I purchased a western digital green drive a few months ago because my main drive, Hitachi, was running out of space but never used it because I never got round to moving stuff over. When I purchased an SSD in April (re-installing windows fresh onto it) along side my WD Green and my now storage Hitachi I decided it was time to backup my drives. The backup took a few hours and once it finished I turned the computer off. Came back the next day and it seemed like it was taking ages to boot up, ever since I started using the WD Green. I decided to unplug the Green drive to see if it was the problem and my computer booted in a few seconds, plugged it back in and it took forever to boot. I formatted the green drive and it booted in a few seconds no problem. I am now 99.9% sure it is the green drive because whenever I put anything onto it, it slows the whole computer down and takes an extra 45 secs- 1 minute to boot. I dont know if this is a common problem with these drives, or it is just faulty and is there any way to cure it?
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WD Green drive seems to be slowing whole computer down
- Thread starter haroldj97
- Start date
Yes it is the hard drive, as always. Tech has left storage in the dust, and storage will always be the primary "bottleneck". This is why RAM exists in the first place. Anyway.
The WD Green drive was never meant to be a primary drive. It was meant for cheap low power mass storage. It has technology that purposely makes it slower in order to make it incredibly power efficient. (I'll explain it if you wish) However, your drive isn't broken or anything.
Greens are great for backups and mass data storage. But not to run programs and Windows off of. You must buy another hard drive, of the SSD, 10,000 RPM, or 7,200 RPM variety to get speed. I recommend the Plextor M5 pro Xtreme for speed. the WD Velociraptor for cheaper but slightly slower speed, or the WD Caviar Black for normal solid performance.
Of these you probably want to Black, as it comes with up to 4 TB or something. The Raptor comes with up to 1 TB, and you probably don't want to buy an SSD with over 250 GB.
Any questions?
The WD Green drive was never meant to be a primary drive. It was meant for cheap low power mass storage. It has technology that purposely makes it slower in order to make it incredibly power efficient. (I'll explain it if you wish) However, your drive isn't broken or anything.
Greens are great for backups and mass data storage. But not to run programs and Windows off of. You must buy another hard drive, of the SSD, 10,000 RPM, or 7,200 RPM variety to get speed. I recommend the Plextor M5 pro Xtreme for speed. the WD Velociraptor for cheaper but slightly slower speed, or the WD Caviar Black for normal solid performance.
Of these you probably want to Black, as it comes with up to 4 TB or something. The Raptor comes with up to 1 TB, and you probably don't want to buy an SSD with over 250 GB.
Any questions?
Thanks for your reply. I already own an SSD with windows installed on that. The green drive is just storage and used for nothing else but.When ever any files are copied to the green drive it slows the whole computer down, when there is nothing on the green drive the computer is really fast. If its not the green drive what could it be?
That's... odd. you need to clarify one point for me. The PC slows down WHEN writing stuff to GREEN or AFTER writing stuff to GREEN. If it is DURING the writing process, this is normal, as the transferring data, and writing part takes up a large part of system resourses. Upgrading to a BLACK probably won't help. upgrading the CPU or something actually might.
One last solution, run 2 programs.
(1) Disk checkup. Go to Computer, right click the GREEN drive, and select properties. Select Disk check, and check now. This might take a while. Do it at night when you sleep, or before you go to work.
(2) CrystalDiskCheck. This shouldn't take too long. download and run. should be quick. please upload the screenshot of the results. (search for snipping tool @ the start menu to take screenshots)
Its AFTER writing stuff to the drive that it slows the computer down. I have fully formatted thw green drive to see if that would help but it didnt. I have ran CCleaner on the disk which still unfortunetly didn't do anything. I am currently not at my computer and wont be till after school tommorow. Thanks for help.
