RAID 1 replacement HD

Hockeydad39 · Sep 19, 2014

I have a HP Pavillion set up with two Hitachi 1 TB drives set up for RAID 1. Drive 1 is failing or has failed. I was thinking about replacing it with a WD blk 1 TB drive. Is this a good choice?

SuperSoph_WD · Sep 19, 2014

Hey there!

WD black is a great choice for high performance and gaming but it's not recommended for RAID use.
WD has designed a specific drive for that and it's WD Red drive:
- Configurable Time Limited Error Recovery (TLER) with a default of 7 seconds
- IntelliPower disk rotation speeds (comparable to power saving HDDs like WD Green)
- Vibration reduction mechanism in hardware
These are all features that cannot be found in most regular drives and exactly why WD Reds are designed for RAID environments.
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=810

But you mentioned that you are going to change just one drive from your RAID configuration, so it is best to swap it with the same identical drive model with the same capacity. However, it is possible to have different drives in RAID but the drives need to have the same specs - cache size, capacity, RPM, etc.
It is not recommended to use non-identical drives in RAID environments, though. I would either not risk it and build the same RAID with the same drives, or back it up and build an entirely new array.

Hope this helped you.

Hockeydad39 · Sep 30, 2014

SuperSoph_WD :

Hey there!

WD black is a great choice for high performance and gaming but it's not recommended for RAID use.
WD has designed a specific drive for that and it's WD Red drive:
- Configurable Time Limited Error Recovery (TLER) with a default of 7 seconds
- IntelliPower disk rotation speeds (comparable to power saving HDDs like WD Green)
- Vibration reduction mechanism in hardware
These are all features that cannot be found in most regular drives and exactly why WD Reds are designed for RAID environments.
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=810

But you mentioned that you are going to change just one drive from your RAID configuration, so it is best to swap it with the same identical drive model with the same capacity. However, it is possible to have different drives in RAID but the drives need to have the same specs - cache size, capacity, RPM, etc.
It is not recommended to use non-identical drives in RAID environments, though. I would either not risk it and build the same RAID with the same drives, or back it up and build an entirely new array.

Hope this helped you.

Hockeydad39 · Sep 30, 2014

I replaced the bad drive with a WD red. So my RAID 1 consists of a Hitachi 1tb 7200 and the WD red. Comaptibilty issue, or should I have installed the WD black drive?

SuperSoph_WD · Sep 30, 2014

Hockeydad39 :

Hi again, Hockeydad39!

Well, what you did is not actually a good configuration and mixture of HDDs. :/
Good choice on the WD Red drive, but usually when you are dealing with RAID environment you need to use identical drives.
Even if they are not identical as a brand or model, they need to have identical cache size, RPM and capacity in order to work properly. RAID using different drives tends to lead to performance problems.
The entire array will perform based on the weakest drive. Mixing your 1TB 7200 RPM drive with WD Red's Intellipower is not recommended. The intellipower on the WD Red stands for a fine-tuned balance of spin speed, transfer rate and caching algorithms designed to deliver both significant power savings and solid performance. This is a setback for your 7200 RPM HDD, because it will not be able to perform according to its own specs.

I'd suggest to use identical drives for RAID, it's up to you to decide how reliable you want your RAID array to be.
However, I'm not sure this is going to work for you.

Keep me posted though!
SuperSoph_WD

Hockeydad39 · Sep 30, 2014

SuperSoph_WD :

Hockeydad39 :

Hi again, Hockeydad39!

Well, what you did is not actually a good configuration and mixture of HDDs. :/
Good choice on the WD Red drive, but usually when you are dealing with RAID environment you need to use identical drives.
Even if they are not identical as a brand or model, they need to have identical cache size, RPM and capacity in order to work properly. RAID using different drives tends to lead to performance problems.
The entire array will perform based on the weakest drive. Mixing your 1TB 7200 RPM drive with WD Red's Intellipower is not recommended. The intellipower on the WD Red stands for a fine-tuned balance of spin speed, transfer rate and caching algorithms designed to deliver both significant power savings and solid performance. This is a setback for your 7200 RPM HDD, because it will not be able to perform according to its own specs.

I'd suggest to use identical drives for RAID, it's up to you to decide how reliable you want your RAID array to be.
However, I'm not sure this is going to work for you.

Keep me posted though!
SuperSoph_WD

Hockeydad39 · Sep 30, 2014

SuperSoph, Should I use the Blk drive that i bought instead, then when that one is rebuilt, replace the other Hitachi with another WD blk?

What can I do with the red, or return it?

SuperSoph_WD · Sep 30, 2014

Hockeydad39 :

The best solution is to use 2 WD Red drives in the RAID array!
This is what will give you a stable RAID configuration. If you use WD black drives in a RAID enviornment it might void their warranty.
They are designed for usage in gaming PCs with demanding performance and high-end applications.

Keep me posted!

Hockeydad39 · Sep 30, 2014

Sorry, but I am confused. I understand using red would be preferable, but I only have two drives in the p/c. I wanted to use the Hitachi to rebuild the second drive. Am I going about this all wrong. This is my first and maybe last foray into RAID arrays. I wasn't able to get my rebuld or sync buttons on the RAID expert to be active. I can't tell if the RAID is rebulding

SuperSoph_WD · Sep 30, 2014

Hockeydad39 :

I'm sorry you got confused. :/
What I meant is that whenever you are using RAID, identical drives are essential. This means that you should have bought the same drive as the one you already had in the RAID, or change entirely the configuration using specific RAID/NAS drives to avoid future failure (in this situation the best case scenario would be 2 WD Red drives).

Does it say somewhere that the RAID is initializing, this can take some time? Hopefully, you will be able to rebuild it.

Afterwards I would suggest to back up just in case and go through a couple of threads that might help you clear things out:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/290729-32-need-raid-sized-hard-drives
http://forum.overclock3d.net/showthread.php?t=34989

Keep me updated!
SuperSoph_WD

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