Need for WD Red HDDs

A sudden upsurge in the data volumes as we see today has increased demand for NAS drives and high demand for supported applications and file systems. For instance, the ZFS format is an enterprise-scale file system. A significant increase in the number of sustainable random write operations during ZFS development causes a delay in idle time for DMSMR-based drives to perform data management tasks, which ends up producing a significant downfall in performance. To address this issue Western Digital, introduce a CMR-driven WD Red HDD lineup, including WD80EFZX 68UW8N0 WD Red 8TB HDD followed by 6TB, 4Tb, 2TB, and 1TB variants.

WD Red NAS HDDs and its Sub-Models

Below is a breakdown of WD Red subcategories that offer NAS support:

• WD Red – WDs DMSMR-based HDDs include 2TB, 3TB, 4TB, and 6TB storage modules that are preferred by most NAS owners who have to deal with moderate workloads.
• WD Red Plus – WD Red Plus series offers CMR-based NAS HDDs belonging to the WD Red family, that offer storage modules that range from 1TB to 14TB. The use case of WD Red Plus HDDs is intended for applications that deal with write-intensive workloads in small or mid-sized businesses.
• WD Red Pro-Last but not least, WD Red Pro CMR-based HDDs range from 2TB to 18TB that are intended to be used in enterprise-grade organizations to handle overwhelming workloads.

Features and Utilities offered by WD Red Family

Western Digital performs on-premise testing on the WD Red HDDs to ensure performance, durability, and several other factors. These hard drives support a multitude of platforms from NAS manufacturers. During test sessions, DMSMR HDDs are found to be capable enough to pass all benchmark tests. WD is consistently in touch with NAS manufacturers like Synology to ensure usage compatibility for customers.

Being a leading manufacturer of HDDs and SSDs, WD is committed to curbing potential issues and challenges faced by customers amidst a highly dynamic tech environment. This practice to validate usage and performance at the customer end was introduced by WD with the debut of its Red series. WD keeps engaging key stakeholders including customers (both B2B and B2C) to find valuable insights from available data to provide top-notch WD Red NAS HDDs to sustain different workload requirements.

In recent times, there have been some common misconceptions about the data write performance used in most WD Red series. Let’s have a deep look at some of the potential offerings of the WD Red series to filter myths and misconceptions attached to the performance grade of WD Red HDDs.

WD Red series is ideal for domestic usage or SMBs using NAS systems as they support immense support for sharing and backing up of files on over 8 drive bays and sustain data transition of upto 180 TB a year. WD has used a robust testing methodology that has been validated by the notable NAS vendors.

Western Digital transparently shares the operational design and performance KPIs instead of keeping its technology under shades. For instance, its famous SMR technology that allows users to adapt to the growing assets of data for individual and organizational usage. 

WD is consistent in its innovative journey to improve its existing performance benchmarks. Varying grades of SMR technology can be used in several different scenarios. For instance, drive-managed SMR (DMSMR), on the device itself, is intended to support entry-level storage modules ranging from 2TB to 6TB WD Red drives. Whereas, host-managed SMR, is offered for high-capacity storage modules so as to be used in IT infrastructures of organizations. Each use-case offers to sustain different storage needs, ranging from PC requirements to some of the high-end and mission-critical data centers.

DMSMR is designed to perform intelligent data placement within the storage, instead of depending on the host, thus allowing a smooth integration process for consumers. The data load of an average SMB or domestic NAS workloads is not consistent, leaving enough idle time for DMSMR HDDs to carry out background data management roles as per the requirement and offer an optimum performance output for users.

WD Red HDDs like WD80EFZX 68UW8N0 WD Red 8TB HDD is known for their reliability and are frequently used in the home and SMB NAS systems around the globe and have been rated upto the benchmark by notable NAS producers. Due to its reliability and high-performance grade, it can be estimated that WD Red drives with high-capacity modules like WD80EFZX 68UW8N0 are much capable of handling workloads far more intensive than their recommended capability.

End Words

WD Red HDDs are considered one of the best storage modules for home or SMB users validated by well-known NAS producers. If you are experiencing the downgraded performance of WD Red HDDs in handling your workloads, it is recommended to consider more capable WD Red variants WD Red Pro or WD Gold HDDs, or even Ultrastar HDDs.