Remember to run the two things I told you. Then tell me your system specs. These are what I want. just answer the parts you know
CPU
RAM (amount+DDR number)
Motherboard (chipset)
SATA version
Laptop v Desktop prebuilt v Desktop custom build
Age
(if desktop) size (small, tower, big tower)
CPU
RAM (amount+DDR number)
Motherboard (chipset)
SATA version
Laptop v Desktop prebuilt v Desktop custom build
Age
(if desktop) size (small, tower, big tower)
It is a custom build computer by myself. The specs are as followed
CPU: i5 2500k @ stock speed
RAM:8GB DDR3 @ 1333Mhz
Motherboard: 1155 chipset
Sata Version: Rev 3 @ 6gb/s
Desktop custom build
Age: Just over 1 year old (Bulit in January 2012)
Mid atx case.
Since it's kinda late here, and I have school tommorow, I will not be able to do the things tou suggested till after school
Perfect.
It seems that obviously you have a problem with the third HDD housing the F and G partitions. Go check out what's wrong with it if you haven't done so already. Is that the Hitachi drive? If that drive has any valuable data on it, I recommend backing up that data immediately. Please post a screenshot of that drive in CrystalDiskInfo too.
It seems that your WD Green is in perfectly good shape, and that your problem is something else. The drive itself does not have any bad sectors, or hardware problems.
It seems that obviously you have a problem with the third HDD housing the F and G partitions. Go check out what's wrong with it if you haven't done so already. Is that the Hitachi drive? If that drive has any valuable data on it, I recommend backing up that data immediately. Please post a screenshot of that drive in CrystalDiskInfo too.
It seems that your WD Green is in perfectly good shape, and that your problem is something else. The drive itself does not have any bad sectors, or hardware problems.
haroldj97 :
The G: is my storage and yes it is a hitachi. I had problems with bad sectors a while ago but it hasn't caused any problems since. This is the data:
OK, now I'm stumped. I have a few more tricks that I'd try, but don't expect much. My reason is that you have proven that there is nothing at all wrong with the WD Green drive itself, and that the problem is linked to it, but lies in a different component, or software. I cannot help you much in terms of software, as I'm not too good in that area. Anyway, here are my last few tricks.
(1) write data to GREEN and experience the performance drop. Shutdown PC, and unplug data and power cables from GREEN start up again and see of PC is any faster.
(2) Download CrystalDiskMark, and run the benchmark of your drive, and see if the result is unusually slow. Googling "WD Green benchmark" "WD Green CrystalDiskMark" or "WD Green speed" should give you something to compare against.
(3) shutdown. unplug HITACHI and see if performance gets better.
(4) you said your formatted the drive. Did you format in some weird way? Did you select some strange setting that screwed everything up? I have no idea what the optimal format setting is, you'll have to start a new thread to get answers on that. But some setting here could have been messed up.
(Bonus) If all of those pass with flying colors, your problem lies most likely in your motherboard, or software. Controlling 3 HDDs is making the thing confused and slow. You're last straw would be a clean Windows install, and if this doesn't work, you have an unsolvable problem.
JPNpower :
haroldj97 :
The G: is my storage and yes it is a hitachi. I had problems with bad sectors a while ago but it hasn't caused any problems since. This is the data:
OK, now I'm stumped. I have a few more tricks that I'd try, but don't expect much. My reason is that you have proven that there is nothing at all wrong with the WD Green drive itself, and that the problem is linked to it, but lies in a different component, or software. I cannot help you much in terms of software, as I'm not too good in that area. Anyway, here are my last few tricks.
(1) write data to GREEN and experience the performance drop. Shutdown PC, and unplug data and power cables from GREEN start up again and see of PC is any faster.
(2) Download CrystalDiskMark, and run the benchmark of your drive, and see if the result is unusually slow. Googling "WD Green benchmark" "WD Green CrystalDiskMark" or "WD Green speed" should give you something to compare against.
(3) shutdown. unplug HITACHI and see if performance gets better.
