Western Digital adds 6TB My Book Studio Edition II

[Matthew DeCarlo]

Western Digital introduced a My Book Studio Edition II with 3TB drives for professionals who deal with hefty video and photo files. The WDH2Q60000 offers up to 6TB of space courtesy of two 3TB Caviar Green drives, which can be configured in your preferred RAID mode including RAID 0, 1, 5 and 10. It the same footprint as less capacious models (6.54 H x 3.87 W x 6.06 D inches). There's no sign of USB 3.0 or Thunderbolt, but it comes with USB 2.0, FireWire 800 and eSATA connectivity.

The front of My Book Studio Edition II has a slick capacity gauge and the device supports automatic backups via WD's supplied software as well as Apple's Time Machine utility. The unit's product page says it comes formatted for Macs, so Windows users will have to reformat it straight out of the box. You'll also need Windows Vista/7 or Mac OS X 10.5.2+/10.6.x to take advantage of the full 6TB. Pricing is set at $550 or about $200 more than buying two of WD's 3TB drives separately.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/42873-western-digital-adds-6tb-my-book-studio-edition-ii.html

 

[Mizzou]

A bit disappointing that it doesn't support USB 3.0 ... especially at that price point.

 

[Lokalaskurar]

Mizzou said:
A bit disappointing that it doesn't support USB 3.0 ... especially at that price point.

And especially at that storage capacity.

 

[Mizzou]

Really, would hate to do any major transfers running at USB 2.0 speeds. Seems to be taking longer than it should for USB 3.0 to become the new standard.

 

[war59312]

Indeed, no USB 3.0, and I stay away. No thanks!

 

[Cota]

And dont forget the backup and file exploring software that comes integrated to it as the virtual drive that will be installed so you can ignore it or get anoyed by it and that RAID 5 and 10 are not so useful for a 2 set HDD, that raid 1 and 0 will not ensure file security since both HDD's will suffer from any hit's x'D

 

[Nima304]

Forget USB 3.0, where's teh Light Peak (Thunderbolt)?

 

[Wendig0]

At least it has eSata... $550 is a little too steep for this setup though.

 

[Rick]

It's a select crowd who would truly be interested in buying this, so the price is probably about right. Companies tend to make healthy profit margins on early adopters and people with unusual needs/wants.

 

[bonniesmith]

Mizzou said:
A bit disappointing that it doesn't support USB 3.0 ... especially at that price point.

Exactly, why not usb 3.0 I don't get it!

 

[fpsgamerJR62]

I've read in other forums about other users experiencing higher than average failure rates with the Caviar Green series, notably with WD HDDs being used as boot drives. I wonder if anyone can verify this information or if WD has released any statements regarding this matter. I'm a bit uneasy trusting my file backups to external HDD enclosures using models that may have reliability issues.

 

[Burty117]

Nima304 said:
Forget USB 3.0, where's teh Light Peak (Thunderbolt)?

Why support that when the only people in the world who currently have machines that use that are stupid moronic Apple fanatics?

Actually they're the kind of people who would buy a box full of Green Drives that have reliabilty issues but the "price is right" for them I guess.

 

[Rick]

fpsgamerJR62 said:
I've read in other forums about other users experiencing higher than average failure rates with the Caviar Green series, notably with WD HDDs being used as boot drives. I wonder if anyone can verify this information or if WD has released any statements regarding this matter.

Hard drive manufacturers do not release their RMA/failure data. At best, all we have to work with are customer anecdotes. I find plenty of similar complaints regarding other brands/models too.

On other hand, I have 4 x 2TB WD Caviar GP drives that see 24x7 usage and not a single one has failed. I've had them for about a year and no SMART alerts or anything.. they've been solid.

Yet, on the other hand, I've sold 6 x 2TB WD GP drives and one was defective out of the box.

Anecdotally, I've had to replace a 1.5TB Seagate drive three times for a client, I recently bought a 1TB Samsung drive for a customer that was dead on arrival and an old "IBM Deathstar" I have still works fine!

What does this all mean? Absolutely nothing, in my humble opinion.

I'm sure reliability varies by a percentage point or two between models and makes; however, at the end of the day, no choice you make will provide a substantial difference in the safety of your data except redundancy for both your primary storage AND backups. You just have to assume the worst and prepare for it because those drives WILL fail given enough time.

Things that are sure in life: Death, taxes and hard drive failures.

 

[Rick]

burty117 said:
Why support that when the only people in the world who currently have machines that use that are stupid moronic Apple fanatics?.

.. For those who WILL have Thunderbolt? Being blinded by Apple hatred makes it difficult to see into the future though.

burty117 said:
Actually they're the kind of people who would buy a box full of Green Drives that have reliabilty issues but the "price is right" for them I guess

I'm not familiar with these bulk-purchasing, defective equipment buying, tight-a#$%ed Apple Fanboys you speak of. I'm not even sure what this means, honestly. Are you saying Apple Fanboys are willing to buy sub par equipment? If so, how do you fit the 'price is right' in? Why would they need a box of them? The correct stereotype would be early-adopting, over-paying, snobby Apple fanboys.

FYI, Apple Hater Syndrome is every bit as bad as Apple Fanboyism.