WD Adds Helium-Filled 10 TB NAS HDDs to Red Lineup

Megalith

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WD Reds, which seem to be very popular choices for NAS setups, now have two 10 TB versions fans can choose from: the standard Red drive, which comes with a 5400 RPM spindle speed, and the Red Pro, which offers better performance at 7200 RPM. I like the idea of a cooler-running drive, especially when it comes to simple media storage, but the Pro version does carry a more impressive workload stat and longer warranty. No release date is listed, but Newegg suggests 5/30 for the Red ($399) and 6/17 for the Red Pro ($459).

...Western Digital is refreshing its Red and Purple lineups with more advanced drives offering 10 TB capacity and using seven 1.42 TB platters. The new WD Red and WD Red Pro with 10 TB capacity are based on revamped 5400 RPM and 7200 RPM HelioSeal platforms that can support a higher number of platters. The drives also feature increased areal density and 256 MB of cache, enabling ~17% higher sequential read/write performance compared to its predecessors, as well as a lower power consumption compared to previous-gen helium WD Red hard drives. Other than that, Western Digital does not really disclose the feature set of its platform for helium-filled HDDs for NAS applications.
 
The Red Pro's seem to have similar specs as the Hitachi NAS drives. I wonder if they are the same?
 
Damn that belongs in the hot deals section. Only 1k a TB

Seagate claims to be bringing out SAS drives for enterprise that will be up to 60TB, I can only imagine what those will cost for that sort of density.
 
Anybody who says that doesn't want storage tech to advance.
2017 - 10TB on one drive? That's a lot of data to lose.
2007 - 1TB on one drive? That's a lot of data to lose.
1997 - 10GB on one drive? That's a lot of data to lose.

and we throw away 4gb sd cards because what is the point of carrying around such a small amount of storage lol
 
The Red Pro's seem to have similar specs as the Hitachi NAS drives. I wonder if they are the same?
Of course they're Hitachi. WD doesn't do any innovation or engineering these days. They just market whatever Hitachi engineers sweat their balls off creating, then sit around the conference table deciding which color stickers to give them.
 
Why would I buy a HD filled with helium when the helium is going to leak? Sure it makes sense for the business which will replace them after 3 years anyway, but the enthusiast user is a different matter.
 
Why would I buy a HD filled with helium when the helium is going to leak? Sure it makes sense for the business which will replace them after 3 years anyway, but the enthusiast user is a different matter.
I think you confused, homey.

Why does helium leak from balloons? The balloon is flexible and porous and generally filled to the point the balloon stretches. The tiny helium molecules go right through (albeit slowly), until the pressure inside the balloon is the same as the pressure outside the balloon. The balloon WANTS to deflate to achieve equilibrium since its under pressure, and it has the means to do so from the tiny holes all through the material.

Hard drives are not balloons.

"BULLSHIT" you say, but its true. Hard drive enclosures are not filled with helium under any sort of pressure, and they aren't really porous. If the pressure outside the hard drive is the same as the pressure inside the hard drive, why would the helium molecules squeeze out? And there would be a vacuum if it did right, and vacuums suck things in. So the tiny helium atoms would have to be replaced with larger nitrogen atoms that would have to leach in to take the place of the helium.

tl;dr: Hard drive enclosures are not balloons, they aren't porous and under pressure, and so its unlikely the helium will be replaced by mostly nitrogen in the air and it really only has to last 10 years before its more than obsolete, which I'm sure went into the manufacturer's testing considerations.
 
Does the helium reduce the weight of the drive? :rolleyes:

As for backup, that's all I trust these larger drives for. I have 6TB or 8TB red drives in my backup servers to do D2D2T backups.

I have nothing more than 4TB (enterprise class of course) drives in my productions servers.
 
Damn, time to sell my Hitachi 6TB drives already? 4 x 6tb @ raid 5 = 17ish TB formatted and I haven't used half of it yet.
 
Indeed, but while helium won't leak through a metal plate, it will gradually leak through the joints.
Why will it leak? What is pushing it out, and what is going to replace the vacuum it would leave behind?
 
Helium is the second smallest atom.
Helium will not move from a vacuum to a higher pressure area, so that means that for a helium filled hard drive to leave the drive, something other than helium (like nitrogen or oxygen which is not the second smallest atom) would have to take its place. The helium is not under higher than atmospheric pressure, so there's nothing to push it out into the lower pressure outside air.
 
Why will it leak? What is pushing it out, and what is going to replace the vacuum it would leave behind?
Diffusion, which occurs even when under pressure equilibrium.

Helium is the second smallest atom.
In terms of size it's actually THE smallest, Helium's 2 proton core attracts both electrons more strongly than hydrogen and there is no electron shell screening to counteract it.
 
Diffusion, which occurs even when under pressure equilibrium.
Can diffusion occur if the hard drive is air-proof? It doesn't have to be helium-proof, just air-proof, right? If air can't get in, then helium can't get out, and I'm quite certain we have the technology to make an air-proof almost entirely metal case.
 
Can diffusion occur if the hard drive is air-proof?

To the best of my knowledge, no.

It doesn't have to be helium-proof, just air-proof, right? If air can't get in, then helium can't get out, and I'm quite certain we have the technology to make an air-proof almost entirely metal case.
That I have no idea, that probably is best answered by someone with better knowledge of gas chemistry than I am, my understanding of it is university level.

