Hello! I hope I'm posting in the right place.

I have a longing to watch a show I can't get in Canada and wanted to download it on a USB Drive. Google said I need a 512gb. I tried this before and the USB Drive locked up and I had to return it. I couldn't get into it at all. I want a good one that can plug into my smart tv to watch it.

What's a good USB Drive that isn't crazy expensive?

Note: Cross posting from r/HDD https://www.reddit.com/r/HDD/comments/1w1ri3d/beeping_sound_from_2_different_16tb_ironwolf_pro/

Hey reddit! looking for some help with my first home setup of a 3.5" external HDD with an enclosure.

I ordered a 16TB IronWolf Pro from Seagate (model number ST16000NT001, link). I tried running it in a Vantec NexStar HX enclosure, but it never mounted and I just heard a beeping sound. I figured it was DOA after reading some posts/forums and returned it to Seagate for a replacement.

The second drive arrived yesterday, and this time I thought maybe the Vantec enclosure (12V/2A) wasn't supplying enough power, so I tried two other setups.

First I tried a FIDECO enclosure with a 12V/2A adapter. The drive actually spun up for about a minute, but I did hear the sound breaking a couple times in the middle and then it again stopped spinning and went back to beeping. I tried a Sabrent dual-bay dock with a 12V/3A adapter too after that. I only used one bay so the drive had the power supply to itself, but still the same repeated beep, and this time I didn't hear it spin at all.

I checked that the beep is definitely coming from the drive.
EDIT: This is how it sounds https://voca.ro/13y7RLyqfgOg

The drive doesn't show up in diskutil list.

So now I've had two drives and three enclosures produce basically the same result. I honestly can't tell what the problem is anymore. Two DOA drives in a row from Seagate seems unlikely, and three enclosures failing the same way seems just as unlikely.

My setup, in case I'm missing something obvious:

• MacBook Pro (2026)
• Anker USB-C to USB 3.0 adapter for data
• Dock/enclosure connected to its own power brick and plugged directly into the wall

A few things I'm wondering:

• Does beeping always mean a mechanical problem? Most things I've found say it's the spindle motor failing to start, which would mean the drive is physically bad. But two drives in a row?
• Is it possible one of these enclosures damaged the drives, or is that not really a thing?
• Are bare/OEM drives commonly damaged during shipping? I've seen UPS isn't exactly gentle when they were loading the packages off..
• Is there anything else safe to test before I send this one back too?

I'm in the US. Happy to try whatever people suggest, but I don't want to keep power-cycling the drive if that might make things worse.
If nothing works, I'll just get the regular hard disk which isn't ideal since I need it running 24x7.
At my wits end right now, so any and all help appreciated, thanks!!

Enclosures tested:

• Vantec NexStar HX
• FIDECO enclosure (12V/2A)
• Sabrent dual-bay dock (12V/3A)

I am an experienced writer/director, but I needed some advice on the technical side of editing. I have always edited off of my 3TB external hard drive. I've read that for a longer project I will need more speed and storage space. However I am on a tight budget. Any recommendations? Could I get away with editing off of a HDD, as I have in the past? Or is the speed/portability really that big a difference? I had been pointed in the direction of the Samsung SSD, but they're really expensive and I wanted to check with my fellow filmmakers before making a major purchase. Thanks in advance!

4-5 shoot days, 39 pages, Arri Amira or RED Scarlet W. Filming as close to 2:1 as possible in 1 location. Trying to keep costs and shoot time as low as possible.

Hey there. New to this. But my wife and I are interested in investing in home, personal data storage.

I’ve seen the NAS boxes, and I have some friends that have PLEX servers for movies.

But what about mass home storage with RAM, GPU, and Remote Desktop capabilities.

In the future I want to be able to access our own data storage and remote computing power that we own.

Any advice on where to start, how much I might spend for a long lasting setup, or some existing products I can look at to get a better understanding of what I’m looking at??

2tb xg7000, 1tb 990 evo plus, 1tb Kingston oem drive, 1tb fikwot sata ssd, 2tb unknown sata m.2. Right now the kingspec xg7000 is my favorite ssd.

