8TB HGST Ultrastar He10 4Kn ISE in a desktop PC?

ElevenFingers

Limp Gawd
Joined
May 30, 2008
Messages
187
Hi,

I'm looking to replace my two 11 year old (yes, they still work fine) SAMSUNG Spinpoint F1 HD753LJ 750GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s HDDs in my desktop. As you may have guessed, it's been a while since I looked into HDDs. I did update many components of my desktop a while back, including the motherboard, CPU and graphics card and added an SSD. However, now that both of my external hard-drives have filled up and I'm at risk of losing files, I think it's time to make an investment.

The current motherboard is an Asus Z170-A.

I was looking at getting two WD Blue 4TB PC Hard Drive - 5400 RPM Class, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64 MB Cache, 3.5" - WD40EZRZ for around €100 each and I got close to buying them, but then decided to look at 8GB options to see if there were any around the same price per GB.

That's when I came across what I think is an excellent deal on 8TB HGST Ultrastar He10 4Kn ISE (0F27505 / HUH721008ALN600) at €220 each. They seem to be much faster at nearly the same price per GB and I'd only need to get one for now.

Question is, are they compatible with my Asus Z170-A?

All the information I've seen online points to these being meant for enterprise, but is there anything stopping me from using them in a rinky-dink tower?

Let me know what you think!

Thanks
 
Yes I would get the HGST ultrastars over those WD Blue without a shadow of a doubt. They are superb drives, performance and quality wise. They should work fine with your mobo, as long as you get SATA versions.
 
Huh,
Get 256gb m2 ssd for the OS and add what you what HDD as second drive.

It's a real penance a hard drive installed OS in the year of 2019
:)

My fault , second glass of ouzo related :)

The Ultrastar , no doubt .
Old OSes cant boot from it but that is not a concern in your case.
 
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Thanks for the quick replies. I'll get the Ultrastar then.

Just one remaining question: If I want to set them up in RAID at some point, do I need to buy them together (since they are likely from the same production batch) or would it be okay to stagger the purchases as long as the model numbers match?

Edit: I just ordered two. Should get them in a few days.

Edit2: Just read that these drives may come with a Power Disable Pin that may cause me some issues. On Tom's Hardware there's a link on the topic. Do you think I'll have a problem? My CORSAIR CMPSU-650TX 650W PSU is ancient (10+ years) and may not have the correct SATA connector. Will I require a SATA to MOLEX adapter to run these?
 
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Just ordered my third 14tb WD/hgst.

The power thing is easy to deal with, it's the 3v power wire that is the 'problem' it tells the modern HDD to shut down so it will never power up.

Simply cut the not red or yello2w or black wire off the sata plug for that drive.

The raid doesn't care . I have read posts by people who even raid different capacity, & different manufacturers.

I still need another 14tb so I can have a raid 10 28tb with backup, right now I have two 14's that I manually mirror with free file sync.

And I am running out of space !!

@ $470 each 14tb (12.7tb actual) is not horribly expensive.
 
I just use tape over the single power pin on the sata connector of the drive and it has been working fine on all my drives (15 of them). Seemed better than cutting wires on my power cables.
 
Cutting that wire is not my first choice for a permanent solution.
Since my case is pretty small ALL of the PSU wires are waay too long and making up a new set with proper length wires. All of my sata power cables will simply not have a 3v wire at all.

So my first thought was to recommend unplugging the 3v wire from the PSU connector.

But that requires tools and skills that I know my little brother-in-law does not have, so cutting that wire will absolutely fix that problem using only a kitchen knife, which EVERYBODY has access to.
(except for the British)

With the drive proved functional any desire to cleanup that useless wire is worth learning about.
 
Yeah those drives will be fine. 4kn, too which is much better than 512e as you don't need to worry about stupid alignment issues -- it just works.
 
Hey, thanks for the updates everyone!

They just arrived today. I got them pretty cheap compared to prices I see in other places. €220 vs €340. They seem to have arrived unscathed. However, the seller was a small store on a local amazon-like store here in the Netherlands that sells a bunch of things that are unrelated to each other. They also posted that the guarantee is 3 years vs the 5 years I see everywhere else.

For these reasons I'm a bit wary. Before I unpack and fire them up, I'd like to run the S/N past some sort of registration to confirm they're new, legit etc... any idea where I can do that?

Thanks!

Edit:

I entered the S/N at HGST Warranty.

They both came back with expiration at:

2023-04

Does that mean they were previously used/registered in April of 2018?

The packaging they're in looks new, but should I be worried?

Edit 2:

Just called HGST. They confirmed the drives are legit and the warranty is 5 years from date of purchase. The default date in their system is date of production + 5 years. Excited to perform some surgery on my PSU and install these puppies!
 
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I use an 8TB He10 as a data drive with a partition for booting a backup OS.
It was £180 on Ebay, new old stock.
It boots Windows 7 fine and is a pretty fast drive.
Reads vary from 120MB/s to 240MB/s.

