Western Digital WD15EVDS 1.5 TB AV Hard Drive

Got this drive running in a TiVo HD box. So far, in comparision to a Seagate SV35 1TB AV drive I had in the TiVo previously, I'm finding that this drive runs noticeably cooler and quieter than the Seagate.

This drive is part of Western Digital's Green series, which means it features low power consumption and as such is supposed to use less energy and generate less heat. Additionally, this drive is manufactured specifically for prolonged-heat, stressful, 24/7 operation such as in a DVR or video surveillance.

Installing this 1.5TB drive in a TiVo HD (Series 3) unit gives 198 hours of HD recording, or 1733 hours of SD recording. The non-XL series HD units cannot use all 1.5TB of space without hardware modification usage is closer to 1.26TB. However, the TiVo HD XL can utilize all 1.5TB of disk space.

Hopefully this drive will last longer than the SV35, which died after less than 8 months despite having a MTBF of 1,000,000 hours.

Can't complain about a SATA drive that works from the day you plug it in. HD reviews don't bother me much anymore. I've looked at so many reviews from Seagate and WD that it came to the point that it's a hit and miss ordeal. I have the same luck from both vendors and so far, I've been fortunate since I'be been buying 1+ Terabyte drives from both vendors. I bought two 1.5 T drives from Seagate with 3-star ratings, one of those large size Terabyte WD passport drives and three of these drives, two for my security camera software and one for the system drive. So far, so good. I'll post an update from time to time on these drives. If you look at 1.5 Terabyte Seagate reviews, you'll see I've updated mine a few times. Those drives are on a softwre RAID controller under linux and are constantly being monitored in a Cron job for failure and sends me an email status every day just to let me know that the monitor is checking the drives for me. Of course this doesn't mean much because all five drives are running 24 hours a day. I don't allow them to spin down. I already use power saving features elsewhere to reduce power consumption and my priority is drive reliance, not power savings. Drives usually fail at spin-up. So if my drives are about to fail, I'll likely discover it upon a reboot. Good thing I have a primary and secondary NAS to protect my data from a quality assurance issue.

UPDATE May 26, 2011

Both WD 1.5 Terabyte drives have been on 24/7 since January, recording security camera streams. They are inside a tower case. There's no dedicated fan to cool them.

Buy Western Digital WD15EVDS 1.5 TB AV Hard Drive Now

I bought this drive to install in my security DVR. The installation and formatting was very easy. So far, it has operated flawlessly. Great product; very good and fast service.

Read Best Reviews of Western Digital WD15EVDS 1.5 TB AV Hard Drive Here