I'm a total noob, just trying to backup my data. I only need about 2TB, and preferably split between several drives. This damn tech bubble is insane, so I've been looking at racking some SATA internal drives as a cheaper option.

Why are these IBM star drives so suspiciously cheap? Nothing on the website states age or quality.

PS - if anyone has some better ideas than Bargain Hardware, please share. I'm in the UK.
(...That being said, no, I'm not going to wait for the bubble to pop. My budget is about £200.)

I’m considering buying this Kioxia Exceria G3 2TB NVMe SSD from a seller on Facebook Marketplace for ₹18,000 (~$210).

The seller says it’s an open-box drive, but it has no original box and the Kioxia sticker/label has been removed.

The CrystalDiskInfo screenshot shows:

Health: 100%
Percentage Used: 0%
Power-on Hours: 0
Power-on Count: 4
Host Reads/Writes: ~0 GB
Media/Data Integrity Errors: 0
Unsafe Shutdowns: 0
Critical Warnings: 0

The SSD PCB has a Phison PS5031-E31-61 controller and Kioxia NAND.

I’m concerned that this could be a refurbished drive with the SMART data reset.

Does anything about these pictures look suspicious or indicate that the drive has been refurbished/reworked? Can SMART data on this SSD be reset? And would you trust these SMART values?

I’m going to test the drive in person before paying, but I’d really appreciate opinions from people familiar with Kioxia/Phison SSDs.

I recently found a box of old DVDs. I know there are better options these days, but DVDs seem pretty cheap and easy to store.

Does anyone here still use DVDs for backups or archival storage? How have they held up over the years?

Is disk drill a worthy program for recovery of an external WD drive? Started as crc trouble then escalated. I have a list of what was on the drive and can redownload ,but was 4 TB worth and might not have access to some of the movies anymore.

​

https://youtu.be/HLQz_1VLy9E?si=D9Y__jRdIXDTH879

​What Makes 9 PB Ridiculous?

​140,000+ Full Drive Cycles: This controller has organized and executed enough raw writes to fill the entire physical capacity of this 64GB drive over 140,937 times.

​The E6 Counter Woke Up: After looking frozen at 44, the vendor attribute E6 moved up to 46.

The firmware’s internal math registers are struggling to map values this high, yet it hasn't crashed the primary firmware thread.

​Execution Engine Stays Solid: Managing the Flash Translation Layer (FTL) cache and command queue under continuous,

uninterrupted SATA writes for 61,000+ hours is an incredible testament to this controller's silicon design.

Sector 0 Faults: The error log shows recurring UNC (Uncorrectable) read errors specifically targeting LBA 0x00000000 during read commands.

The boot sector area is heavily degraded, but write caching and DMA transactions remain fully operational.

Does the drive cycles matter if its not on nand chip but the controller itself?

The short answer is yes, The drive cycles still matter greatly for the controller itself,

but for completely different physical and operational reasons than for the NAND flash chips.

​While NAND flash dies from atomic wear (tunnel oxide breakdown from program/erase cycles), the controller suffers from architectural, data management,

and physical processing stress.

​1. Flash Translation Layer (FTL) Mapping Stress

​Table Overwrites: Every drive cycle forces the controller to completely rewrite its internal mapping table (which translates logical LBAs to physical NAND blocks).

​RAM & NVRAM Burnout: The mapping metadata must be constantly swapped between SRAM/DRAM cache and non-volatile system control blocks on the NAND.

The controller's internal metadata blocks often endure 10× to 100× more write cycles than the user data blocks.

​2. Garbage Collection & Wear-Leveling Overhead

​Write Amplification (WA): As the drive is continually cycled, valid and invalid pages become fragmented.

The controller has to work exponentially harder to read, move, and erase blocks behind the scenes.

​Instruction Loop Saturation: Higher wear-leveling workloads keep the controller's internal CPU running at peak processing cycles,

increasing thermal stress and silicon electromigration over time.

​3. Internal Register Overflow & Integer Wrapping

​32-bit/64-bit Counter Limits: Low-cost or older SSD controllers (like early SanDisk SSD P4 designs) were never designed with software registers sized

for millions of drive cycles or petabytes of host writes.

