Western Digital AV-GP WD30EURS 3TB 64MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare Drive

Pros: This drive is designed for Audio Visual but can be used as a standard storage drive. For that purpose it runs and works perfectly. However also keep in mind that it is NOT designed for a main/OS drive. See notes below for explanation.

Cons: It is a green drive that uses IntelliPower which in a nutshell means the heads park when not in use, thus saving Power/Money and wear and tear, However it does affect speed on a normal OS running. Not a major con since it is a Audio Visual Drive.

Overall Review: I installed this drive in my Testbed PC and installed Windows 8 Pro on it and found the drive seemed rather slow, almost sluggish at times. This is to be expected but was disappointing none the less. I then reinstalled my SSD and chained this drive as a AV Storage unit. This is where it excels. I transferred several movies over to it and found that the movies worked perfectly. No lag or studder. I then formatted the drive to be used as a Image Storage Drive. I made several images using Active Disk Image, Macrium Reflect and with Acronis True Image. As expected the drive worked perfectly and was rather zippy in both the image creation (Between 10-15 Minutes per image depending on software used) For a 50gb data used drive. That is pretty snappy. Almost, but not quite as fast as a WD Black. The reason is the way the cache is used. It allows caching the data before, during and after the image is created. That saves tons of time. Now as for restoring, This is where I found it a tad slow. The restore was between 25-30 minutes (Depending on software used). What I found was the installed cache works well with creating an image, but when restoring it seems to loose its purpose and forgets it has any, thus the slower results. Just for an example of speed with a WD Black 3tb drive and this one: Create an image: Macrium Reflect 21 minutes Acronis True Image 19 minutes Active Disk Image 14 Minutes Restoring an image: Macrium Reflect 28 Minutes Acronis True Image 17 Minutes Active Disk Image 13 Minutes On this drive: Image Creation: Macrium Reflect 20 Minutes Acronis True Image 19 minutes Active Disk Image 14 minutes Restore Image: Macrium Image 24 minutes Acronis True Image 21 minutes Active Disk Image 16 minutes Basically the above is stating that this drive should NOT be used for image creation if speed is a requirement. However I would still recommend this drive to do image creation because of the head parking. With the head parking it uses less power on a daily basis, and it also cuts down on the wear and tear of the drive. This is a huge plus for a image drive. Overall a very solid drive if used for what it is designed for. As an OS it would be a major fail at times and NOT at all recommended. As a Data Drive I would use it in a split second. As a Audio Visual Drive it works as advertised and is zippy and as used as a Image Drive I personally would stay away from it. A simple Seagate drive would work faster then this one for that purpose. Overall recommendation is 4 of 5 and that is because of the lackluster OS performance and the slow Image times. Oh and before I forget, As for some reviews saying Greens are noisy, That was true several years ago but this drive is silent. I can't tell the noise between my Black, Barracuda and this drive. And that means it is quiet.

Pros: This drive can handle heavy loads Transfer speeds are reasonably high for this drive Using this as a media drive A lot of space Easy to unlock full 3TB (2.72TB Formatted) Still A lot Decent transfer speeds for the drive

Cons: Not DOA thankfully!

Overall Review: I compiled some numbers for this Sata 3.0Gb/s numbers for people to like to see some! This is for a 10GB transfer showing IOPS and sequential read/writes... Read - 147.9 MB/s 4 KB random single 103 IOPS 4 KB random multi 236 IOPS Write - 142.4 MB/s 4 KB random single 238 IOPS 4 KB random multi 292 IOPS Now 2 GB File Read - 145.2 MB/s 4 KB random single 134 IOPS 4KB random multi 292 IOPS Write - 138.1 MB/s 4 KB random single 358 IOPS 4 KB random multi 312 IOPS

Pros: It took 18 minutes to install Windows 8 Professional (x64) (build 9200) (minus updates). I’ve confirmed 3000.04 Gigabytes Usable Hard Drive Capacity. Windows 8 was very accommodating. This is a piece of application-specific hardware; it has to be judged accordingly. It could be appropriately used in a television station or high end DVR; it’s not intended for rigorous video gaming. Don't confuse this with hard drives found in video surveillance systems you can buy at your home-improvement center or big box wholesale club, they’re more suited more for convenience store scrutiny. “This” is well suited for serious scientific research and audio/video aficionados. This device appears to be able to efficiently function in an uninterrupted environment withstanding a lot of wear and tear, without incident. Only the test of time will reveal if this assumption is correct. This isn't my first 3 TB hard drive; my other is a #$%#$@#^&^&% which is excellent. You can't compare the two; it would be like comparing apples and oranges. Analogy: Long-distance runners vs. a sprinter, both have their application correct place.

