SATA hard drives for NAS

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mushtac

157 posts

Master Geek

#34075 18-May-2009 00:16

I am purchasing a Netgear ReadyNAS NV+ 4-bay gigabit desktop network storage & two 1TB SATA hard drives. I am confused on the best bang for buck vs. performance SATA hard drive for NAS application.
Any advice or suggestion on hard drive choice? The ReadyNAS NV+ supports SATA & SATAII.

Ragnor

8219 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#215495 18-May-2009 02:19

Samsung or Western Digital are currently the best $ per GB in the 1TB size and both make quality drives. They are both around the same price $170-190 depending on where you buy from (I recommend Computer Lounge for Auckland and Ascent for Wellington).

Samsung Spinpoint F1 1TB 7200rpm SATAII 32MB Cache

Western Digital CAVIAR 1TB 7200rpm SATAII 32MB Cache

Western Digital also has a green version of their drive with reduced power consumption but it's normally a little more expensive.

Pskonejott

24 posts

Geek

#215547 18-May-2009 10:36

The WD green drives often experience excessive load/unload cycles while in a raid array that may lead to premature failure of the drives. If you go for this option keep an eye on it and if it's a problem download wdidle3 and change the timer settings to stop this from happening.

Also if you go down the WD path, download wdtler and turn on time limited error recovery to stop the drives dropping from the array if a bad sector is encountered. AFAIK WD are the only ones with something like WDTLER out there, if you want to go with any other brand drives you'll need to buy proper raid edition drives to get their equivalent of this feature.

Ragnor

8219 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#215655 18-May-2009 17:58

Sounds like Samsung is the way to go then, I have two in RAID 1 here with no problems myself.

Pskonejott

24 posts

Geek

#215672 18-May-2009 18:45

I wouldn't necessarily draw that conclusion, if the Samsungs develop bad sector(s) they will probably drop from the array because they will spend up to 30 seconds trying to remap the sectors. However I do hear good things about the Spinpoint F1 drives.

I was actually trying to point out that the WD drives offer considerable benefits because you can configure domestic model drives to have features that you typically need to buy in the form of a raid edition drive.

mushtac

157 posts

Master Geek

#216042 19-May-2009 19:13

Are there any SATA hard drives that are specifically for NAS/Business purposes?

Pskonejott

24 posts

Geek

#216070 19-May-2009 20:19

Yes, not sure about other brands but Western Digital do RE drives. They're up to generation 4, and it's a 2TB drive with 64MB cache. The RE drives come with a 5 year warranty rather than 3 and are built better, specifically designed for constant 24 hour operation. Plus they have the time limited error recovery etc. However they're about 1.5-2 times the price of a domestic model drive.

mushtac

157 posts

Master Geek

#217501 24-May-2009 19:59

I'm gonna try the WESTERN DIGITAL 1TB 32MB Raid Edition RE3, thanks for your time and advice Ragnor & Pskonejott.

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Pskonejott

24 posts

Geek

#217512 24-May-2009 20:31

They should do you right. The comparisons that I've seen between RE drives and domestic show better seek times etc. on RE drives. The RE4 drives also have dual processors onboard which help the 64MB cache do an even better job...