WD15EADS WD Caviar Green - 1.5TB

[Jonavin]

So far no problems. Over 2000 power on hours in my ReadyNAS Pro.

[Max Rebo]

I have four of them running in a ReadyNAS NV+. 350 hours with no issues so far.

SMART info posted here: http://www.readynas.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=26591

-Max

[devster1]

ATA errors seen on one of mine:
viewtopic.php?f=64&t=32319&p=184235#p184235

plus they both show a high load cycle count as described here:
viewtopic.php?f=84&t=32178

[chano22000]

Which version of the WD15EADS do you have which works well /does not work (ATA errors, LCC, disconnection from array, ...)
WD15EADS-00P8B0
WD15EADS-00R6B0
WD15EADS-00S2B0
WD15EADS-0H7B00
???

Thanks for feedback.

[devster1]

both are WD15EADS-00P8B0 but if you look here, there are now potential solutions to both problems

viewtopic.php?f=64&t=32319&p=184235#p184235

I am going to try them out and see if they work

[chano22000]

Controlling the TLER might solve potential conflicts with Raidiator rebulding the array but should not have an impact on the LCC . Some users report an increase up to 3 every minute which potentially leads to disk premature failure according to WD datasheet (70 days to reach the 300 000 load/unload cycles specified by WD ...)

WD does not support any more tools and officially discourage their usage to control the (green) features of their new disks (as wdidle3 in a recent past).

It seems that different versions of WD15EADS leads to different behaviour even though the firmware is numbered the same (as 01.00A01).

According to some other forums as http://forums.vr-zone.com/the-singapore-it-scene-sim-lim-square-funan-digitalife-mall/473070-wd-green-1-5tb-3-platter-here.html, the WD15EADS-00P8B0 might be the most recent 3 platters implementation of the WD15EADS.

Thanks for your observations.

[devster1]

WD might not support or encourage users to change these values, but hey if it stops LCC increasing every 2 minutes and the disk failing out the array, then I am going to change them.

[shanaclan4]

Stable and clean running...

Model: ReadyNAS Duo [X-RAID]
Firmware: RAIDiator 4.1.6 [1.00a043]
Memory: 1024 MB [2.5-3-3-7]
Volume C: Online, X-RAID, 2 disks, 69% of 1389 GB used

I have tweaked the drive operating parameters with two utilities.
IntelliPark feature disabled using WDIDLE3 WD utility to counter high LLC issue reported with this drive and similar WD models.
TLER enabled using WDTLER WD utility to support non-enterprise disks in RAID configuration.
See here for more info: http://www.readynas.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=64&t=32319&p=184386&hilit=WDTLER#p184386

I am also running with a 10 minute Spin-down configured as a Power option.

Note that I have two different drives within the WD15EADS model series based on the model suffix (e.g. WD15EADS-00R6B0)

Here are the SMART stats so far:

==================================

Code: Select all

SMART Information for Disk 1

Model:    WDC WD15EADS-00R6B0
Serial:    WD-WCAVY0746463
Firmware:    01.00A01

SMART Attribute
   
Raw Read Error Rate   0
Spin Up Time   9908
Start Stop Count   720
Reallocated Sector Count   0
Seek Error Rate   0
Power On Hours   2425
Spin Retry Count   0
Calibration Retry Count   0
Power Cycle Count   27
Power-Off Retract Count   24
Load Cycle Count   709
Temperature Celsius   38
Reallocated Event Count   0
Current Pending Sector   0
Offline Uncorrectable   0
UDMA CRC Error Count   0
Multi Zone Error Rate   0
   
ATA Error Count   0

Extended Attribute
   
Hot-add events   0
Hot-remove events   0
Lp stat events   1282
Power glitches   0
Hard disk resets   0
Retries   0
Repaired sectors   0


==========================

Code: Select all

SMART Information for Disk 2

Model:    WDC WD15EADS-00P8B0
Serial:    WD-WMAVU0139509
Firmware:    01.00A01

SMART Attribute
   
Raw Read Error Rate   0
Spin Up Time   5000
Start Stop Count   698
Reallocated Sector Count   0
Seek Error Rate   0
Power On Hours   2342
Spin Retry Count   0
Calibration Retry Count   0
Power Cycle Count   31
Power-Off Retract Count   29
Load Cycle Count   679
Temperature Celsius   36
Reallocated Event Count   0
Current Pending Sector   0
Offline Uncorrectable   0
UDMA CRC Error Count   0
Multi Zone Error Rate   0
   
ATA Error Count   0

Extended Attribute
   
Hot-add events   0
Hot-remove events   0
Lp stat events   5
Power glitches   0
Hard disk resets   0
Retries   0
Repaired sectors   0


[megamiles007]

My comments concern recent sad experiences with new Nov 2009 builds WD15EADS 1.5TB drives in a ReadNAS Duo over the festive period.

I ordered a pair of these drives mid Dec 2009 and they arrived with a recent Nov 2009 build code. Drives are WD15EADS-00P8B0 / Firmware 01.00A01

All seemed good, both drives sensed by my ReadyNAS Duo, but then numerous and escalating SMART drive errors set alarm bells ringing. Eventually one of the drives (within 4 hrs of initial insertion) was reported as DEAD by the SMART monitoring system during the initial resync build. The other driver just had escalating SMART errors.