Cons: Cons: Essentially none. However, the Newegg product page doesn’t coincide with the manufacturers; which lists a five year-limited warranty vs. the retailer’s (details) listed a three-year warranty. It’s a good thing when you discover you’re getting more than you reckoned.

Overall Review: I haven’t found any system cooling devices that are as quiet as this hard drive, “Noise levels have been minimized to less than one sone – virtually below the threshold of human hearing.” However, the familiar (normal) sound of the arm moving as far as it will go to and back to its landing point hasn’t been isolated. Think about how far we’ve come (nowadays), 3 TB @ +/- $150 vs. (1998) 9GB SCSI cost more than $1,500 (now, comparable storage = $00.45)! The AV-GP WD30EURS goes way beyond a generic 3 TB drive with it's always on durability and ability to stream proficiently “twelve” a high-resolution video conduits simultaneously. It appears the manufacturer is trying to dodge stating RPM speeds to avoid irrational comparison shopping. I understand the reasoning behind this, but, a few other folks seemingly don't. That's, it isn't significant, in this application efficiency is paramount, non-essential RPM translates into noise, heat & energy consumption. This device does what it’d intended to do very well. Editorializing: I’ve read the reviews for both this & the red NAS version, some of which I’d call disheartening. There are a lot of things to consider when researching a piece of hardware like this. The usual determining factors are function, price/value, warrantee & personal experience. Shared experiences, like mine might help, or, you might be discouraged by an adjacent review, that’s your judgment call. Why am I stating this, from personal experience, I feel this manufacturer merits less ragging-on and more credit than they’ve been getting? Reviews are opinions; ether to believe them or don’t, deciding is a challenging task. There will always be better & newer versions of products. I’m not comparison shopping; I'm evaluating value for the buck, in this instance I’d say, definitely YES! It’s hard to be overly critical of a product which fulfills its marketed task and comes with a five-year warranty. That’s incredible, when you take into account it very well may be on (nonstop) for five years! Endorsement: Judging from my first impression (first impressions count), this may not be a rock star, but, nevertheless; it’s a marathon star. I was pleasantly surprised by the drive; I like it and highly recommend it for audio/video applications. Testing computer profile: Testing configuration was done using 3.30 gigahertz Intel Core i5-2500K, 64 kilobyte primary memory cache, 6144 kilobyte secondary memory cache, 64-bit ready, Multi-core (4 total), Not hyper-threaded . Board: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd. Z68A-D3H-B3, Bus Clock: 100 megahertz, BIOS: Award Software International, Inc. F4 05/06/2011, 16362 Megabytes Usable Installed Memory.

Pros: I’ve been using this drive for about a month and it’s been trouble free as a media drive. Formatting (GPT) was simple in Linux to get the full capacity. It readily handles recording 2 HD streams and playback of one HD Stream. Good cache size. See other reviews for specific benchmarks. The drive is very quiet, useful for the media center usage. It parks heads while not in use, giving good power savings. Overall, I’m very satisfied with the drive for a non -OS purpose.

Cons: Not the fastest access speeds and transfer rates, but that’s not what the drive is designed for.

Pros: I have to say.. I'm very impressed with this drive. the drive for 3tb is just as big as my 1tb hard drive which was cool. Once I got it working correctly it recognized right away and formatted to 2.72tb. I had to format to GPT format to get it to recognize correctly and then it noticed right away. the 64mb cache is nice as well. My 1tb is 64mb cache but it seems like this one is a bit faster for some reason. I transferred a 7gb movie it took about 20 minutes. Also did 1gb and it took about 40 seconds. I wasn't sure about how fast it would be. But it did more than I expected. I also transfered 250gb over to it and that also took about 2 hours and the transfer speeds were lowest around 10mb/sec not to bad. I've had drives transfer 1mb or less /sec

Cons: I had to format to GPT format to get it to recognize correctly with windows 7 64bit. It took me a few minutes but once I got it it was perfect. Obviously not enough to knock off an egg.