If I were to guess, if the drive was only Air proof and not helium proof, the helium could still leak because, while the pressure between inside and outside of the drive is the same, the PARTIAL pressure of the helium is MUCH higher in the drive than in the air (air has barely any helium in it), and that is pretty important for equilibrium, not only the absolute pressure have to be the same, the partials of each component must be also.

But, the other part of me thinks of Second law of thermodynamics, and gasses escaping into the surroundings and leaving vacuum behind violates that law.
 
the PARTIAL pressure of the helium is MUCH higher in the drive than in the air (air has barely any helium in it), and that is pretty important for equilibrium, not only the absolute pressure have to be the same, the partials of each component must be also.
Eh crap, forgot about partial pressures... well, it may all be moot, because it may be hermetically sealed against hydrogen as well. It won't flow through the metal walls, and if they join the two halves with an appropriate epoxy that helium can't pass through, then that also solves the problem.

The Bill of Rights was sealed in helium for fifty years without leaking, so we have the tech.
 
Helium will gladly diffuse through metal, given enough time. It will blow through a rubber seal, between two metal plates even faster. At work, we test enclosures with a He leak detector, and it takes practice to distinguish between a helium leak and helium diffusion.

I know jack shit about hard drives, but I see no reason beyond marketing, why you'd want He in a drive. If you were worried about turbulence, you'd keep it under vacuum. If you were worried about oxidation, you'd put it under a heavy inert gas.
 
Now if only they drop the price of current 4-8 TB drives
 
10TB was available for shipping at $365 from amazon last week (~release date) and now price went up.
 
I used to be with the "Too much data to lose" crowd , but after switching to 2 dedicated NAS ( one for backup) with RAID1 and cloud backup for the important stuff, i say the only thing i`m bothered with is price of HDD
 
We don't have huge amounts of Helium so I hope this gimmick ends here.
 
I'm all for helium filled hard drives. Anything that makes my tower lighter is a win. In fact, I'm concerned that if I buy too many of these HDs, I may have to tether my rig.

;)
 
Helium will gladly diffuse through metal, given enough time. It will blow through a rubber seal, between two metal plates even faster. At work, we test enclosures with a He leak detector, and it takes practice to distinguish between a helium leak and helium diffusion.

I know jack shit about hard drives, but I see no reason beyond marketing, why you'd want He in a drive. If you were worried about turbulence, you'd keep it under vacuum. If you were worried about oxidation, you'd put it under a heavy inert gas.
Given enough time doesn't matter if we are talking about 100 years. And you can't run platter drives in a vacuum because the head would crash. Its designed to float over ancushion of thin low resistance helium.
 
We don't have huge amounts of Helium so I hope this gimmick ends here.

If we just banned party balloons we be using 80% less Helium then we do now probably. But yes we need to better manage the stocks we have left.
 
Give me my nitrous oxide filled drives, and then we can talk .

"Fast & The Furious 15" coming to a WD Black near you
 
I know jack shit about hard drives, but I see no reason beyond marketing, why you'd want He in a drive. If you were worried about turbulence, you'd keep it under vacuum. If you were worried about oxidation, you'd put it under a heavy inert gas.
They are not concerned w/oxidation. What concerms them is turbulence, hence filling them with He.
You cannot use a vacuum because the head has to float over the platter on a layer of something, which a vacuum is short of.
Why will it leak? What is pushing it out, and what is going to replace the vacuum it would leave behind?
Isn't it obvious, the helium will be replaced by hydrogen that's just waiting to squeeze into that warm cuddly enclosure. ;)
 
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They are not concerned w/oxidation. What concerms them is turbulence, hence filling them with He.
You cannot use a vacuum because the head has to float over the platter on a layer of something, which a vacuum is short of.

Isn't it obvious, the helium will be replaced by hydrogen that's just waiting to squeeze into that warm cuddly enclosure. ;)

Why just make a hermetically sealed hard drive under a vacuum and let the read heads float on a bed of virtual particles!! SCience!
 
I want to know when the 10TB single drive My Books are coming out.

Indeed, so we can buy them for $180 and bust them open for just the drives.

Helium will gladly diffuse through metal, given enough time. It will blow through a rubber seal, between two metal plates even faster. At work, we test enclosures with a He leak detector, and it takes practice to distinguish between a helium leak and helium diffusion.

I know jack shit about hard drives, but I see no reason beyond marketing, why you'd want He in a drive. If you were worried about turbulence, you'd keep it under vacuum. If you were worried about oxidation, you'd put it under a heavy inert gas.

From what I have read, and looking at the He drives I have, they look to be sealed in a different way, they also state this in the information about them....Marketing? Gimmick? Possible, I don't have a bad one yet and sure as hell am not going to bust a new one open to see how it is done, can only state what I see from the outside and what they say about it. Also, sure, it might happen, BUT, considering normal HDD life or usefulness, what does it matter? 100 years, 50 years? Hell, even 10 years? Might be nothing but SSD at that point (I hope!). I have more HDDs not being used because of not being useful anymore than I have from them going bad, not even sure the He leaking out would even make them go bad either? Might be an interesting question there, if it really is a gimmick I would think it leaking out would have no effect, and so long as I can still get them cheap in the WD externals for my home server, I am happy.
 
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