WD Blue or WD Red?

[Chris Moore]

I came across an article at AnandTech (link below) that asked the question, would a WD Blue drive be bad in a NAS.
I read the responses and was a little surprised to see the claim that in a software RAID implementation like ZFS that TLER is actually not needed and the Blue drives would be fine. I don't have a preconceived notion here but I would like to know what others think. Comments?

https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/would-wd-6tb-blue-5400rpm-drive-be-bad-for-a-nas.2463122/

 

[Dice]

Mah, I've memory flashes from this forum discussing the relevance of TLER in relation to FreeNAS.
Beyond that, another aspect is the wdidle time out fix (sorry lack of proper nomenclature) that Greens required to be comparable to Reds. Don't know if Blue drives can be recoded using the same tool.

 

[bigphil]

My personal experience is that I've never had good luck with blue drives (poor reliability, slow) and I'll never try them again. As for TLER, I've always opted for drives that support it. From my reading, it doesn't sound like TLER is essential for a ZFS filesystem, but it also sounds like it's helpful and wont hurt by having it. By having it, you are limiting the drive's time for self recovery which is lower (usually 7 seconds) than the FreeNAS default for kern.cam.da.default_timeout=60 and kern.cam.ada.default_timeout=30. Without TLER, I've seen a post where the OS is waiting too long and disconnects the drive. Then from wikipedia about the relationship with ZFS.

 

[Johnnie Black]

Don't know if Blue drives can be recoded using the same tool.

They can still be changed with wdidle3.

 

[rs225]

Some Blue can be fixed with wdidle3, but there are reports the latest models (such as the 6tb?) can not.

 

[Johnnie Black]

Some Blue can be fixed with wdidle3, but there are reports the latest models (such as the 6tb?) can not.

Didn't test on 6TB yet, did test on 3 and 4TB and it works, but would expect it to work on 6TB as the new blues are the old greens with a blue label.

 

[Ericloewe]

TLER isn't essential and it doesn't always work (I had a really slow WD Red that never actually reported errors to the host). However, it is very useful to not have a pool completely stuck for a bit repeatedly because one drive isn't cooperating.

 

[rs225]

Didn't test on 6TB yet, did test on 3 and 4TB and it works, but would expect it to work on 6TB as the new blues are the old greens with a blue label.

It would be good to hear if the 6TB or any other newer model has the parking problem, and if so, whether wdidle3 works on it.

 

[Ericloewe]

The idle timers are going to be the same 8 seconds or so, almost certainly.

 

[Johnnie Black]

The idle timers are going to be the same 8 seconds or so, almost certainly.

They are the same, at least in the 3 and 4TB models, 6TB should be also.

 

[Dice]

However, it is very useful to not have a pool completely stuck for a bit repeatedly because one drive isn't cooperating.

To put some meat on that - this comes in handy for example during resilver with the failing drive still attached to the pool. IIRC.
Resilvering may take excessive times due to the slow drive and may be <faster> but with increased <risk> to pursue resilvering without the failing drive still attached.

 

[Inxsible]

...... as the new blues are the old greens with a blue label.

I hate it when manufacturers play marketing games like these. Makes it terribly confusing to consumers and also makes older reviews etc obsolete, in that you can't rely on those reviews/forum posts with certainty.

 

[jgreco]

I came across an article at AnandTech (link below) that asked the question, would a WD Blue drive be bad in a NAS.
I read the responses and was a little surprised to see the claim that in a software RAID implementation like ZFS that TLER is actually not needed and the Blue drives would be fine. I don't have a preconceived notion here but I would like to know what others think. Comments?

https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/would-wd-6tb-blue-5400rpm-drive-be-bad-for-a-nas.2463122/

My comment? "It's a stupid argument." Plus there's a big post on the topic.

https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/checking-for-tler-erc-etc-support-on-a-drive.27126/

Whether or not TLER is needed is like arguing about whether or not your data is important. It depends on other things. If you would find it acceptable if your NAS appeared to freeze for a minute when it was trying to write a block, you don't need TLER. If you are running protocols like iSCSI that would totally lose their mind and cause a disconnect/reconnect apocalypse due to the storage freezing up, you need TLER. ZFS itself doesn't really give a crap whether your drives support TLER or not, so someone will try to "win" the argument in their favor on that basis, but when you see someone do that, you may wish to discount their opinion as being poorly reasoned. You have to look at whatever is using the pool to understand if you need, would like, or don't need TLER.

