WD Red vs Green for Raid-0 USB backup.

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gerr

gerr

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I know the popular answer, which would be Red. However, take into account that I only use my 2 HDD external Raid-0 enclosure to backup my home server and it will only be accessed at midnight when I run my backups and for only as long as it takes to complete those backups. Therefore, wouldn't the Green drive work better because of it's ability to nearly turn itself off and thus save on power?

The normal reason the Green isn't used in Raid is because it's programed to park the headers after only 8 seconds and the constant parking & unparking of the head is what causes failures. In my case, the fact that my external enclosure is only accessed once a day and sits dormant the rest, I would think the Green would be the better option.

Thoughts?
 
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drtweak

drtweak

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It has nothing to do with how often it's accessed. if the fact they get parked period and has the possibility of being dropped from the RAID to begin with. Trust me stick with the Red's. Greens are for single drives that don't get used often like a single storage drive. Not designed for RAID's.
 
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SuperSoph_WD

SuperSoph_WD

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Hey there, gerr!

Both WD Red and WD Green have IntelliPower as a feature. You seem to be familiar with the difference though, main thing is that WD Reds can recover from extended error in your setup. As @drtweak already said, it doesn't matter if it's accessed regularly or not WD Greens are designed for secondary storage and to be used as standalone drives in computers or external enclosures.
I'd really go with WD Reds for RAID if I were you. I have some questions though:
Why would you configure RAID 0 (stripe) instead of RAID 1 (mirror), which is much safer?
And why would you even consider RAID for backup?
You should keep something in mind - RAID is not really a backup, it can protect against a drive failure and store your data, but that's it.
If you really want to go with WD Greens (or any external HDD), you can just set them up in external enclosures and back up separately to one drive at a time, using a backup software like SmartWare.
In your case using RAID might not be the best choice. It may be easy, but a normal backup is worth more and can protect against more dangers.

Hope this is helpful.
SuperSoph_WD
 
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nick779

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Why would you even consider RAID 0 for a backup? That kinda defeats the purpose of even having a backup if youre backing up to such a fragile setup...

I find it weird that your enclosure doesnt support RAID 1
 
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gerr

gerr

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In my server, I have a 6TB(2x3TB) Raid-0 drive made up of HGST NAS drives and this is my main storage. I am looking for a backup solution, and decided on a external UBS3 enclosure that uses 2 HDD's in either JBOD, Raid-0, or Raid-1 configurations. Since I need this to be 6TB, the Raid-1 option is out. I already have 1 3TB Red and 1 3TB Green drive, so was wondering if I could mix those in this external drive in JBOD configuration, or if I need to buy a 2nd Red drive for it.
 
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junkeymonkey

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the way I remember it its best to use like drives but if you don't it will work but at the lesser drives rate also size and speed needs to match

what you should do is e-mail wd with that statement above and they will look that over and reply a solution for that need
 
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drtweak

drtweak

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Me. I got 2 2TB Samsungs for my Main storage in a RAID 0 with a Seagate 4TB as my back drive. You got 3x2Tb in RAID 0. What i would do?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822236737

Boom. Just use that. Yea ya got to get another drive but honest you can do one of two things.

1) Get a single 6TB Drive and copy, clone, backup program, what ever you want and be done.

or

2) Find a backup program that can backup to multiple drive (Not really sure of one though. You think they would make one with how big drives are getting these days?) and then backup to each drive seperatly as a single drive. So it would backup 3TB to one drive, then 3Tb to the other.
 
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gerr

gerr

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What I think I will do is buy another Red drive and put it in the external enclosure along with the Red I just bought, giving me a 6TB Raid-0 external USB3 enclosure that I will use to backup the server. I will then put the Green drive in the server along with the two HGST drives, but keep it as it's own drive and use it to store PC Client backups where the HGST drives in Raid-0 will be used to store my media collection.
 
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SuperSoph_WD

SuperSoph_WD

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Hi again, @gerr!

A final advice - be careful when using RAID 0, this is not something people usually set up for backups.
Anyways, your solution does sound like it might work as well, but I really don't like RAID 0 configurations for backup or any storage solution whatsoever. RAID 0 arrays are usually used when you need speed and performance (gaming, streaming, editing videos, graphic designs, etc.), in any other case it's the worst possible array to build for storing data.
@drtweak gave a pretty awesome recommendation on how to go about things, but I guess it's up to you.
I also would use the drives separately for the backups or download a software (maybe SmartWare or Acronis) to backup on at least 2 other locations, if I had your data.

Good luck with everything though. Once you are done with your configuration, let us know how it works!
Hope we were able to help you out! :)

SuperSoph_WD
 
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gerr

gerr

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Well, my backup plan isn't to store the info once the drives gets too full, but instead to just have a backup copy in case the main drives fail. Granted a 6TB single external drive would have been better, I already bought the 2-bay Raid enclosure and 1 drive. Newegg charges a restock fee, so not sure if it's worth returning those and getting a single drive or not.
 
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