to say the least. Edited January 3, 2018 by Circaflex Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mindovermaster Moderator Posted January 3, 2018 Author Moderator Share Posted January 3, 2018 IDR who, but someone in here (Dev maybe?) says not to trust externals. Why I asked. With this WD MyBook, it uses a controller card to encrypt the data. So you just can't transfer it to a computer SATA port and read it. I had several discussions that I read from BudMan about backup... I know, I know... Yeah, I'm not sure what would be the best scenario here. I got these WD MyBooks on sale, so hope I can do that again. Draconian Guppy 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Circaflex Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 Until you can decide what it is you need/want, no one can really give you the proper answer. Do you want an actual backup solution? Do you want a device that you can access over the Network? ie NAS? Do you just want a storage pool to store temp data/data you don't care if it is backed up? Do you just want replacement drives to continue what you are doing? Or is this just another "what-if" scenario, much like the other threads? Never heard of MyBooks self-encrypting, it sounds like some sort of thing the user has to enable, but I'll take your word for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mindovermaster Moderator Posted January 3, 2018 Author Moderator Share Posted January 3, 2018 I don't really need a backup solution, as I keep my most important data are across mine, my Dad's and Mom's computers. So If one of us looses it, we can recover. I'll come up with something... Always do... Here's a vid on ecryption: You don't have a choice. And most people do not know about this... Draconian Guppy 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevTech Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 20 minutes ago, Mindovermaster said: IDR who, but someone in here (Dev maybe?) says not to trust externals. Why I asked. With this WD MyBook, it uses a controller card to encrypt the data. So you just can't transfer it to a computer SATA port and read it. I had several discussions that I read from BudMan about backup... I know, I know... Yeah, I'm not sure what would be the best scenario here. I got these WD MyBooks on sale, so hope I can do that again. It was a discussion on longevity of internal vs external - any answer is in the specific details and in the end nobody has a crystal ball. You already have the drives. So stuff them in the ipfire.org router you know you want to build. Use the OwnCloud option to have handy access to that data anywhere. Cost: zero so far. Now take that money and get a BackBlaze.com subscription and presto, your data is safe! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mindovermaster Moderator Posted January 3, 2018 Author Moderator Share Posted January 3, 2018 I though WD Green drives were frowned upon, no? Question about BackBlaze, though. How do I know how much I am going to upload and download within a day/month/year? I'd just pay one price per TB, or something. Draconian Guppy 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Circaflex Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 29 minutes ago, Mindovermaster said: I though WD Green drives were frowned upon, no? The only reason Green drives were frowned upon, was in 24/7 usage or a NAS box, the drives weren't meant to run like that. There were "hacks" to have them run better, ie disabling head park timer. The drives would constantly park, which is really only supposed to happen when powered off, however, these drives were "green" for efficiency and power saving. Mando 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevTech Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 1 hour ago, Mindovermaster said: I though WD Green drives were frowned upon, no? Question about BackBlaze, though. How do I know how much I am going to upload and download within a day/month/year? I'd just pay one price per TB, or something. It is not an online storage service like OneDrive or DropBox. Pay every month and it backs up unlimited data. https://www.backblaze.com/cloud-backup.html Unlimited Online Backup Backblaze will automatically back up all your files including documents, photos, music and movies. Unlimited files. Unlimited file size. Unlimited speed. Back up all your attached external drives. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mindovermaster Moderator Posted January 3, 2018 Author Moderator Share Posted January 3, 2018 (edited) Would any of you recommend I get this? https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA1DS14F8916 And reformat the WD Green Drives? Just swipe them so they won't get encrypted "again"? Throw away the WD controller cards. And put them in this case/pcb? Edit: will take a few more hours before I get the last drive backed up... Draconian Guppy 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevTech Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 36 minutes ago, Mindovermaster said: Would any of you recommend I get this? https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA1DS14F8916 And reformat the WD Green Drives? Just swipe them so they won't get encrypted "again"? Throw away the WD controller cards. And put them in this case/pcb? Edit: will take a few more hours before I get the last drive backed up... Personally, I hate fooling around with piles of stupid little external drives. Take any old bunch of PC parts lying around in the back room/closet, slap it together, and shove in up to 10 hard drives and be done with it. Mando 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mando Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 8 hours ago, Mindovermaster said: Would any of you recommend I get this? https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA1DS14F8916 