Question about WD Red 3TB that's about 2-3 years old.

Edit : I bought it in 12/18/2013, older than I thought.

So I bought this HDD 2-3 years ago and didn't really used it until 1-2 months ago. I've noticed its pretty noisey when Idle, but I remember it was always like that. I remember looking into it soon as I bought it, but now the info is pretty buried... basically they have some "intelipark" feature on these drives which kinda kills them while they're idling. There are fixes for it but I keep checking for said fixes and I can't find it. I even managed to find a link to something that updates the firmware of the drive.

I found this - WD Red SMART load/Unload utility 3.5" Drive
http://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?DL

But it is so vague on WHICH drives it supports and confirms that it should not be used on drives other than those that are supported... Ok... but it doesn't give info so I can match it with mine lol. I assume this process would have been easier if I had done it when all of this was very new, but too late for that.

Anyone have any info/suggestions?

 

It's not all that vague actually. Currently there are three different "Red" drives WD sells: the Red Pro 3.5" (which it sounds like you don't own), the Red 3.5" (what you have), and the Red 2.5" (which tops out at 1TB).

That said, I don't know anything about this firmware, so I can't help you there. I can only say that my 3TB Reds don't make any unusual noises while they're operating.

 

I've been using WD Red for a few years now as my backup drives for my server and slowly changing my server drives to WD Red as well. Haven't noticed any weird noises. Then again, it's well away from where I normally operate. But so far have been running cool and error free (knock on wood).

 

Funnily I had found the file that was needed same day/day after, but the problem is it doesn't work on Windows 10. Awesome. Well the sounds the drive makes when idle, it sounds like I am writing a ton of data to it. But if I am using my PC, it is silent. Like I said my WD Red is from December 2013, its old. Not old by "power on hours" though, that is very low as I loaded it up and stopped using it. I would assume on future WD Reds they wouldn't include the not-so-intelligent "intelipark" that a lot of people gave them **** about. I'm trying to get a hold of someone on their Facebook page of Twitter to figure out how to do this on Windows 10