WD Raid Edition worth it? RE2

[MadHacker]

I'm contemplating buy some 1TB WD raid drives to add to my existing system.

Currently have 5 500Gig in Raid5 on a Highpoint Raid card and would like to add more space.
I'm trying to decide to buy the
Western Digital Caviar GP WD10EACS 1TB 5400 to 7200 RPM 16MB Cache
or
Western Digital Caviar RE2 GP WD1000FYPS 1TB 16MB Cache

in Canada the difference in price is $100. non raid edition being cheaper and on sale.
is the extra $100 worth it?

I'm going with Western Digital dues to it being easier to RMA (cross shipping) while Seagate doesn't support cross shipping.
I have RMA'd 3 Seagate drive in the last few months...

any feedback would be appreciated.

 

[chookman]

The GP is actually designed as a power saving drive (hence the 5400-7200rpm rating) from what i have seen in reviews the RE2 drives are a fair bit quicker but dont offer anywhere near the power saving features. RE2 is supposed to have a high MTBF (hence RAID edition) but i have rarely seen those numbers mean much

In anycase $100 is a big difference for a hard drive that is exactly the same size, id just stick with the cheaper GP version

 

[leo2kp]

I have two RAID drives and I love them. Personally I think the 5-year warranty and high MTBF (hence the warranty) are worth the extra cost. When I build a PC for someone, I always try to get a good 5-year drive in there. The best part is, those drives are designed for 24/7 use for 5-years. Those are enterprise-class disks for entry-level servers, and in a desktop I think they'll last a lot longer than that.

On the down-side, they don't have quite the platter-density of other cheaper disks. The reason being is that the denser the platters, the more errors that occur. Disks drives have hundreds of errors every read/write that you don't know about and much of it has to do with the density of the platter (according to the founder of Spinrite). To create such a robust disk, I think they use more mature technology with less-dense platters to create a more reliable drive which, I think, also helps increase the speed because of the less errorage. Less density equals more platters used for the same size though, and that increases energy usage. You may also want to note that the RAID disks, I believe, have a different bearing than the typical disk to reduce friction and noise, helping it achieve the long MTBF and simultaneously reducing heat. My drives stay at 30C with the intake fans blowing over them and you can hardly hear two of them at once (although I have a lot of fans too).

Another feature you might bennefit from, being that you have a RAID-5 array, is the fact that the RAID disks will allow more time for a drive that drops from the array to recover before it errors out on you. This could prove to save you money in the long-run I think.

So yea that's my rant! Yep, call me a fanboi of enterprise-class disks but hey, never knock the way another cat swings

 

[z_dori]

i got the 750GB RE2 & It's Great!

the GP Drives are for power saving. less power= less speed.
the GP drives are almost the slowest drives around today.
go for the 1TB Raid or if it's too Expencive got with the 750G RE2, it is better.
the 750GB has a 98MB sustaind, the other Raid sizes have 85MB sustaind.
in Raid configuration the RE2 drive have advanteges over the KS ver in speed mostly.
i read some reviews before i got mine coz the difference between the KS & the AYYS (RE2) was equal to the price of 250GB drive or getting the 1 TB GP.
i choose speed over power savings.
i don't think that 1 or 2 HD's will make a difference in my electric bill....

as for the Green couse.... enterprises that will use 1000 GP drives instead of RE2 will gain a difference for their electric bill & the enviroment...

 

[MadHacker]

Thanks for the feedback...
the reason I'm so undecided is the cost.
3 RE Drives @ $262 is $786+Tax
3 GP Drives @ $179 is $537+Tax
the difference is enough to buy another 1TB drive.

I currently have 4 500Gig WD RE drives as well as 3 500Gig Seagate (desktop Ed.) drives.
So far I have RMA'd 1 WD drive (cross shipping) back in October but didn't loose any data.
I have since then RMA'd my 3 Seagate drives in the last 2 months... (1 left to RMA no cross shipping) and lost my entire raid.
Seagate doesn't support cross shopping in Canada.
My server machine runs 24/7 and cheaper hydro bill is nicer... as well as cheaper drives...
but the cost of loosing my Raid again... is not something I'd like.

Decisions... Decisions... Decisions...