Western Digital 4TB WD Black Performance Internal Hard Drive HDD - 7200 RPM, SATA 6 Gb/s, 256 MB Cache, 3.5 - WD4005FZBX

WD drives do not exhibit the HD having to go to the zero stop/HOME on the drive due to losing track of cylinder position. That is what the frequent Knocking sound is even when the drive is Idle. The drive will work BUT is defective. Seagates lose the cylinder position and have to go out to the zero stop position then count back in to where they were supposed to be. I have observed this problem since the 1990s and just had it with a 16TB drive I sent back. I should have known better!

Western Digital hard drives are my choice when I pick a new hard drive. I used to live near their California HQ and was a former head of a large PC user group and learned WD has good quality. This drive is more expensive than others because i researched which one was good for handling heavy graphic read and writes when using video editing software and the file was on an external drive. This is a SATA drive and runs the faster 7200 RPM with a large cache. You have to either install this an internal drive, or buy an external drive case for this, with cables, etc. This is a do it yourself product and not for novice users. This drive is NOT a consumer product. You have to go to the website to get the instructions on how to format this drive, etc. That is what they mean by Bulk/OEM labels - it lacks any extras included with consumer hard drives in a box. You have to order the cables you need, and download the configuration software from the WD website, which is fairly easy to do. If you dont want to configure a drive like this, find a consumer external drive with the CD, cable, etc. and buy it instead. You need to know if your PC will handle large partitions, ie. 2 TB, or you have to format it with several partitions due to older operating systems. I did not buy a separate external drive box, but bought an Anker external open case with power supply and capability to connect to both USB 3.0 AND eSata connections. I did that because using the eSata port on my old laptop was much faster than 2.0 USB. But, I can move the box and drive to my desktop which has a USB 3.0 add in card. Both eSata and USB 3.0 are much faster transfer speeds than USB 2.0 and this drive can handle it. I have included pictures of the drive working fine in the Anker case so you can see both in use. Note: Hard drives have standard connections to the case or internal slot for power and data transfer. The ability to provide USB 3.0 or eSata connections is built into the case, not the hard drive. Both USB 2.0 and eSata require special cables, so dont forget to get them if you do this. In my case, since I used the external open Anker docking station, I didnt need cables. I just slid the drive into the docking slot and the connection for data and power was made. The Anker unit also has an on off switch. Of course, if you use this drive internally in your system, that is a different process and involves other tasks if you make it your primary drive with an operating system. I did not do that, so mine is used primarily for a video data file drive and has not been setup with booting capability. You cant go wrong with Western Digital. (Unless they sell out to someone,then watch what changes in quality). You can get this drive in 1 TB, 2 TB or 3 TB versions. I got the 2 TB version and it cost about 30% more than WD drives with lower speeds and features.

Pretty common thing Ive read for these drives is how loud they are. They are not kidding. The read/write heads click quite frequently, no matter how small a task you are doing. They even sometimes run when the drive isnt being accessed. Recently I switched it to another computer case, and its even louder. Other than that, the drive is great.

i have ordered two of these and use both for external backup. the first one worked so well i ordered another. both are housed in the RSHTECH Hard Drive Enclosure. yes, they come unformatted. install the drive in an enclosure of choice and connect to computer then in windows 10 pro, right click on start menu and click disk management; look for the drive that is indicated as unallocated and not formated. right click in that stippled space and follow instructions to format. honestly, i already forgot how to do it beyond this point but instructions to use disk management to format a new drive abound on the net. the trick to remember: above 2tb a different formatting system has to be used. not a big deal but this product 100% has to be formatted. regarding the discussion of wd or another brand - at the end of the day i went with wd for their reputation and because i have not had problems with them previously. regarding the black level of the product - it has the specs i want for my application at this memory size which is speed and cache. i am reluctant to go with a larger size hd preferring 2 smaller sizes such that in case of failure not all my eggs are in one basket. i also use the cloud for storage and have other items dispersed in dual backup amongst various ssds and memory sticks - my conclusion being one can never be too cautious about having multiple copies of saved files in the digital paperless world. i always plug in thru a surge protector and manually turn off when not in use. so far so good with wd and i will continue to buy again from them; fyi, they now own sansdisk which is another product line that has performed well for me over the years.

I bought this as a second hard drive. I got the black version because I use it for audio storage so I want extra reliability. Its been great. 9 months of daily use and no problems. Nothing to report - it seems fast enough as far as platters go, and it just works. Installation was a breeze. I did need a hard drive kit for a cable so make sure you have that. And make sure you have mounting brackets ready -- my case already had them, I just needed the cable.