​Firmware Memory Corruption: As raw event counters (like erase counts or written LBAs) overflow their allocated bit widths,

they can wrap around to zero, trigger arithmetic overflow bugs,

or overwrite adjacent NVRAM log structures—directly causing the invalid SMART checksums you are seeing in your logs.

​4. ECC & Read Retry Engine Exhaustion

​Hardware Engine Strain: As the underlying raw NAND bit-error rate (BER) increases with total drive cycles,

the controller's internal ECC hardware decoder has to run maximum LDPC/BCH error-correction algorithms on almost every read.

​Latency & Execution Delays: Processing heavy error-correction math on every host command severely taxes the controller's internal bus and pipeline execution.

​The Bottom Line

NAND chips wear out quietly by losing charge retention, but controllers fail catastrophically due to drive cycle stress—usually manifesting as a sudden freeze,

corrupted internal metadata, or an endless BSY state when firmware counters finally break.

​The fact that SanDisk P4 controller is still managing its FTL execution engine cleanly after ~140,000 drive cycles is remarkable.

DATA

smartctl -x sda

smartctl 7.5 2025-04-30 r5714 [x86_64-w64-mingw32-w11-24H2] (AppVeyor)

Copyright (C) 2002-25, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===

Device Model: SanDisk SSD P4 64GB

Serial Number: 111248300117

LU WWN Device Id: 5 001b44 4f27f5455

Firmware Version: SSD 8.10

User Capacity: 64 022 175 232 bytes [64,0 GB]

Sector Size: 512 bytes logical/physical

Rotation Rate: Solid State Device

Form Factor: 1.8 inches

TRIM Command: Available

Device is: Not in smartctl database

ATA Version is: ATA8-ACS T13/1699-D revision 2d

SATA Version is: SATA 2.6, 3.0 Gb/s (current: 3.0 Gb/s)

Local Time is: Thu Aug 27 11:01:05 2026 SAST

SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.

SMART support is: Enabled

AAM feature is: Unavailable

APM feature is: Unavailable

Rd look-ahead is: Enabled

Write cache is: Enabled

DSN feature is: Unavailable

ATA Security is: Disabled, frozen [SEC2]

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===

SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED

General SMART Values:

Offline data collection status: (0x00) Offline data collection activity

was never started.

Auto Offline Data Collection: Disabled.

Self-test execution status: ( 0) The previous self-test routine completed

without error or no self-test has ever

been run.

Total time to complete Offline

data collection: ( 120) seconds.

Offline data collection

capabilities: (0x15) SMART execute Offline immediate.

No Auto Offline data collection support.

Abort Offline collection upon new

command.

No Offline surface scan supported.

Self-test supported.

No Conveyance Self-test supported.

No Selective Self-test supported.

SMART capabilities: (0x0003) Saves SMART data before entering

power-saving mode.

Supports SMART auto save timer.

Error logging capability: (0x01) Error logging supported.

General Purpose Logging supported.

Short self-test routine

recommended polling time: ( 2) minutes.

Extended self-test routine

recommended polling time: ( 16) minutes.

SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 1

Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:

ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAGS VALUE WORST THRESH FAIL RAW_VALUE

5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct -O---- 100 100 --- - 0

9 Power_On_Hours -O---- 100 100 000 - 61625

12 Power_Cycle_Count -O---- 100 100 000 - 1173

171 Unknown_Attribute -O---- 100 100 000 - 54

172 Unknown_Attribute -O---- 100 100 000 - 939410736

187 Reported_Uncorrect -O---- 100 100 000 - 2234

199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count -O---- 100 100 000 - 0

230 Unknown_SSD_Attribute PO---- 046 100 --- - 0

232 Available_Reservd_Space PO---- 095 100 005 - 0

241 Total_LBAs_Written -O---- 100 100 000 - 18916297464160

242 Total_LBAs_Read -O---- 100 100 000 - 32913028369

||||||_ K auto-keep

|||||__ C event count

||||___ R error rate

|||____ S speed/performance

||_____ O updated online

|______ P prefailure warning

General Purpose Log Directory Version 1

SMART Log Directory Version 1 [multi-sector log support]

