[ale] Refurbished HDDs

[DJPfulio at jdpfu.com]

I've been buying WD Black HDDs for a long time for the 5 Yr warranty.

a) Only 1 WD Black has failed before the 5 yr warranty period. It failed 8 month it, hard, with lots of prior warning and was replaced by WD using their RMA process. The replacement took much too long, about 6 weeks, so I'm not very pleased with their warranty support. They claimed to have shipped the replacement over a week before they actually shipped it, then delayed answering my query to "find it" for 4 days.  I'd paid for expedited replacement.

b) The other 5 HDDs are showing ZERO issues in the SMART data. 3 are over 5 yrs old and 2 are under 2 yrs old.

c) Daily, automatic, backups have been key here. Stopped using RAID completely around 2018, when SSDs started being used for really important stuff, like app virtual machines and OS storage. I was late to this.

d) Retired a WD Black 1TB HDD that started showing suspicious results after 12 yrs of continuous use.  Felt is was an excellent value for the price.

Nothing replaces backups. Definitely not RAID.

I don't just replace storage because the warranty has expired.  In a business, that choice would be different. At home, do you replace your hot water heater when the warranty is over or to you maintain it and keep using it for the following 10-20 yrs?

I've not been impressed by any other WD storage products, though I do have 2 USB external 8TB devices that are used exclusively for backups. I don't trust USB connected storage for anything besides backup storage and temporary connections.  Array storage connections are either eSATA or Infiniband (it was cheap).

Weekly SMART tests show HDDs that are just beginning to fail in about 5 of the test attributes, so I haven't been surprised. Monthly, I run long SMART tests. The test output is retained for 6 months for each storage device, since comparing the values of the attributes as they change over time is the best way I know to predict any issues.


On 2/2/26 13:20, Bob Toxen via Ale wrote:
> It's been my experience that high quality disks, such as the Western 
> Digital Caviar series, will last 5 years and should be replaced at 
> that time!!!  I find most other brands to be suboptimal, e.g.,
> expect a head crash and catastrophic loss of all data.  The Caviar
> Black disks spin at 7200 RPM and carry a 5 year warranty!
> 
> I've had poor luck with Seagate.  YMMV.
> 
> I realize that a RAID array is redundant but is it worth being cheap
> to hopefully replace every failed disk before another one also
> fails?
> 
> Understand that the MTBF is less than that for one disk increased by 
> being able to continue until two disks fail.  This is because,
> assuming all disks of the same type and time in service are more
> likely to fail around the same time, same as incandescent light
> bulbs.
> 
> I suggest, if you use refurbished disks, pick a RAID mode, such as
> RAID6, with double redundancy due to two different parities that can
> withstand two disk failures in the array.
> 
> Wikipedia's "RAID" entry is excellent.
> 
> If the cost isn't out of your pocket buy new WD Black!
> 
> Bob
> 
> [Bob's political comment suppressed by Bob]
> 
> On Sat, Jan 31, 2026 at 06:25:39PM -0800, Alex Carver via Ale wrote:
>> Anyone have recommendations for an online place to buy refurbished
>> HDDs (not SSDs)? I want to add a few more drives to the NAS.
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