Because it took five months to buy all the parts I needed for my new computer, and I bought this hard drive first, I did not know that this was a dead hard drive until a few days ago. And of course, Amazon.com only gives customers 30 days to return items, not five months. So now I am stuck going through the WD support site to get a replacement drive. When, and if, I get a working replacement HDD, I will either update this post, or give a new review of this product. MACJR Update: The replacement drive arrived a few days ago, from WD. The HDD itself is very nice, and by itself, would rate 5 stars. The reason I only give this drive 3 stars is because of WD support. The anger and irritation I am feeling at WD right now should have this drive rated at one star, but as I said, the drive is actually very nice. Warning: If you are a Windows 10 user, and you buy a brand new WD drive (although I hear Seagate has, or had, this same issue), the TrueImage software found at the WD support site WILL NOT clone a good copy of Windows 10 to the new drive! The software maker is more than happy to sell you their own full version of the software, with all kinds of extras (that I did not want of need) for a rather steep price for a program an average user would seldom need. That software is priced out of my range right now. I just spent a small fortune, on my budget, building a new PC, there is no extra to throw away on a software package that only has one feature I needed. Warning 2: Be careful about the low cost and freeware options you will find in a search for HDD drive cloning software. Most of it is pure junk, that will not even work, for one reason, or another (and may get you on a SPAM list in some cases, if you give them your e-mail address). On the second day of searching, I finally found software that offered a free version of their software that would allow me to clone a Windows 10 HDD. Search for DriveClone, if you find yourself in the same situation as I was in. It worked. I am still angry at WD, even more so after trying to tell them I found a solution, only to have their support form not work for me today. I just wanted to tell them the I finally got the blasted drive up and running with a cloned copy of Windows 10, from my old drive, and that I did not need the RMA they sent me, that I did not ask for. I am also still angry at Acronis, the makers of the OEM versions of the software that WD and Seagate offer at their support sites. The full version of their software is too expensive for the average person to justify, and most of us would only rarely need it. Acronis does offer a free trial version, but the catch is that the cloning tool is disabled in the trial version. Bleep, bleepity, bleep,,, and so on. Done ranting now. MACJR

Ive used nothing but WD drives for over 30 years. First one was a tiny 240MB drive and since have been through many upgrades. While most were due to outgrowing the drives, Ive had maybe 2 catastrophic failures. I had a few drives start to go bad developing bad sectors but were caught in time to preserve data on a backup drive. While I know SSD is the thing now and is my preference for sure for a laptop, I do not find them to be a great advantage for sustained transfers like backing up or cloning a HD. SSD rates are initially very high then slow down after a few seconds. So for a while I will stick with spinning platters. This particular model is very fast rivaling SSD transfers for routine writes to another section of drive, as fast as my SSD laptop is.

I had high expectations when it came to this drive. My solid state was getting a little full and I was no where near done downloading files. I purchased this to more or less take over as the main drive for my files and archives and let the solid state take care of the OS. Now, why did I buy this rather than say the VelociRaptor? Well, for one, I wanted 2TB and the Raptor doesnt provide anything more than 1TB. Two, the Black is only 15% slower. To put that in some perspective, the 1TB black is ~$75 while the Raptor is ~$205; 273% cost increase for 15% more performance doesnt make much sense to me. So, lets talk about that speed. I will post CrystalDiskMark benchmark for those who love looking at those numbers, but I like to use my butt dyno as my test. Coming from the SSD, I could definitely see the difference in load times, program start-ups, image rendering, model rotating, and yata yata. With all that said, I have never felt the need to yell at my computer to hurry up; everything still moves at a quick pace that satisfies what I need. The next thing on the list is noise. I have eight fans in my case that is a foot and a half from my head. The only time I can actually hear the drive working is when I first open a program such as SolidWorks or BeamNG Drive. Even while doing the benchmark it was quiet. So, unless your computer has no fans and is close to your face, you shouldnt hear too much grunting from this guy. At any rate, this is a great drive if you need the space and speed and just cant find the want to fork out the big bucks.

Ive been using WD hds since the early 90s and theyve been consistently reliable for me, more so than their peers, which I why I tend to gravitate towards them when buying hds. To be honest its been years since Ive bought one since my pc is all SSD or at least it was until I installed this drive. Previously my fastest hd was a wd velociraptor but this one is very fast for a mechanical drive. Id hoped that the Seagate hamr drives would be available to the public by now but alas enterprise customers only. I needed large capacity storage and a 4tb ssd is $600 so this was a happy medium that I could live with. I have included my crystaldiskinfo drive test so you can see my throughput. My system is an AMD X570 with a R9 3900X that was using a crucial mx500 2tb sata ssd for storage but its just not enough room for my 4k videos. I dont hear much drive noise when its active but then again my Cooler Master HAF932 case is loaded with fans and I tend to hear my gpu and aio fans above everything else so they could be drowning it out. Bottom line is that if you need a new hd this one would not disappoint you for a mechanical drive. I keep my games on my ssds so I cannot comment on things like loading times from them but you see the drive test so you know what Im getting out of it.

I added this to a ThinkStation P390 with ease. The SSD and the 4TB platter drive I got in the bundle have given me adequate storage for my 3D / Digital art content. That said, Ive trusted Western Digital/WD drives for years and am very happy with this purchase.