Articles about Western Digital

Western Digital is a name often associated with quality hard disk drives, but the company's solid state drives are quite excellent too. They are reliable and fast, making them a good choice amongst other trusted brands of SSD, such as Samsung and Intel.

Today, Western Digital unveils its latest solid state drive. Called "WD Blue SN550," it is an M.2 2280 NVMe SSD with read speeds up to 2,400 MB/s. As a sign of the company's confidence in the drive's reliability, it comes with a respectable 5-year warranty.

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For some people, it makes sense to store your data on someone else's drives -- that's what cloud storage is, after all. For others, they want full control of their data by storing it locally on their own storage devices. Keep in mind, just because you are storing data yourself, doesn't mean it can't be accessed remotely or by other machines on the same network. By using network-attached storage (NAS) you can easily access your data on your own terms.

Today, Western Digital unveils new WD Red NAS storage drives, and it is very exciting. You see, the WD Red NAS line no longer just includes mechanical hard drives -- there are solid state drives now too! Called WD "Red SA500," there are two types of the NAS SATA SSD available -- 2.5-inch and M.2.

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Last month, I reviewed the HUAWEI MateBook 13 -- an excellent Windows 10 laptop. I was impressed with many aspects of that computer, including the very speedy Western Digital NVMe solid state drive. I’m usually a Samsung man when it comes to SSDs -- after all, its drives are always superb. But thanks to the respectable performance of the drive found in the aforementioned laptop, I am now intrigued by Western Digital SSDs too.

Back in January, Western Digital announced the WD Black SN750 -- an NVMe SSD for enthusiasts. Today, the company releases a budget-focused NVMe SSD aimed at upgraders that don’t necessarily need the absolute fastest storage drive. Called "WD Blue SN500", the 2-lane drive is significantly faster than an SATA SSD, but slower than performance-focused NVMe drives. Most importantly, the M.2 2280 PCIe Gen3 x2 drive is very affordable, regardless of which capacity you choose.

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Earlier today, we reported on some very exciting news regarding microSD -- a new faster "Express" version of the card type is on the way. microSD Express will usher in a new era of ultra-fast diminutive storage cards.

For now, however, SanDisk is laying claim to having the world's fastest (non-Express) 1TB microSD. In addition to this new 1TB variant of the Extreme UHS-I microSDXC card, the company is also announcing a 512GB model at a significantly lower price. Speed between the two new capacities will be identical. The previous top capacity for this line of high-performance cards was 400GB.

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NVMe solid state drives are quite incredible. They offer insane speeds that put SATA SSDs to shame. With that said, many -- if not most -- consumers do not really need such performance. In other words, if your PC already has a 2.5-inch SATA SSD, it probably isn't worth upgrading. Simply put, your real life performance gains will be negligible. With that said, if you need a new SSD, and your computer is compatible, it would be foolish not to go NVMe -- prices have gotten quite affordable.

Today, Western Digital unveils its latest NVMe drive, and it looks wonderful. The "WD Black SN750," as it is called, features several capacities and price points, making it achievable for most consumers -- even those on a budget. Best of all, you can opt for a variant with a heatsink, which will cool it down, and in theory, prevent throttled performance. Why wouldn't you want the heatsink? Depending on your computer -- laptops in particular, although some desktops too -- it may not physically fit.

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For home computer users, it is crazy not to use a solid state drive -- especially when coupled with a good cloud backup plan. With that said, data centers are an entirely different beast. When you are looking to maximize storage on a budget -- and with physical constraints -- a hard disk drive still reigns supreme. That's why its so important for companies to continue to innovate when it comes to mechanical hard drives.

For example, last year, Western Digital released an impressive 14TB SMR HDD for data centers, and today, the company kicks it up a notch. The 3.5-inch Ultrastar DC HC620, as it is called, gets a slight 1TB bump. In other words, this new data center drive features a very spacious 15TB of storage. And yes, as the SMR in the name implies, the drive uses the innovative shingled magnetic recording.

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The easiest and best way to speed up a slow computer is to replace its HDD with an SSD. This will deliver a huge performance boost, and can make an old PC feel brand new. If you’re after the best speeds and your computer has a compatible PCIe-based M.2 slot, then a NVMe solid state drive is what you should you be looking for as they are significantly faster than SATA models.

That said, SATA remains the dominant interface for connecting a SSD to your PC, and for most consumers the performance improvement it provides will be perfectly acceptable -- certainly much quicker than you’d get from a mechanical drive. We took SanDisk’s Ultra 3D SATA SSD for a spin to see how it fared.

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Solid state drives are in the future of computing, while hard disk drives are the past. With that said, despite being destined for the history books, HDDs are still a big part of the present. In other words, despite being older technology, mechanical hard drives definitely have their place these days. Why? Well, they offer huge capacities at affordable prices. True, solid state drives are dropping in price, but they still aren't financially feasible for data centers, for instance. SSDs will get there eventually, but for now, hard drives live on.

Amazingly, some manufacturers are still pushing the HDD envelope, delivering ever-increasing capacities. For instance, today, Western Digital -- one of the most respected storage companies -- announces a new 14TB HDD called "Ultrastar DC HC530." While that storage capacity has been done before, this is the first 14TB drive to use conventional magnetic recording (CMR).