 

[Chris Moore]

If you are running protocols like iSCSI that would totally lose their mind and cause a disconnect/reconnect apocalypse due to the storage freezing up, you need TLER.

Now, that is a good reason for TLER that the article did not cover at all. I think they were only considering simple file sharing.
Thanks for the insight.

 

[jgreco]

Now, that is a good reason for TLER that the article did not cover at all. I think they were only considering simple file sharing.
Thanks for the insight.

I can't be the only one who has seen some application that freaks out if the files on a share vanish for awhile. "Simple file sharing" is probably a bit of an unintentionally deceptive red herring. I've seen Windows Copy take down a PC when copying files to a NAS that crashed (not FreeNAS). Is that not "simple" enough? Is it bad if you are running a database from a CIFS share, and the data file gets corrupted when the application doesn't properly handle a write failure? Maybe that's not "simple" ... but looking at that from a different direction, in general we seem to be in an era where things are overly complex and programmers have often done a poor job of handling situations that they didn't expect to happen.

I think there's a reasonable argument in general favor of TLER/ERC, but on the other hand, I can imagine lots of cases where it doesn't matter, or where I trust the software not to screw up a write, etc., and the cost differential for non-TLER drives can be substantial in some cases. In other cases, it is frustrating that sometimes a TLER-capable option isn't even available.

 

[Johnnie Black]

It would be good to hear if the 6TB or any other newer model has the parking problem, and if so, whether wdidle3 works on it.

Got a 6TB Blue today and happy to report wdidle3 still works.

 

[Inxsible]

I am currently building a new FreeNAS box that will become my main NAS and my existing NAS will become my backup. So, I will be looking at buying quite a few drives in the near future. I have only ever used 1 desktop drive in my FreeNAS box (Samsung Spinpoint 1TB -- which is a Seagate Barracuda rebadge).

This time though, I am wondering if I should go with all desktop drives -- especially the 5400RPM ones if it will save me a ton of money. My new chassis has 12 drive bays. I would start with a 8-drive vdev so I would need at least 8 drives which would cost a lot of money even without adding the premium that NAS drives have over desktop drives.

I currently have 2 6TB Ironwolfs -- which run way too hot for my liking(45C). What options would I have?

1. Are all WD Blues above 4TB 5400RPM?
2. Are Barracudas available in 5400-5900RPM anymore?
3. If I go with Barracudas @ 7200RPM, how hot do they run in FreeNAS?

 

[Johnnie Black]

Are all WD Blues above 4TB 5400RPM?

I can answer this one, all 2TB and above Blues are 5400rpm, 1TB Blue exists in both 5400 and 7200rpm models.

 

[Inxsible]

I can answer this one, all 2TB and above Blues are 5400rpm, 1TB Blue exists in both 5400 and 7200rpm models.

If you don't mind, how many blue drives do you have in both your NAS boxes and have they ever given you trouble?

 

[Inxsible]

I know you already bought the 6TB Blue, but the price difference between WD 6TB Blue and WD 6TB Red is only $6
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822235009

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

For that difference, I guess the confidence of having a "NAS" drive is worth it and you don't have to deal with setting up wdidle3

 

[Johnnie Black]

If you don't mind, how many blue drives do you have in both your NAS boxes and have they ever given you trouble?

Eight 4TB Blues on the main FreeNAS server and between greens, blues and a few reds another 60 or so from 2 to 6TB on other servers, I've been generally happy with them, one failure here and there, nothing out of the ordinary.

but the price difference between WD 6TB Blue and WD 6TB Red is only $6

Not where I live, for $6 more it's well worth getting the red, if nothing else because of the extra warranty, since changing idle time takes 30 seconds.

 

[southwow]

I'd never trust the blue drives with my data. But, that's just personal opinion.

 

[Chris Moore]

If you don't mind, how many blue drives do you have in both your NAS boxes and have they ever given you trouble?

I have 32 drives in my main (home) NAS and they are all Seagate Desktop or Seagate Barracuda drives.
If you have enough airflow, they run cool enough.
I have been better satisfied by them than what I had before.