Properly Check New Drives?

[Tim_R]

Hello everyone,

 

I am a little new to nas's but am learning a lot and planning my first project/build. I know its a good idea to check the new hard drives before using them, but how do i go about properly doing it? I plan on ordering a couple of WD Red's (undecided on size, either 3TB, 4TB, or 6TB) and do not want to have bad drives before i start dumping data.

 

Is there a specific tool either in Unraid, or outside of unraid to run the initial test(s)? I see there is a WD data lifeguard diagnostic tool, but is this a good tool, or would a 3rd party tool be better? I also heard somewhere you should write all zero's to the drive, then check it? im not sure how true that really is, or how to go about doing so if i should. And what specifically would i be looking out for to determine if it is a bad drive and should be exchanged?

 

And how paranoid should i be about ordering 4-6 drives from the same site at the same time? i keep hearing about getting multiple drives from a bad batch. should i order from 2 different places? or is this something i really shouldnt be concerned about?

 

I would really appreciate any help.

 

Thank you.

Edited July 20, 2017 by Tim_R

[c3]

This is the topic of "preclear". You may want to do additional testing, but it is a good start. Most run just preclear some number of passes between 1 and 3. It does take some time, but worth it, to avoid the things you mentioned.

 

I would not be concerned about ordering multiple drives at once. A more significant concern is when the drives are not properly packages for shipment. Buying from multiple sources will not avoid the historical "bad batch". They are more like bad model/size.

[Tim_R]

Thank you for the quick response.

 

Now that you say "Preclear" i am finding a lot more useful information.

[tdallen]

WD's Data Lifeguard is a good tool to stress test the drive, as is unRAID Pre-Clear.  I tend to use Data Lifeguard as it's more convenient for me to stress test a new drive outside my unRAID box.  Then when I add the disk to my server I'll either do a single pre-clear, or let unRAID handle it as it adds it to the array.

[Tim_R]

that is actually a good idea too, to do both. probably gonna take forever doing both from what i am hearing. but seems like a good plan right now.

[tdallen]

My server runs headless, in a closet in the basement and doesn't have externally accessible drive cages.  It would be inconvenient to install a drive in there and have it die immediately.  My W10 desktop is much more accessible and has internal hot swap bays, so initial testing just works better with Data Lifeguard - and yes, the long test on Data Lifeguard still takes a *long* time.  The best approach is probably a few pre-clear passes on a server with external hot swap bays but I'm pretty happy with my workaround approach, it does a good job identifying unhealthy new drives.