Just to be clear, Drive Spin Down option was not enabled on my config.

I powered the system down and pulled both drives, swapped them into USB - SATA enclosures and found that they both worked fine. Used them in the ReadyNAS as USB 1 and USB 2 respectively. No issues formatting them as EXT3

Reading about the WD utilities that can be found on the internet, I built a boot CD with the WDTLER and WDIDLE3 utilities. This required that I move the drives from the USB enclosures to run directly from the SATA controller in one of my PCs (Intel SATA controller)

It appears that WD have put a stop to any end user firmware tweaking in the Nov 2009 builds, as the TLER (Time Limited Error Recovery) could not be accessed. Ideally I wanted to see just what the settings were, but you can not even get this far. Thus I assumed it was 0 sec Read/ 0 sec Write. No hope for changing to the RAID friendly 7 sec Read / 0 sec Write.

There was more success with the WDidle3 (Idle3 timer), which could be accessed and checked on each disk. The default was 8.0sec, but this could be changed to a suggested 300 sec. The object here was to look at the Load/Unload Cycles effect.

Despite changing the Idle3 timer to 300 sec, when the drives were re-installed in the ReadyNAS Duo they just would not work. Even trying just a single drive was problematic.... I used GParted to wipe all partions so they would appear as virgin drives. Rebuilding the Duo's firmware had no effect, it just would not boot up in my ReadyNAS Duo. In the end I pulled the WD15EADS and reverted back to the stock Seagate drives which powered up first time, have no SMART errors and just work.

Caveat emptor would seem the appropriate phrase to use ! This does somewhat put the problem on returning the drives as they would not be tested in a ReadyNAS just a standard PC or USB enclosure !

Based on other posts, this is a firmware / date build issue so drives newer than Nov 2009 are likely to have issues in a ReadyNAS Duo. There may be some hope in a later RAIDiator release ?

[devster1]

when you say the TLER value could not be accessed what error message did you receive?

[megamiles007]

From memory, when the TLER command was issued the DOS screen said something "Unable to access location ???? and error encountered etc"

I tried with the TLERscan.bat then the TLER-ON.bat and TLER-OFF.bat, all generated the same error message, so I assume WD have put the stop on any desktop drives being used in RAID configs. Unless there is a very smart user who knows how to get the TLER changed, the current probing used by the HDACCESS.exe command can only be used on older pre-Nov 2009 drives.

Anyway, have sent the drives back, and now in the suppliers hands to deem if they are defective or not, so I could end up getting them back as NFF when used in a desktop or USD enclosure. In this case I will put them as primary drives in my desktop.

[shanaclan4]

You should press for the refund indicating that the drive did not work successfully for your application - and that it was reasonable to think that they would. Whether they work properly in a PC directly or in an enclosure is complete immaterial. You should stand your ground on that.

Curious, however, did you run the WDTLER command straight-away - outside the context of those batch files? I don't think a successful HDAccess command is required for a successful tweak. I noticed similar errors, but upon checking the results with the /? switch, verified that a change was made.

[nuclearman]

I have (sadly) independently found all of the same conclusions as megamiles007 posted on Tue Jan 05, 2010 7:17 pm.

The most recent WD15EADS drives DO NOT WORK as previously described here. I have (two) WD15EADS-00P8B0, dated 20 Oct 2009. Here are my findings:

1. WDidle3 v1.00 can disable the idle timer.

2. However, WDTLER just returns an error ("cannot access TLER setting").

3. When inserted into the ReadyNAS Duo, I get a failure one minute later saying "The disk attached to channel 2 could not be used. The most common reasons are RAID resync in progress, faulty drives, and disks that are too small to be added to the array."

Crap!

[shanaclan4]

Did you return your disks or do you still have them? If you have them, I would try to hook them up to a PC and run GParted or Cute Partion Manager to blow away any partitions on those disks. Then start from scratch and see where that gets you. Just a thought...

[megamiles007]

Thanks for the support and recent feedback.

When I pulled the drives from my ReadyNAS Duo and hooked them up in one of my PC's I did indeed run GParted, as noted in my initial posted. I could see two partitions created by the ReadyNAS but just zapped them to make "virgin drives"

I had absolutely no joy putting these back in my ReadyNAS Duo, I'm not sure if the ReadyNAS recorded any IDs (serial numbers etc) from the drives and so marked them as bad from the initial insertion. All I got was the familiar ReadyNAS flashing lights at power on (series of short then long flashes). So I downloaded the latest RAIDiator and reflashed my device. Even doing this did not help, the WD drives just would not boot my ReadyNAS Duo.

With the Seagate drives back in, the system just booted up perfectly, so powered down and pulled one of the drives (the second slot, far right hand side) and tried to see if a migration to the larger capacity WD drive would work. I tried both and neither would spin up or be found, my ReadyNAS Duo showed just one drive, though the logs did indicated a disk insertion.

I can't put my finger on why they just will not work now but did initially. Clearly it is a major compatibility issue that does lie I feel with WD.

Anyway, I think the findings of nuclearman mirror what I experienced. So, sorry to say, this will be last WD drive I will buy.

I'll update you on the RMA status and will certainly press my case strongly, should that be needed. I ordered from Dabs.com, who are normally very helpful and I rate them highly. Snow chaos in the county means that they are still awaiting collection !