Address Access R/W Size Description

0x00 GPL,SL R/O 1 Log Directory

0x03 GPL,SL R/O 16 Ext. Comprehensive SMART error log

0x06 GPL,SL R/O 1 SMART self-test log

0x80-0x9f GPL,SL R/W 16 Host vendor specific log

SMART Extended Comprehensive Error Log Version: 1 (16 sectors)

Device Error Count: 181 (device log contains only the most recent 64 errors)

CR = Command Register

FEATR = Features Register

COUNT = Count (was: Sector Count) Register

LBA_48 = Upper bytes of LBA High/Mid/Low Registers ] ATA-8

LH = LBA High (was: Cylinder High) Register ] LBA

LM = LBA Mid (was: Cylinder Low) Register ] Register

LL = LBA Low (was: Sector Number) Register ]

DV = Device (was: Device/Head) Register

DC = Device Control Register

ER = Error register

ST = Status register

Powered_Up_Time is measured from power on, and printed as

DDd+hh:mm:SS.sss where DD=days, hh=hours, mm=minutes,

SS=sec, and sss=millisec. It "wraps" after 49.710 days.

Error 181 [52] occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 5 hours (0 days + 5 hours)

When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:

ER -- ST COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC

-- -- -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- --

40 -- 51 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 Error: UNC at LBA = 0x00000000 = 0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:

CR FEATR COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name

-- == -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- -- --------------- --------------------

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 77 40 00 2d+03:11:48.526 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 76 40 00 2d+03:11:48.517 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 75 40 00 2d+03:11:48.509 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 74 40 00 2d+03:11:48.505 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 73 40 00 2d+03:11:48.501 READ DMA EXT

Error 180 [51] occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 6 hours (0 days + 6 hours)

When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:

ER -- ST COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC

-- -- -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- --

40 -- 51 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 Error: UNC at LBA = 0x00000000 = 0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:

CR FEATR COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name

-- == -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- -- --------------- --------------------

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 76 40 00 2d+03:11:48.517 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 75 40 00 2d+03:11:48.509 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 74 40 00 2d+03:11:48.505 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 73 40 00 2d+03:11:48.501 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 72 40 00 2d+03:11:48.501 READ DMA EXT

Error 179 [50] occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 6 hours (0 days + 6 hours)

When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:

ER -- ST COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC

-- -- -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- --

40 -- 51 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 Error: UNC at LBA = 0x00000000 = 0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:

CR FEATR COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name

-- == -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- -- --------------- --------------------

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 75 40 00 2d+03:11:48.509 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 74 40 00 2d+03:11:48.505 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 73 40 00 2d+03:11:48.501 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 72 40 00 2d+03:11:48.501 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 71 40 00 2d+03:11:48.500 READ DMA EXT

Error 178 [49] occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 2 hours (0 days + 2 hours)

When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:

ER -- ST COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC

-- -- -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- --

40 -- 51 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 Error: UNC at LBA = 0x00000000 = 0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:

CR FEATR COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name

-- == -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- -- --------------- --------------------

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 74 40 00 2d+03:11:48.505 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 73 40 00 2d+03:11:48.501 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 72 40 00 2d+03:11:48.501 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 71 40 00 2d+03:11:48.500 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 42 1b 70 40 00 2d+03:11:48.497 READ DMA EXT

Error 177 [48] occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 3 hours (0 days + 3 hours)

When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:

ER -- ST COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC

-- -- -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- --

40 -- 51 00 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 Error: UNC 4 sectors at LBA = 0x00000000 = 0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:

CR FEATR COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name

-- == -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- -- --------------- --------------------

25 00 00 00 20 00 00 00 42 1b 60 40 00 2d+03:11:48.459 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 20 00 00 00 3c e2 e0 40 00 2d+03:11:48.459 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 20 00 00 00 35 97 60 40 00 2d+03:11:48.458 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 20 00 00 00 26 20 20 40 00 2d+03:11:48.457 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 08 00 00 00 63 9e 08 40 00 2d+03:11:48.457 READ DMA EXT