(4) you said your formatted the drive. Did you format in some weird way? Did you select some strange setting that screwed everything up? I have no idea what the optimal format setting is, you'll have to start a new thread to get answers on that. But some setting here could have been messed up.
(Bonus) If all of those pass with flying colors, your problem lies most likely in your motherboard, or software. Controlling 3 HDDs is making the thing confused and slow. You're last straw would be a clean Windows install, and if this doesn't work, you have an unsolvable problem.
1. Wrote data to the GREEN drive, performance drops. Shutdown computer and unplugged, computer is as fast as it should be
2.The benchmark is similar to other benchmarks on the internet
3.Unplugged Hitachi drive (GREEN drive not plugged in) and computer is as fast as it was with it plugged in
4. I used Windows formatting utility and followed a tutorial online
When I bought my SSD in April and reinstalled Windows, problem was occurring before and after. I hope its not the motherboard but I have got a spare 80gb sata so might try that and see if slows, if it does then its the motherboard or software and doesn't then I don't know
As you stated in the beginning, the problem was linked to the Green drive. However it layed in the HDD controlling part. Since many many older PCs (including mine) run lots of HDDs well, I think the problem lies in your specific motherboard, or the model. you could search whether your mobo model has a HDD issue online. If nothing comes up, you're pretty much out of luck. If there is a newer version, you COULD try a motherboard driver update, if speed matters for you. I say COULD, as you could screw something up. unlikely but possible.
Software problems probably don't exist, sorry, as Windows controls HDDs and if 3 HDDs makes windows go crazy, we'd have heard the whining by now.
1155 Chipset is incorrect as 1155 is the CPU socket code. chipset looks like "H67, Z77, Z87, H55" or some other code of one letter followed by two numbers. Mobo makers usually post this in huge stylized letters on the board to show off.
Software problems probably don't exist, sorry, as Windows controls HDDs and if 3 HDDs makes windows go crazy, we'd have heard the whining by now.
1155 Chipset is incorrect as 1155 is the CPU socket code. chipset looks like "H67, Z77, Z87, H55" or some other code of one letter followed by two numbers. Mobo makers usually post this in huge stylized letters on the board to show off.
I have timed how long it takes to boot up with:
Hitachi drive + SSD - 29.3 seconds
Hitachi drive + SSD + 80GB drive - 27.9 seconds
SSD+ GREEN drive - 41 seconds
I am now 99.9% sure it is to do with the GREEN drive. I don't what is wrong with it though to say that it passed all the tests. Anyway thanks for your help, I am going to get into touch with Western Digital to arrange a warranty replacement.
Hitachi drive + SSD - 29.3 seconds
Hitachi drive + SSD + 80GB drive - 27.9 seconds
SSD+ GREEN drive - 41 seconds
I am now 99.9% sure it is to do with the GREEN drive. I don't what is wrong with it though to say that it passed all the tests. Anyway thanks for your help, I am going to get into touch with Western Digital to arrange a warranty replacement.
I filed a Western Digital RMA and followed the procedures. I sent my 2TB Green off. The RMA replacement came yesterday and they sent me a 3TB Green drive which is just under 2 months old (28th April 2013 manufacture date) . Don't know if it was a mistake or they just didn't have any 2TB in stock. Any way, plugged the drive in, formatted and copied large files over to the drive and rebooted the computer, booted like it should. I am now sure it was definitely the drive that was at fault even though it passed all tests. So now its acting like it should and I have got an extra 1TB of space aswell. Thanks for your help.
Glad I could try. Now we know that something quirky with drives happens beyond common measureable means.
It seems that AHCI vs IDE seems to have troubled some speed issues with others (mostly SSD). Maybe that was the problem.
Anyway, enjoy your system! (don't forget best answer)
It seems that AHCI vs IDE seems to have troubled some speed issues with others (mostly SSD). Maybe that was the problem.
Anyway, enjoy your system! (don't forget best answer)
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