I solved the power up issue with a Molex to SATA power adapter initially.
Since then I bought a Seasonic Prime Ultra Titanium PSU that comes with a set of SATA power connectors with pin 3 disabled, this works great.

This drive runs a lot cooler than my other HGST 6TB and 4TB drives.
They both need fans to stay around 30C, this He10 doesnt need a fan.
 
Oh Nenu, great to hear that the price I paid wasn't 'too low to be true' and that you pais something similar. Is there a list of PSUs with the 3V disabled somewhere? Kinda feeling like it might be time to update my 11 year old one.
 
It was luck I found this PSU had some enterprise drive SATA connectors, I was buying it anyway.
Its only one branch of connectors like this, the rest are normal.
I guess searching for the term enterprise might yield a useful result, but who knows which reviews would mention it.
So it will probably be down to the published specs.

ps I just checked my drive temps and the 6TB none He10 drive is 3C higher temp with fan, the 4TB with fan is the same temp as the 8TB He10 without a fan.
 
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Had some time to unpack and install them. They look new, though they aren't entirely identical on the connection side. Weird but okay... Pulled the 3.3v cables from the sata connectors and booted the PC. Disks recognized in BIOS as 8TB HGST HUH721008ALN600... so good so far

When I go into Disk management I see this:

upload_2019-7-13_6-56-24.png


When I attempt to initialize, I get an error message: 'The system cannot find the file specified'. The drive disappears from the list when I click okay, until I reboot the PC.

upload_2019-7-13_7-0-18.png


An hour ago, I had my 750GB HDDs connected to these exact SATA cables, so I doubt it's both of them. In addition, my SDD is daisy-chained to the same sequence of connectors and is working fine.

Is there a way to troubleshoot this and maybe get them to work with third party software or was I dealt bad hardware after all?
 
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What motherboard and OS are you using?
Are you running the latest bios?

If the drive powers up and stays running there is no worry with the drives power.
Make sure you can feel the drives running by touching them.
 
I just did a system restore an hour before installing the drives (Win10 Pro - Version 1803), so it could maybe be that. I wanted a fresh start...

My motherboard is an Asus Z170-A. A quick look on PCPartPicker (not a scientific test, I know) list plenty of compatible 8TB+ HDDs, so I don't think it's that.

Downloaded and ran the HGST Drive Fitness Test for Windows. Both passed the quick test, running the extended one now.

I'll check if the OS is up to date after the tests are finished.
 
I have used 4Kn drives on much older systems than that but only in linux. Not exactly sure why the size is detected wrong.


Downloaded and ran the HGST Drive Fitness Test for Windows. Both passed the quick test, running the extended one now.

I expect them both to pass. Nothing wrong with the drives.
 
sometimes if the gui disk management won't play nice with a disk, good 'ole Diskpart in powershell/cmd will do the trick

edit:
>diskpart
>list disk
>select disk [number corresponding to the 8TB]
>clean (i don't think this is really needed for new disks but i always do it for good luck)
>convert gpt
>create partition primary
>select partition 1 (or the proper number if different)
>format fs=ntfs quick

that usually does it
 
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I just did a system restore an hour before installing the drives (Win10 Pro - Version 1803), so it could maybe be that. I wanted a fresh start...

My motherboard is an Asus Z170-A. A quick look on PCPartPicker (not a scientific test, I know) list plenty of compatible 8TB+ HDDs, so I don't think it's that.

Downloaded and ran the HGST Drive Fitness Test for Windows. Both passed the quick test, running the extended one now.

I'll check if the OS is up to date after the tests are finished.
Check the bios is up to date!
 
KATEKATEKATE:

Trying your method:

upload_2019-7-13_17-28-49.png


Disk 1 and Disk 2 show up with same wrong storage size. Disk 0 is SSD and Disk 3 is USB stick.

upload_2019-7-13_17-32-46.png


No dice.

Will try flashing BIOS with update.
 
That's a bit wild- if you have one available or can pick one up quickly, a USB SATA3 adapter might allow you to do the GPT partitioning and format the drives.

You could also boot up a live Linux ISO from USB (such as Ubuntu) and use the graphical GParted tool to do the partitioning, then reboot back into Windows.
 
yeah, weird. must be a firmware thing huh. 4TB wall exists, learn something every day....
 
A little update on the BIOS.

Current version is 0502. Newest version is 3802.

Download new drivers, formatted USB to FAT32.

From BIOS: Error when selecting file to use for update (3802): "file from selected bios is not a proper bios file"

Renamed the file on the stick using the ASUS tool, based on some posts on the same issue for another ASUS motherboard.

Tried again in BIOS. Same error.

Downloaded the AI3 tool, to see if I can use that to update the BIOS. I can't.