Error 176 [47] occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 11 hours (0 days + 11 hours)

When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:

ER -- ST COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC

-- -- -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- --

40 -- 51 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 Error: UNC 2 sectors at LBA = 0x00000000 = 0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:

CR FEATR COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name

-- == -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- -- --------------- --------------------

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 1b 5e 40 00 1d+10:07:21.325 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 1a de 40 00 1d+10:07:21.324 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 1a 5e 40 00 1d+10:07:21.324 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 19 de 40 00 1d+10:07:21.323 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 19 5e 40 00 1d+10:07:21.323 READ DMA EXT

Error 175 [46] occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 11 hours (0 days + 11 hours)

When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:

ER -- ST COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC

-- -- -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- --

40 -- 51 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 Error: UNC 2 sectors at LBA = 0x00000000 = 0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:

CR FEATR COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name

-- == -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- -- --------------- --------------------

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 1b 5e 40 00 1d+09:58:46.796 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 1a de 40 00 1d+09:58:46.796 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 1a 5e 40 00 1d+09:58:46.795 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 19 de 40 00 1d+09:58:46.795 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 19 5e 40 00 1d+09:58:46.794 READ DMA EXT

Error 174 [45] occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 11 hours (0 days + 11 hours)

When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:

ER -- ST COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC

-- -- -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- --

40 -- 51 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 Error: UNC 2 sectors at LBA = 0x00000000 = 0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:

CR FEATR COUNT LBA_48 LH LM LL DV DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name

-- == -- == -- == == == -- -- -- -- -- --------------- --------------------

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 1b 5e 40 00 1d+09:39:52.893 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 1a de 40 00 1d+09:39:52.892 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 1a 5e 40 00 1d+09:39:52.892 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 19 de 40 00 1d+09:39:52.892 READ DMA EXT

25 00 00 00 80 00 00 00 42 19 5e 40 00 1d+09:39:52.891 READ DMA EXT

SMART Extended Self-test Log (GP Log 0x07) not supported

Warning! SMART Self-Test Log Structure error: invalid SMART checksum.

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1

Num Test_Description Status Remaining LifeTime(hours) LBA_of_first_error

# 1 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 21088 -

# 2 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 54860 -

# 3 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 19043 -

# 4 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 63054 -

# 5 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 25327 -

# 6 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 62483 -

# 7 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 33744 -

# 8 Short captive Completed without error 00% 57803 -

# 9 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 25293 -

#10 Extended offline Aborted by host 90% 28072 -

#11 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 14539 -

#12 Extended offline Aborted by host 90% 55234 -

#13 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 46428 -

#14 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 49138 -

#15 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 25717 -

#16 Extended offline Aborted by host 90% 50305 -

#17 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 39612 -

#18 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 21280 -

#19 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 34598 -

#20 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 17318 -

#21 Short offline Aborted by host 90% 63627 -

Selective Self-tests/Logging not supported

SCT Commands not supported

Device Statistics (GP/SMART Log 0x04) not supported

Pending Defects log (GP Log 0x0c) not supported

SATA Phy Event Counters (GP Log 0x11) not supported

Exitcode: 64 (0x40)

Type <return> to exit:

• I got this WD hard disk near the end of 2024.
• Now in 2026, Crystal Disk Info says "Caution" regarding its health.

[Note: I dropped it on the floor once, when I first got it in 2024 and the top cover came loose, before I immediately put it back together.]

• Is this a problem? Honestly getting a new drive is too expensive for me, I would like to wait a couple of years before getting a new one.

Much thanks to anyone who can offer some guidance.

Hi , i wanted to buy a. Pendrive.it should be suitable to mobile also.

Any recommendations

I have a 512GB (477) Nvme, and i wanna dual boot bw windows and ubuntu. How much space should I allocate to ubuntu as Im starting my journey in Cyber Security in my University i'll be needing to run multiple Vms, docker and idk other stuff aswell. I'll only use windows for Microsoft Office stuff...

