Western Digital releases affordable WD PiDrive 314GB HDD for Raspberry Pi

The Raspberry Pi line of computers are so much fun. By utilizing an OS-loaded memory card, it is easy to get started, making it a great project for young technology enthusiasts.

But what if you prefer a larger mechanical hard disk drive to an SD card? Sure, you can leverage a USB variant, but they typically aren't designed for the Raspberry Pi. Today, Western Digital announces a Raspberry Pi-focused HDD, called the WD PiDrive 314GB. Yes, as you can probably guess from the name, the low-power drive features 314 gigabytes.

"The WD PiDrive 314GB device is based on Western Digital's proven, high-volume 500GB platform with design changes made specifically for Raspberry Pi. Customizations made to the drive's magnetic recording and electrical system operating set-points align with Raspberry Pi's USB data and power design to reduce the electrical power load of the hard drive on Raspberry Pi, while still maintaining sufficient performance to deliver maximum USB data transfer rate. Platform design flexibility and the manufacturing tuning process enabled WDLabs to create this specialized product for Raspberry Pi efficiently without compromising quality and reliability", says Western Digital.

The company further says, "WDLabs and the author of BerryBoot, a highly regarded, well-established and free software solution that simplifies the loading of multiple software applications, have created a special version of BerryBoot for WD PiDrive device customers, which includes software applications featuring the use of mass-storage devices with Raspberry Pi.  Many operating systems and software applications can be stored on the WD PiDrive HDD, taking full advantage of the 314GB of storage. Upon system boot-up, the OS can be selected from the BerryBoot menu and launched with a couple of mouse clicks".

While this all sounds cool, it is the price that makes it particularly intriguing. Western Digital quotes a price of $45.81, but the drive is getting a Pi Day-inspired discount of 31.4 percent, which brings it to a super-low $31.42. It is not clear how long the discount will last, so you should definitely act fast. Grab one here for the Raspberry Pi Model B+, 2 Model B, and 3.

Will you buy the WD PiDrive 314GB for your Raspberry Pi? Tell me in the comments.