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Western Digital Black Ops
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2020-07-11, 13:26

Not industrial espionage, but a hard drive.

https://shop.westerndigital.com/prod...ve-usb-3-2-hdd



Love the look, hate the frikkin USB micro B port.


They say something about them being "good for gaming", but is there any reason why this wouldn't work as a normal external drive?



...

Last edited by drewprops : 2020-07-11 at 16:32.
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chucker
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: near Bremen, Germany
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2020-07-11, 16:56

I don't see why.
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PB PM
Sneaky Punk
 
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Vancouver, BC
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2020-07-11, 18:47

Normal marketing nonsense, nothing more, nothing less.
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2020-07-12, 09:52

Come Now!!!

This hard drive is tougher than most, because of its sexy design and comely graphics.

My friends are going to be floored when I pull this bad boy out and begin futzing with the Micro USB port.

Haters.

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Brad
Selfish Heathen
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
 
2020-07-12, 15:22

According to this table, WD Black in the 2.5" form factor uses SMR, though it only mentions 1TB, not this 2/4/5TB version. SMR means it's probably only going to be good for general-purpose storage and even then only if you don't expect to actually fill the disk. SMR drives get dramatically slower as available space shrinks. Modern games benefit greatly from residing on fast drives like SSDs because there are so many assets that have to be loaded and reloaded during gameplay.

FWIW, Western Digital has been the target of great ire from storage enthusiasts and enterprise customers for sneaking poor-performing SMR drives into their supposedly-professional "Red" line of NAS drives. They're also being sued for this deception, though that class action lawsuit is still in progress, AFAICT. Some people are effectively boycotting WD drives and advocating the competing Seagate drives.

I couldn't find any claims about CMR vs SMR on the linked product page for this particular Black drive. Some larger capacity drives are still using CMR. Maybe it's okay, but I would be suspicious that they're hiding SMR in there unless I did some more research.

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Brad
Selfish Heathen
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
 
2020-07-12, 15:28

But it does look kinda cool.

And, yes, there's nothing truly special about "gaming" drives. It's all marketing.

Consoles especially tend to have limited internal storage, and people need more drives for more games. Faster drives are better for games. That's about as far as it goes.

The quality of this board depends on the quality of the posts. The only way to guarantee thoughtful, informative discussion is to write thoughtful, informative posts. AppleNova is not a real-time chat forum. You have time to compose messages and edit them before and after posting.
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chucker
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: near Bremen, Germany
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2020-07-12, 15:49

Quote:
Originally Posted by Brad View Post
FWIW, Western Digital has been the target of great ire from storage enthusiasts and enterprise customers for sneaking poor-performing SMR drives into their supposedly-professional "Red" line of NAS drives.
Yeah. What a dumb move. "Let's make a few extra bucks and perpetually tarnish our reputation among those most likely to compare offerings by reputation."
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2020-07-12, 21:47

Daaaaaaaammmmzzz.

Thanks for letting me know.

As cool as this looks, I'm only buying drives with the USB C 3.X "never wrong" ports. So far that means a couple of LaCie drives.

I lived for several years using some Seagate drives with that damned weird Micro B connector.

My knowledge of drives is antiquated.

Was trying to understand the needs of a gaming drive; figured everyone wants fast, big, and cheap.



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kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2020-07-13, 10:49

If you want fast and rugged, go down this road.

Although "cheap" is not their forte. Also, they're not "sexy". Or small. Or anything else you're looking for.

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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2020-07-14, 06:55

I love (and own) stuff by OWC!

It's just (currently) impossible for most mortals to afford 5TB of SSD for mobile knockabout use.

One day we'll look back at this and laugh.

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Bryson
Rocket Surgeon
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: The Canadark
 
2020-07-14, 09:03

Captive cable? Good heavens.


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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2020-07-14, 10:40

I had to look that up!

The WDBO drive uses the weird USB Micro B connector, which is still USB isn't it?


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kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2020-07-14, 10:48

Yes. It's still USB.

It's the hokey connector that sounds like all the connectors are breaking every time you plug it in.
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