SMR vs PMR Hard Drive

Jason Rage · 23 Sep 2019 at 11:00

Woke up today to the fine sight of Pending sector count warnings in smart control.

Tried CHKDSK but it failed with an error. Trying a full format now to 0 it.

Looks likely that a replacement will be needed. If I have to replace the drive it will be used primarily for downloading media.

Now I have read somewhere, cannot remember where though

that SMR drives are terrible for this constant "slow" writing/reading and will fragment like crazy before long.

So am I better off going with a PMR drive?

Thank you

EssexBoy · 23 Sep 2019 at 11:03

Reading is fine on smr once copied over but writing is slower than pmr. Also many prefer WD\HGST over Seagate for reliability even though i have not had a seagate fail on me yet.

Jason Rage · 23 Sep 2019 at 11:37

Dunno if its a stock issue but the prices for the HGST are insane on Amazon! WD have about as many 1 stars due to failures as Seagate. Any recommendations on a good established drive at a reasonable price just for storing downloads and using for Plex.

Second thought, any drive links for say Amazon that use PMR.

Thanks

EssexBoy · 23 Sep 2019 at 11:44

I would personally grab a WD external above 6TB and shuck it to get a white label drive. How much space you looking for as the smaller externals have blue drives in them.

Jason Rage · 23 Sep 2019 at 11:53

EssexBoy said:
I would personally grab a WD external above 6TB and shuck it to get a white label drive. How much space you looking for as the smaller externals have blue drives in them.

Just read it, Shuck means remove it from the housing and you get either a red or white though white is the most common. Then depending on power supply you might have to cover some pins or some such.

2TB is plenty for me tbh. Reckon Ill grab a blue WD, blue is PMR right? Was trying to find a 7200rpm but just figured that anything from 2TB above is 5400rpm. Not really a problem as games, programs run off SSD.

P.s, whats the benefits of using an external vs internal other than one being portable?

EssexBoy · 23 Sep 2019 at 11:58

Sata will be slightly faster but not enough to worry about tbh. I would just grab whatever suites you for the price.

Jason Rage · 23 Sep 2019 at 12:01

EssexBoy said:
Sata will be slightly faster but not enough to worry about tbh. I would just grab whatever suites you for the price.

Thank you. Can you confirm that the WD blue use PMR and not SMR? Save me trolling for an answer online.

EssexBoy · 23 Sep 2019 at 12:39

WD use pmr they have only just started to get into smr so you will be fine.

Jason Rage · 23 Sep 2019 at 15:43

EssexBoy said:
WD use pmr they have only just started to get into smr so you will be fine.

Wish it was as easy as that! 2 Blue versions on Amazon, older and newer. A forum question asking the same thing I am led to the answer of SMR. This was backed with https://www.newegg.com/Product/SingleProductReview?.reviewid=5188127

Granted, the model number on the reviewed one is a WD20SPZX 2.5 whereas the one I am looking at is WD20EZAZ 3.5 but man who really knows?

Good news is that drive is now reporting good on CrystalDiskInfo after format but that is not saying much considering I just recently formatted it anyhow.

I have fired an email at WD asking directly for an answer on the WD20EZAZ specifying my particular usage & resulting performance issue I might right into. Reckon I'll get the same spill of "Its internal information" but we will see.

bremen1874 · 23 Sep 2019 at 15:57

If you think the drive might have a problem download the manufacturer's diagnostic and run a full scan.

EssexBoy · 23 Sep 2019 at 16:09

2.5's may be different but 3.5's are fine.

LuckyBenski · 23 Sep 2019 at 16:54

Friendly reminder that these forums are paid for by OcUK and it's against forum rules to post links to competitors...

JasonM · 23 Sep 2019 at 17:33

The 3.5" 2TB WD Blue will be PMR. SMR drives are the very high capacity units that also use HelioSeal, so if I drive is not marked HelioSeal it will be a PMR drive.

The very very best drives that you can buy are the Western Digital Ultra Star / Gold / RE. I have been using these enterprise drives for years as desktop drives, I also use WD's Blacks they are also good, however if not much in price will always choose the enterprise over Black. The secret to buying WD drives is when there cheap or on offer. For example I use 2 x 2TB WD Gold's on my main desktop, and got them around £55 each new 18 months ago.

Also don't be put off buying clean server pulls, there are plenty of WD RE's are are reclaimed, and providing there tested ok they will be ok. To be dead honest I would rather take a reclaimed RE drive that's passed all tests, then a brand new blue drive. The reclaimed enterprise drives don't fetch much as people think an enterprise product won't work in a desktop, but in reality they work perfect and are very fast for HDD's.

The WD Blues are OK, however they don't have the dual controllers that the black's / enterprise drives have, so not as fast with high IO requests, however for general data storage and lower levels of queued IO WD Blues are still a good drive.

chrcoluk · 23 Sep 2019 at 17:58

SMR is horrible in my view.

I would avoid if it at all possible, luckily only seagate seems to be using it on any kind of scale at the moment so by avoiding that brand you probably wont have one, but WD are starting to test the waters with it now on their largest drives.