WD Red Disks in USB3 enclosure?

[Dave Grant]

I currently have a Dell XPS 8300 with a 1TB internal drive and almost 2TB of photos/videos stored on two 2TB MyBooks.

I have been thinking about getting a NAS but, for now, my plan is.

1) Buy two 4TB WD Red disks
2) Put one WD Red in a spare bay in the PC - store a copy of the photos/videos on it
3) Put the other WD Red in a USB3 enclosure - store another copy of the photos/videos on it
4) Use the two MyBooks to hold a further copy of the photos/videos

That will give me three copies of close to 4TB each, which should be enough for the existing files and at least a couple years more storage (I reckon I create about an extra 5-10GB a week).

I understand that WD Red disks are primarily designed for NAS but, from reading other threads, it seems that they will be OK in the PC. They also give me the option of switching to a NAS at a later date.

Aside from the use of WD Red disks in the PC, does the above sound OK?

Will a WD Red disk be OK in an external enclosure and can I store it long term in that enclosure, or does it need extra care?

Any thoughts would be much appreciated.

 

[Emerald]

You can use the WD RED drives as a standalone drive without any problems even in the USB encloser.

the only add bonus to the RED drive is that it allows to work in RAID

 

[giantbucket]

I have a 2T Red and a 4T Green, and I find I get faster read/write/access on the Green than the Red. I actually regret buying the Red now, since it cost me more but is slower (worse as far as I'm concerned).

Both were used internally in two different computers, same results.

 

[Dave Grant]

Thanks.

I have actually ordered two Seagate 4TB NAS drives, because the more I read about WD Red (especially the 4TB version) the more I questioned their reliability.

Hopefully they will be OK in the PC and the enclosure (I have ordered a StarTech enclosure - which seems to have been tested for 4TB).

I paid £136 each for drives, £30 for the enclosure and £30 for a 4-port USB3.0 card, so £332 for the lot (including delivery).

If the drives don't work out, I'll probably end up getting a NAS, but it never seems quite so expensive if you do it incrementally!