WD Red Pro 26TB NAS 3.5" Internal Hard Drive - 7200 RPM, SATA 6 Gb/s, CMR, 512MB Cache

Just performed an extended Smart (S.M.A.R.T) test on this 20TB drive via DSM on my Synology DS220J NAS. Test reports the drive is healthy and total power on time was 0, as you'd expect for a brand new drive. So all is working well. I purchased this drive from Amazon and they delivered it too. Packaging was sufficient but really, for an item of such high value, I wish they would do better. It essentially came in a cardboard box with some brown paper used to pad it out - only on one side of the box though - should be on both, and at the sides! Fortunately though, the WD box itself is fairly well packaged with some plastic inserts to hold the drive in place and prevent it making contact with the edges of the box itself. The box was also sealed with a clear plastic label which looked original to me. The drive itself was within an antistatic bag. So the drive is packaged in the WD box quite well - Amazon, not so much. But it arrived in good condition and it's working - that's all that matters. As for the price - the only word I can use to describe it is 'ridiculous'. Not only in the sense that AI data centers are pushing HDD prices up across the board, but the price on Amazon seems to change every five minutes. I won't say any more than that as this review will probably get blocked but Amazon has a 'price history' feature, which I'd encourage you to use. I've never had a WD NAS grade drive before so can't comment on longevity, but my expectations are that this should last at least 5 years and if that proves not to be true, you can guarantee I will come back and update this review!

Very well packed. Nice drives.

Package arrived in a small plain cardboard box. No fragile label and no outer box with foam packing. Clearly split from a much better-packaged and protected job lot case and cheaped out on transit protection. It was an urgent order, so I didn't have the time to refuse delivery for inadequate packaging or fully test and RMA it. My preferred supplier Scan UK only stocked up to 18TB Red Pros at the time these 20TB drives were the highest capacity and now that 24TB Red Pro drives have been out for months only stock up to 22TB. I wish I had refused delivery or returned. Within a week there were a few bad sectors. Health in HD Sentinel has now in 2024 (T+2yrs) deteriorated to CRITICAL 10% Health with 854 BAD SECTORS during self test.40 WEAK SECTORS S.M.A.R.T. 5,Reallocated Sectors Count,1,100,100,OK,000000000001,0,Enabled 196,Reallocation Event Count,0,100,100,OK (Always passing),000000000001,0,Enabled 197,Current Pending Sector Count,0,100,100,OK (Always passing),000000000028,0,Enabled 198,Off-Line Uncorrectable Sector Count,0,100,100,OK (Always passing),000000000356,0,Enabled A 10TB WD Red Pro installed in the same machine June 2019 is still perfect with no bad or weak sectors. I expect better packaging, particularly when Amazon overpackage robust items.

If NVMe speed is not the driving factor rather a reliable backup is then these are a good alternative I run 2 of these in a RAID 0 set giving me 32TB of backup space and they are very good, Performance is surprisingly fast and as its just two disks after 4 years I'll mothball these as a backup of that day and pop in two new ones (in 4 years time that's more likely to be SSD). Today though with an inexpensive Enclosure its an inexpensive and reliable backup solution when you need high volume backups. I use these as a fast tertiary backup so Raid 0 is fine. I would never recommend Raid 0 as your only backup option.

Replaced a failing drive in my NAS and it's working well.

Ordered to 6 TB drives. One drive posted a tiny bit of exterior damage. After testing I decided it is safe to use so I did not return. Not happy with the damage though as the metal lid is a bit bent on the edge

Pricey but good quality.

Not using this drive as a NAS but normal storage on my PC. This drive is quiet and quick and not getting hot in normal use. Easy to setup and format. No problems so far

Keeps making scrubbing sounds at all time. Won't be suitable for use in a home NAS device, if noise is a concern.

Excellent NAS drive, and great price! Bought four to upgrade a client's Synology NAS server. After days of drives swapping, storage pool repairing and data scrubbing, all four drives installed without any hiccup. System ran well for over a month now without any issue with many updates and modification. Heat performance is outstanding! No matter the load, drives kept at around 33 degrees Celius, compared to the Seagate 8GB NAS drive routinely ran at over 40 degrees Celius. Even the client mentioned that the Synology NAS enclosure is noticeably cooler to touch, and also quieter. R/W speed is also satisfactory. Highly recommended!

Good

Excellent as described

The driver is ok to spin but the system can not detect the driver. Either MacOS nor Windows. I have no choice but to return it.