Overall Review: Really good drive and really worth the buy. I would purchase this drive anytime. And the space is more than enough being a graphic designer I need the space. I use this drive as a storage drive. Hooked up to a 3.0 sata and 3.0 port in a asus 990fx motherboard.

Pros: >It pretty darned quiet. See Test 1 in other thoughts. >Setup was a breeze, but I would like to leave notes for those with older systems in the business environments. See Test 2. >The 64MB Cache is a nice feature for the price, as it is like giving the drive its own tiny, dedicated, stick of RAM. It is good to have when you need it. Like for watching movies or playing games.

Cons: None really. And for newer systems, you really cannot bash too much on the read write speeds. Why? Well the technology of new machines more than likely will come with 6Gb/s SATA, while this drive only supports 3Gb/s SATA. Keep that in mind when deciding to buy.

Overall Review: TEST 1-NOISE - To test this, I put it under quiet a bit of load, read, write, and watched movies that I copied over. Never once did I consider it a burden, and the entire drive was exposed in the docking station which supports more than the drive can spit out. TEST 2-FIRST TIME SETUP: Not quite sure on the Windows 8 installation, but for Windows 7 and before, you need to know a few things. >At 3TB, you cannot use MBR for the partitioning setup. It is just a Windows limitation that you will have to put up with it. There are two ways around it: ONE: split it into multiple partitions. Or TWO: Partition it using the GUID Partitioning Table (GPT). This neat little feature of the Windows OS lets you partition it with a different format. After that is done, you then have to enable the drive before you can format a file system (NTFS). I chose Option TWO, for sake of testing as a whole partition.

Pros: The WD AV-GP WD30EURS is an eggsellent drive. Remarkably quiet and cool operation. Does everything the spec sheet says and more. I installed it in my test bench rig and started testing it out under normal HDD situations (yes I know its not a normal HDD) but knowing some folks may buy it thinking it is, why not have stats to support it. I ran a simple disk mark run on it at 500mb size and I was shocked it beat out my 1TB black by 50mb/s the AV-GP scored a nice 167.8 read and 166.9 write very respectable numbers compared to my 1Tb Black's 110.7 read and 108.5 write speeds yes both drives on same controller cable and port on my Asus 990Fx Sabertooth. Both drives are sata 3.0 the only difference is my black is 32mb cache vs the AV-GP 64mb cache. Next I loaded it up with video's and popped it into my server to test streaming thru my home. I was able to connect 6 different devices (my homes limit) and stream 6 different videos to each device without any hiccups . The AV-GP is speced to run up to 12 simultaneous stream at the same time and I do not see this being an issue for it at all. This thing is simply amazing. Even with 6 feeds streaming off it at one time it kept its cool and quiet disposition. I unfortunately have no surveillance system to test out that particular aspect of it but from what i have seen it'll do the job without a sweat.

Cons: I can not find one single thing to say for a con with this drive. It preformed every task I set upon it with out hesitation. Even the price point is agreeable for most budgets.

Overall Review: Western Digital is by far my most called upon brand for hard drives. I've been using them for well over 2 decades without any major complaint on 95% of my builds. Their customer support is by far the best in the business. I wont say I have never had one fail. I've had several fail but a quick run to their website to set up an RMA and I'm normally back in business within a few days. You just cant beat them for support and service. Buy this product with confidence that you'll have a superb product backed by (yes I'm saying it again) THE BEST SUPPORT AND SERVICE around.

Pros: I have a total of 12 WD30EURS and 6 WD20EURS drives. The oldest WD30WURS is 8 months, WD20EURS, 15 months. There have been no drive failures once in operation.

Cons: I ordered eight WD30EURSs on 11/22/2012, 2 were DOA.

Overall Review: I have a total of 12 WD30EURS and 6 WD20EURS running in 6 video surveillance recording computers. The computers are from 2 months to two years old and operate 24x7. They are rack mount chassis, Intel desktop class motherboards. The drives connected to the motherboard SATA connectors with no RAID. All 6 computers are running Windows 7 Pro 64 bit and ExacqVision Pro video surveillance software. Individual drives record from 30 to 100GB per day. Playback from the recorders is only occasional.