And reformat the WD Green Drives? Just swipe them so they won't get encrypted "again"? Throw away the WD controller cards. And put them in this case/pcb? Edit: will take a few more hours before I get the last drive backed up... meh aint going to be any more reliable than your Mybooks tbh mate. if it was me, id do a RAID NAS and something like what Devtech stated, Backblaze. I personally have had good experience with buffalo Nas units, one lasted 10yr and was replaced solely down to total run hours, but still works perfectly fine. Synologies are also good, you could use your greens in those, aint like youll notice too much, their lower RPM over a Gb LAN really (if used just as a backup repo), ive set my NAS only to run between 0900 and 00:00 so they are not running 24/7 but are available for use in a large enough window. or grab one of these, working on upgrading one today https://lenovopress.com/tips1300-ibm-storwize-v3700-for-lenovo lovely bit of kit for the £ i run an entire site (200 endpoints, 150 users) off a pair of these and esxi 6 HA setup (3 hosts 30 V-servers) on 3 X series 1U hosts. None of the kit even breaks a sweat. 4Gb cache upgrade to 8gb and 64Tb upgrade from 32tb modular too (I love my job!) just waiting on it indexing the new extra 32Tb atm. 3,2,1 remember 3 backups of different methods, 2 locations minimum and 1 totally offline (BD-r, DVD-r) You can never 100% protect against hardware failure, but you can mitigate as best as you can. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mindovermaster Moderator Posted January 3, 2018 Author Moderator Share Posted January 3, 2018 1 hour ago, Mando said: meh aint going to be any more reliable than your Mybooks tbh mate. if it was me, id do a RAID NAS and something like what Devtech stated, Backblaze. I personally have had good experience with buffalo Nas units, one lasted 10yr and was replaced solely down to total run hours, but still works perfectly fine. Synologies are also good, you could use your greens in those, aint like youll notice too much, their lower RPM over a Gb LAN really (if used just as a backup repo), ive set my NAS only to run between 0900 and 00:00 so they are not running 24/7 but are available for use in a large enough window. or grab one of these, working on upgrading one today https://lenovopress.com/tips1300-ibm-storwize-v3700-for-lenovo lovely bit of kit for the £ i run an entire site (200 endpoints, 150 users) off a pair of these and esxi 6 HA setup (3 hosts 30 V-servers) on 3 X series 1U hosts. None of the kit even breaks a sweat. 4Gb cache upgrade to 8gb and 64Tb upgrade from 32tb modular too (I love my job!) just waiting on it indexing the new extra 32Tb atm. 3,2,1 remember 3 backups of different methods, 2 locations minimum and 1 totally offline (BD-r, DVD-r) You can never 100% protect against hardware failure, but you can mitigate as best as you can. Well, as Circaflex said, WD Greens are not good for NAS... So externals would be the best for it, no? Draconian Guppy 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevTech Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 4 hours ago, Mindovermaster said: Well, as Circaflex said, WD Greens are not good for NAS... So externals would be the best for it, no? No. No. Your brain has been eaten by Disk Drive Manufacturer's Marketing. They came out with all these specialized drives to encourage sales due to worries about Flash RAM killing HDs The HD is just a HD. With specs. It does whatever the specs say. It won't explode if you use in a NAs or use as a Boot drive etc, it just might be slower and a bit less effective in those use cases but although Greens are the slowest, they are not unbearably slow. WD Greens got a really bad reputation when they self-destructed due to too many parks. If you have a non-defective unit, it is just a hard drive. Do hard drive things with it! Mando 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brandon H Supervisor Posted January 3, 2018 Supervisor Share Posted January 3, 2018 3 minutes ago, DevTech said: No. No. Your brain has been eaten by Disk Drive Manufacturer's Marketing. They came out with all these specialized drives to encourage sales due to worries about Flash RAM killing HDs The HD is just a HD. With specs. It does whatever the specs say. It won't explode if you use in a NAs or use as a Boot drive etc, it just might be slower and a bit less effective in those use cases but although Greens are the slowest, they are not unbearably slow. WD Greens got a really bad reputation when they self-destructed due to too many parks. If you have a non-defective unit, it is just a hard drive. Do hard drive things with it! that's the problem with the green drives, they're slow, they're just meant as data storage. (had a friend try to run his OS off a WD Green Drive a few years back and it was not a smooth experience lol) would not recommend using as a NAS drive for this same reason. I personally wouldn't use it to store more than pictures and music. DevTech and Mando 2 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mando Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 4 hours ago, Mindovermaster said: Well, as Circaflex said, WD Greens are not good for NAS... So externals would be the best for it, no? not first choice but you realise the only diff in WD Greens are their 5400RPM speeds right and probably less onboard cache? (instead of 7200rpm/10k) a NAS is an external mate, with an rJ45 interface. DevTech 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevTech Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 2 minutes ago, Brandon H said: that's the problem with the green drives, they're slow, they're just meant as data storage. (had a friend try to run his OS off a WD Green Drive a few years back and id was not a smooth experience lol) Yeah with all of