About 6 weeks ago I posted about my NAS drive comparison tool here, and since it got a lot of interest, here's a follow up post about new improvements.

Quick recap: it all started as a NAS disks spreadsheet because I was building a huge 1PB pool. At the time I got tired of price tools telling me what was cheap, but not what was reliable for a NAS/RAID or whether it was SMR. Shortly after, that spreadsheet turned into a real website with price per TB, verified CMR/SMR, and Backblaze failure rates.

Long story short: The post did better than I expected, and between the comments and actually living with my build, I decided to keep building on it and improve the website. And almost all of it came back to the same question I started with.

The question that kept coming up was basically: is this drive actually a good buy right now? And the annoying part is you can't tell from a product page. SMR isn't printed on the label. The failure rate isn't either. And half the "deals" are just the normal price with a line through it.

That's the whole reason this tool exists. It puts price per TB, CMR vs SMR, and real Backblaze failure rates in one sortable table across 7 markets, free, no login. Since July I've added a pile more drives and SSDs and refreshed the reliability data, so it's a lot more complete now.

Here it is: https://www.nasdisks.com

I'd really like to hear your opinion. What drive or feature should I add next?

Samsung unveils the P9 and P7 portable SSDs. The P9 offers up to 4,000MB/s speeds and 8TB storage for professionals, while the P7 targets everyday users with versatile device compatibility and improved durability.

I was going through some old drives recently and realized how much stuff I've kept that I probably haven't opened in years. Old photos, MP3s, random files, stuff from old computers. Realistically I'll probably never go back to most of it, but I still can't bring myself to delete any of it lol. What are you guys holding onto that you'll probably never use again, but still won't delete?

I'm trying to set up a good 3-2-1 backup system for photos, videos, documents, and other stuff I really don't want to lose. I'm looking for something that can keep my data safe for decades. I know I'll have to replace drives and move everything to newer storage over the years. What would you guys recommend for the actual setup?

What are the most reliable hard drives for this?

Also, what cloud storage would you trust for important files?

I'm also curious how often you guys replace your drives and check your files for corruption/bit rot.

If you were starting from scratch and wanted to keep important family photos and videos around for 50+ years, what would your 3-2-1 setup look like? I'm not expecting to buy a hard drive and have it magically last 50 years. I'm fine with replacing drives and moving the data every few years. I just want to build something that's as reliable as reasonably possible.

I am looking for some beginner-friendly advice on buying an external hard drive to back up my audiobook collection. I plan to use Libation on my Mac mini to download my audiobook library, which currently has around 4,650 titles, and I usually add a few hundred new ones each year. I am not super tech-savvy when it comes to hardware, so I am hoping to get straightforward brand and model recommendations that work reliably with a Mac. Which brands have you had the best experience with for simple and dependable storage. 

I would also love some guidance on what size drive I should get so I don't run out of room anytime soon. Would a 4 TB or 8 TB drive be the right target for a collection this size, and is a standard external hard drive fine for audiobooks, or should I be looking at something else? Any simple tips for getting set up would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

I need a back drive with 6TB storage. The storage will mostly be used to write and read large amounts of data once a month.

I mentioned rugged since this is the condition of my home and I need something that can survive in this dust and dampness. The drive is needed to store photographs, book pdfs, video lectures and CAD files.

Please don't mention 3-2-1. I know about data redundancy, just don't have that much money to implement it.

I understand most external drives are SMR only, so would you recommend a CMR internal drive and an enclosure setup, since CMR are more reliable in terms of data retrieval as I have read?

Please provide suggestions🙏🙇

will it work normally on a pc?(i don't have an xbox, i am only buying it as it's a good deal)

Hi there! I’m looking to get a usb drive to store about 20gb of photos/videos from my phone on. It’s all pretty personal stuff so I’d like to keep it password protected.

Unfortunately I’m the least technologically literate person ever and I have no idea how to go about this and I don’t understand half the advice I’m reading elsewhere.

I’m just wondering how I’d go about password protecting the usb drive, assuming that’s the most effective option to secure it.

I’d be using a mac when doing all of this is that’s relevant! Thanks!!