** WD ENTER THE HELIUM MARKET **

Robbie_G

Robbie_G

Robbie_G

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OcUK Staff
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Hi,

As you guys are probably aware from review sites WD have been developing it's own version of the Helium drives and I am happy to say they have finally released the 8TB Red drive to the market. The 8TB Red NAS drive will not only offer more space than the popular 6TB Red it has more cache offering 128mb instead of 64mb and has SLIGHTLY faster transfer speeds.

We have managed to get hold of some from the first shipment batch and they are live on the website. All details of the drive are below and the price is more than likely going to go up once the first batch has sold out.

WD Red 8TB 5400rpm SATA 6 Gb/s 128 MB Cache HDD - OEM (WD80EFZX) @ £285.95 inc VAT

HD526WD_139123_800x800.png


WD NAS hard drives are the essential solution for NAS applications. These drives are cool and quiet, and offer optimum compatibility in 24x7 NAS systems with up to eight bays.

Storage for 1 to 8 bay NAS solutions - WD Red™ is designed specifically for NAS systems that have 1 to 8 drive bays in both 3.5-inch and 2.5-inch form factors. The drives are designed and extensively tested for compatibility in the unique 24x7 operating environment and for the demanding system requirements of home and small office NAS.

NASware grows to 3.0 - WD Red now supports small NAS systems from 1 to 8 bays thanks to NASware 3.0, which further improves drive compatibility and reliability. At 48 TB of potential capacity in an 8 bay system, WD Red expands your NAS experience.

Need help? We offer premium support - Every WD Red hard drive comes with our world-class professional support services including a premium dedicated 24/7 support line (available in English, other regional support hours vary) and a 3-year limited warranty.*

* Support outside of normal business hours is available in English only. Go to http://support.wd.com for further details.

3D Active Balance Plus - Our enhanced dual-plane balance control technology significantly improves the overall drive performance and reliability. Hard drives that are not properly balanced may cause excessive vibration and noise in a multi-drive system, reduce the hard drive life span, and degrade the performance over time.

Longer warranty coverage - WD NAS hard drives are backed by a 3-year limited warranty for greater peace of mind.

The WD® advantage - WD puts our products through extensive Functional Integrity Testing (F.I.T.) prior to any product launch. On average, each new product goes through 600,000 hours of testing. WD also has a detailed Knowledge Base with more than 1,000 helpful articles. You can also call toll-free support 7 days per week in the U.S. and Canada. See the WD Support site for full details.

*Business critical RAID environments - Please consider WD NAS Hard Drives for all multi-bay consumer NAS environments. WD Red hard drives for up to 8 bay chassis and WD Red Pro hard drives for 8-16 bay chassis.

- Optimal compatibility for NAS systems
- Tested for 24x7 reliability
- Specifically designed for use in NAS systems with up to 8 bays
- 3-year limited warranty
- Seamlessly integrates into your NAS system with up to 8 bays
- Designed for the unique system requirements of NAS environments
- Highly reliable, affordable solution for demanding 24x7 networking environments
- Backed by a best-in-class 3-year limited warranty

Specification:

- Interface: SATA 6 Gb/s
- Rotational Speed: 5,400 RPM (nominal)
- Buffer Size: 128 MB
- Buffer To Host (Serial ATA): 6 Gb/s (Max)
- Capacity: 8 TB
- Form Factor: 3.5 Inch
- Idle Mode: 29 dBA (average)
- Seek Mode 0: 29 dBA (average)

Power Dissipation
- Read/Write: 6.40 Watts
- Idle: 5.20 Watts
- Standby: 0.40 Watts
- Sleep: 0.40 Watts

Only £285.95 inc VAT.

ORDER NOW
 
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More than twice the price for double the data loss, yay \o/

I'll hold of on these for a year or so...
 
WD are one of the most reliable hard drives on the market especially the NAS drives.

The 6TB Red drive will be increasing in price as well shortly so the price difference will be about £80 from what I can see. The high price is mainly due to the helium technology which is new to the market with HGST and WD so it maybe some time before the price goes down.
 
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If they are the most reliable then why not give a 5 year warranty instead of 3-year limited warranty especially if the price is going up, it would make the customer happier to spend that much on 1 single drive.
 
They offer the 5 year warranty on the Pro versions which is also a price increase so like most NAS drives they come with the standard 3 year warranty which is the same on the Seagate NAS drives. The 3 year is basically to split the benefits of the Pro and the standard Red drives as we could just say offer lifetime warranty on the Pro which will not happen.

The price across the Red drives as a whole is good value for the drive as they have more features, support and reliability when used correctly with NAS drives making the risk of data lost very minimal.

The new helium technology will allow the drive to be better than the lower sizes. The price is related to the performance of the drive making it on par with the current market.
 
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Robbie, what is the reason for the price increases, is it just the worse pound to dollar conversion rate or has something happened in the hard drive industry to cause it?

In normal times you would expect the price of the 6TB to start going down when the 8TB is introduced at the top end of the capacity spectrum. The only other time I can remember an across the board increase in mechanical hard drive pricing was a few years back when there were floods that affected the factories (in Thailand?) that manufactured the spindle motors.
 
The prices are all related to the conversion rate which is currently not the best but i'm hoping i'm wrong and prices will go down but at the moment everyone is working of a bad currency conversion.

We seem to bang in the middle on pricing as they seem to range from £280 - £300 we just need the market to get better so we can get the better prices to you guys.
 
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Aww... Red? (even though red is my favourite colour)

Will there ever be Black versions of these drives (black usually has the better reliability and possibly better performance too)? And most importantly, how noisy are these relative to current WD drives (I have no idea what 29dB means)? My 2TB WD Black is the noisiest part in my system and that alone makes me want to go SSD-only in the future.
 
varkanoid said:
Whats a helium drive ? Does it make your PC sound like Joe Pasquale ?
Click to expand...

As they increase platter count to increase storage capacity the surface area of the platters increases along with it.

Filling the enclosure with helium instead of air reduces drag on the platters for less energy consumption and heat.
 
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