us being used to SSD boot drives, even a WD Black seems to slog through mud as a boot drive. For the way most people use NAS as basically a large external hard drive, Greens are perfectly fine for NAS. In fact, for most people that don't access their NAS very much, the energy savings probably make them a better choice. Mando and Brandon H 2 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Circaflex Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 7 minutes ago, Mando said: not first choice but you realise the only diff in WD Greens are their 5400RPM speeds right and probably less onboard cache? (instead of 7200rpm/10k) a NAS is an external mate, with an rJ45 interface. The speeds aren't even the concern, Green drives were notorious for having a short idle timer, they would park the heads after 6, 8 or 10 seconds of no use. This is only supposed to happen when the drive is powered off, these were an attempt to stay "green" aka energy conservative. Luckily WD released a utility to either adjust the timer, or disable the feature completely. The drive speed wasn;'t that big of a deal, especially on a a NAS. The constant parking was what killed those drives. Pro tip for everyone, WD did ditch the "green" label, but just calls it Blue/Mainstream now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevTech Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 15 hours ago, DevTech said: It is not an online storage service like OneDrive or DropBox. Pay every month and it backs up unlimited data. https://www.backblaze.com/cloud-backup.html Unlimited Online Backup Backblaze will automatically back up all your files including documents, photos, music and movies. Unlimited files. Unlimited file size. Unlimited speed. Back up all your attached external drives. Just in case people are interested, Backblaze is Open Source Hardware! All the instructions and design information, parts lists etc are on their web site for their custom Storage Pods. https://www.backblaze.com/b2/storage-pod.html https://www.backblaze.com/blog/open-source-data-storage-server/ Mando and Jim K 2 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mando Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 1 minute ago, Circaflex said: The speeds aren't even the concern, Green drives were notorious for having a short idle timer, they would park the heads after 6, 8 or 10 seconds of no use. This is only supposed to happen when the drive is powered off, these were an attempt to stay "green" aka energy conservative. Luckily WD released a utility to either adjust the timer, or disable the feature completely. The drive speed wasn;'t that big of a deal, especially on a a NAS. The constant parking was what killed those drives. Pro tip for everyone, WD did ditch the "green" label, but just calls it Blue/Mainstream now. head parking that frequent shouldnt affect normal NAS use though, (only if its being used heavily it could be an issue), which most NAS units being used for, wont hit ever hit full, frequent I/O put it this way, if i was self building a NAS and had a pair lying about id use them, if they fail no loss, as a NAS shouldnt ever be just the "backup" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevTech Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 4 minutes ago, Circaflex said: The speeds aren't even the concern, Green drives were notorious for having a short idle timer, they would park the heads after 6, 8 or 10 seconds of no use. This is only supposed to happen when the drive is powered off, these were an attempt to stay "green" aka energy conservative. Luckily WD released a utility to either adjust the timer, or disable the feature completely. The drive speed wasn;'t that big of a deal, especially on a a NAS. The constant parking was what killed those drives. Pro tip for everyone, WD did ditch the "green" label, but just calls it Blue/Mainstream now. I'm sure everyone here knows the history. WD fixed the "self destruct" issue so it's unlikely he would run into it, but he can easily check his firmware version online... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevTech Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 2 minutes ago, Mando said: head parking that frequent shouldnt affect normal NAS use though, (only if its being used heavily it could be an issue), which most NAS units being used for, wont hit ever hit full, frequent I/O put it this way, if i was self building a NAS and had a pair lying about id use them, if they fail no loss, as a NAS shouldnt ever be just the "backup" The bug he mentions was evil. When the drive hit a pre-defined number of parks, it thought there was a serious malfunction and so it just locked up and stopped working. Perfectly good drive with all your data on it and absolutely no way to get it back. Right up there for an all-time list of stupidest design decisions ever... Mando 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mindovermaster Moderator Posted January 3, 2018 Author Moderator Share Posted January 3, 2018 So, If I am reading this right... My Green drives should work fine in a NAS. AKA, All hardware dies. Draconian Guppy and Mando 2 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Circaflex Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 Just to be safe, download WDIDLE3 and check your drives, if Intellipark is enabled, disable it. Mando 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ctebah Posted January 3, 2018 Share Posted January 3, 2018 6 minutes ago, Mindovermaster said: So, If I am reading this right... My Green drives should work fine in a NAS. AKA, All hardware dies. They will work but I reds are meant for NAS. I used Greens before and they kept dying so once each died, I replaced it with a Red. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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