Decided to try an older BIOS file, version 1402. Thinking, maybe jumping 3 years worth of versions at once is the problem...

Rename file, open BIOS. This time no error, but stuck at reading file (5 min+)

Restart PC, try again. Same thing.

Currently formatting another USB stick to see if that's the issue.
 
Have you tried the EZ Update software from within Windows? Asus lists it as the first BIOS update option in the manual.

Edit: Also weird that your BIOS is 0502, Asus lists the first BIOS as 0504. Are you sure about the mobo model (Z170-A)?

Edit 2: Looks like BIOS 3503 lists "Fix compatibility issue with some large size HDD" as a fix, so BIOS update probably is the best route to be going down right now.
 
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Have you tried the EZ Update software from within Windows? Asus lists it as the first BIOS update option in the manual.

Edit: Also weird that your BIOS is 0502, Asus lists the first BIOS as 0504. Are you sure about the mobo model (Z170-A)?

Edit 2: Looks like BIOS 3503 lists "Fix compatibility issue with some large size HDD" as a fix, so BIOS update probably is the best route to be going down right now.

Windows, BIOS, original purchase and the physical mobo all say Z170-A, so I'm as sure as I can be without bringing solipsism into the equation. That being said, the '0502' threw me off a bit too, but I just confirmed it in the BIOS and Windows.

The comment about AI3 refers to the EZ Update. I don't think it's a feature available for my board, at least not when I look under Utilities for Z170-A and Win 10 64bit. Maybe I'm missing something.

upload_2019-7-13_19-8-57.png


From videos I've seen, people who are able to use this tool to flash their BIOS have the EZ Update listed here as an option...

Going to try with another stick now. Knock on wood I don't brick the damn thing.
 
Windows, BIOS, original purchase and the physical mobo all say Z170-A, so I'm as sure as I can be without bringing solipsism into the equation. That being said, the '0502' threw me off a bit too, but I just confirmed it in the BIOS and Windows.

The comment about AI3 refers to the EZ Update. I don't think it's a feature available for my board, at least not when I look under Utilities for Z170-A and Win 10 64bit. Maybe I'm missing something.

View attachment 173770

From videos I've seen, people who are able to use this tool to flash their BIOS have the EZ Update listed here as an option...

Going to try with another stick now. Knock on wood I don't brick the damn thing.

Hmm...I downloaded the Manual for your board and that's where I got the EZ Update idea from. I guess I just figured it was a component of the AI Suite as I didn't see an individual download for the EZ Update, either. Do you have an option to update the BIOS via the internet from within the BIOS? Wish I had it in front of me to tinker with as this is intriguing me for some reason. Good luck!
 
Do you have an option to update the BIOS via the internet from within the BIOS? Wish I had it in front of me to tinker with as this is intriguing me for some reason. Good luck!

I tried the internet option early on and it didn't work.

I just tried a different stick with the 3802 update through the BIOS and it recognized, 'successfully installed' and then said it would reset my pc. Screen went off and it's been humming with no output to the monitor since. Not sure how long I should wait, but I'm scared to touch it. 5 min and counting. First time I've ever updated a BIOS so I'm not sure what to do...
 
Try power cycling it -- you might need to reset the bios if it doesn't come back.

Are you sure you flashed the bios for the correct mobo model? It shouldn't let you flash the wrong one though.
 
So... I forced a shut down, started it up again and after turning itself on and off a few too many times for me to be comfortable with, I've landed at this screen.

Looks like the bios is now 3802... Going to proceed, but wasn't expecting this...

Edit: Hello, from the other side. Didn't brick it!
 

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Yeah go into the BIOS -- load defaults and then reconfigure everything. You were probably NOT using RAID mode so when you see that option in the BIOS set it to AHCI.
 
Try connecting your HDMI lead to the motherboards output if you lose display.
 
Glad to hear you got the BIOS issue figured out! Now get it configured and see if Windows plays nicer with your drives now!
 
Yeah go into the BIOS -- load defaults and then reconfigure everything. You were probably NOT using RAID mode so when you see that option in the BIOS set it to AHCI.

I didn't do much configuring... just loaded defaults and booted to windows.

Try connecting your HDMI lead to the motherboards output if you lose display.

I should have thought about this!

Glad to hear you got the BIOS issue figured out! Now get it configured and see if Windows plays nicer with your drives now!

Drumroll...

Sadly no change!

upload_2019-7-13_19-56-39.png


I'll download any utilities and other things for the mobo now that the BIOS is updated... but beyond that, anyone have any ideas?

Edit: Not sure which utility did it, but one of them did!

Finally, some progress!

upload_2019-7-13_20-11-52.png


Edit #2:

Drives are formatted. Thank you thank you thank you, to everyone that helped me through all this. Really happy with the new expansion to my tower!
 
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Good to hear! My next guess was a setting in the BIOS but it looks like you got it figured out!
 
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