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While prices for NVMe solid state drives are dropping, it is important to remember that all such drives are not created equally. We recently shared a new Kingston NVMe drive with you -- the A1000 -- and while I am sure it's a fine product, it only uses PCIe Gen 3.0 x2, making it slower than drives utilizing x4. Consumers will have to decide if the speed trade-off is worth any potential savings.

Today, Western Digital launches the Black 3D NVMe SSD, and it looks amazing. While it is affordable, like the aforementioned Kingston drive, it uses PCIe Gen 3.0 x4, giving it insane performance. In other words, with this drive, you don't have to sacrifice speed for savings.

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Back in the day, external storage capacity was quite minuscule compared to what is on the market now. Believe it or not, there was once a time where a 1.44 MB floppy was seen as huge. Zip disks eventually brought 100MB, while optical media delivered even more. USB flash drives and memory cards started out low on capacity, but these days, they offer hundreds of gigabytes in tiny form factors. Modern flash media doesn't just offer a ton of capacity, but super speed too.

Today, SanDisk -- a Western Digital company -- announces the 400GB Extreme UHS-I microSDXC card. What really makes this card special, however, is not its capacity, but its speed. The company claims it is the world's fastest UHS-I card. How fast is it? It offers 160MB/s read speed. Write performance is less impressive at "just" 90MB/s.

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I must be honest -- I am starting to become fatigued by all of the vulnerabilities and security failures in technology nowadays. Quite frankly, between Spectre and Meltdown, I don't even want to use my computer or devices anymore -- I feel exposed.

Today, yet another security blunder becomes publicized, and it is really bad. You see, many Western Digital My Cloud NAS drives have a hardcoded backdoor, meaning anyone can access them -- your files could be at risk. It isn't even hard to take advantage of it -- the username is "mydlinkBRionyg" and the password is "abc12345cba" (without quotes). To make matters worse, it was disclosed to Western Digital six months ago and the company apparently did nothing until November 2017. Let's be realistic -- not everyone stays on top of updates, and a backdoor never should have existed in the first place.

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Nowadays, more and more consumers are embracing the cloud for data storage and backup. This is not a mistake -- it is smart to store your files off premises. With that said, it is even smarter to also store the data locally for redundancy purposes. For instance, with local storage, if your internet connection is down, you can still access your files. With the cloud, if there is a disaster -- such as a house fire -- your data can be retrieved even if your local storage drives are destroyed. In other words, using the cloud and local storage together gives you the best of both worlds.

Picking local storage can be tricky, however. For cost purposes, a mechanical hard disk drive is still your best bet for backup. If you have a desktop, you can probably buy an internal drive, but laptop users aren't often as lucky. If you own a notebook, you most likely need to opt for an external USB drive. With USB 3.0 being fast enough for connecting a mechanical hard drive, even desktop users should probably consider it for convenience. I have been testing a very intriguing new external USB-C HDD with my MacBook Pro (running High Sierra). What makes the drive so special? It features 20TB of storage!

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Western Digital makes a damn good hard disk drive. The company's quality is legendary -- it is a popular choice for both home and the enterprise. I am currently testing one of the company's latest external offerings -- a 20TB monster aimed at home users and enthusiasts.

But what about the enterprise? Don't worry, Western Digital is focused on business users too. In fact, today, it announces an enterprise hard disk drive with a massive 14TB of storage capacity! This is the largest capacity enterprise HDD ever, and follows its 12TB offering. Called "Ultrastar HS14," the helium-filled drive uses HGST (a subsidiary of WD) branding. This drive isn't just attractive because of its large capacity, however -- it is also very power efficient.

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As many of you know, 2.5-inch notebook mechanical hard drives are largely obsolete. The larger 3.5-inch desktop variants have a lot of life left in them, however, as they offer much more capacity compared to a solid state drive. If you want the most storage from a single SATA drive, a desktop HDD is where it's at -- for now.

Today, Western Digital unveils a monstrous desktop HDD as a part of its Enterprise-class "WD Gold" line. This new 12TB SATA model (WD121KRYZ) has a large 256MB cache, 7200RPM disk speed, and an impressive five-year limited warranty. Of course, such a massive capacity comes with a rather high price tag.

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There is no shortage of diminutive bus-powered portable USB storage drives on the market nowadays -- both SSD and 2.5-inch HDD variants. Unfortunately, these drives typically offer relatively small capacities. Some professionals (and home users) need an external drive with much higher storage possibilities and being portable doesn't always matter. In these cases, a 3.5-inch-based USB drive is preferable, as plugging into a wall outlet for power is not an issue, and more importantly, it is available in higher capacities.

Today, Western Digital unveils a new external desktop drive line that should meet the needs of many. Called "My Book Duo," it actually leverages two 3.5-inch mechanical hard drives in RAID-0 to offer capacities up to 20TB. For example, the top capacity offering is comprised of dual 10TB drives. It connects with the latest-and greatest USB-C connector. Making it even more useful, it even includes an integrated two-port USB-A hub. This makes the My Book Duo storage system particularly ideal for machines without USB-A, such as the newest MacBook Pro. It will not charge a connected laptop, sadly. The external drive also features 256-bit AES hardware encryption and comes with a respectable 3-year warranty.

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