WD Easystore 8TB Compendium

(Prices up to date as of: Dec. 2, 2017 @11am Eastern)

The Western Digital (WD) Easystore 8TB is an external hard drive sold exclusively by Best Buy. It's sought after by many r/datahoarder folks because it often (but not always) contains a WD Red 8TB drive which can be "shucked" and used in a home server among other similarly shucked Easystore drives. As it regularly goes on sale it is a very cheap method to pickup large amounts of reliable storage. This post is to serve as a collection of relevant information about the drives.

##Links and current price

Model	Link	Regular Price	Current Price	Lowest Price To Date
NESN	https://www.bestbuy.com/site/wd-easystore-8tb-external-usb-3-0-hard-drive-black/5792401.p?skuId=5792401	$299.99	$199.99 (11/28/2017)	$149.99 (Cyber Monday 2017)
NEBB	https://www.bestbuy.com/site/wd-easystore-8tb-external-usb-3-0-hard-drive-black/6110900.p?skuId=6110900	$299.99	$299.99	$129.99 (Black Friday 2017)

##What Internal drive is likely in any given Easystore

Based on the information I have right now, the following chart is what you're likely to get from a particular Easyshare model, and in the case of the NESN some clarification on them as it seems to change depending on when it was boxed and where.

Easyshare Model Number Ends In...	Potential Drive Models
-NESN	WD80EFZX (older Made in China), WD80EFAX (older Made in Thailand), WD80EMAZ (Seemingly newer packaged Easyshares)
-NEBB	WD80EMAZ

u/dokukinoko has a great run down here on how to potentially identify the actual model of the drive inside the Easystore shell based on information available on the box.

##Finding out which drive you have before shucking it

Even with u/dokukinoko's run down, the only way to be certain of what drive is inside an Easystore is plugging it in to a computer and running a check. There are different ways to find the model of internal drive that is in an Easystore shell for each operating system, but I'm going to list just one each based on what the community thinks is best.

Windows: you can use CrystalDiskInfo.

Linux: you can use this command:

ls -lah /dev/disk/by-id/

OS X: You can use smartmontools (smartctl) after installing the drivers available here (try 0.8 or 0.11 trailer for your OS version). (Thanks to u/eyeyen for more detailed instructions)

# take note of the diskNumber here
$ diskutil list
$ smartctl -i /dev/diskN | head -n 7
smartctl 6.6 2017-11-05 r4594 [Darwin 16.7.0 x86_64] (local_build)
Copyright (C) 2002-17, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, 
www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Model Family:     Western Digital Red
Device Model:     WDC WD80EFAX-68LHPN0

(Writer's note: Can anyone confirm if the OS X command also works on other BSD variants? Or provide an alternative?)

##The different internal drive models

When buying these drives for shucking you're likely hunting a specific type of internal drive. Here's what we know:

Drive Model | What that means | Issues? ---|---|----|---- WD80EFAX | 8TB WD Red, 256MB cache | Preferred by many due to higher cache WD80EFZX | 8TB WD Red, 128MB cache | Works for most WD80EMAZ | 8TB WD "White label", 256MB cache | Seems identical to WD80EFAX, but potential problems? See below.

##Which model do I want?

The model that most people want is the WD80EFAX. This is a "true" Red with 256MB cache. You can't really know what's in an Easystore until you at least have it hand, but you can take some guesses.

1. Older NESN's are almost always Red's. As stocks have been changing in recent months more and more NESN's seem to be including the WD80EMAZ White label drives, seemingly due to a shift in manufacturing. Some users are still getting all Reds, some are getting mostly white label, so it's still a toss up.
2. On the older NESN boxes if says it's "Made in Thailand" it's probably a 256MB cache version, where as "Made in China" is probably a 128MB cache version. In store you can check the Made In info, but if ordering online it's luck of the draw.
3. The NEEB will almost always be a WD80EMAZ.

Getting a 128MB cache version isn't bad, just not great. For most people it probably won't make a difference you can truly see day to day. If your purposes would benefit from more drive cache, you can return and reorder to your hearts content, but if you just need large amounts of storage don't worry about it. Do yourself and Best Buy a favor and go to the store if you're going to be picky about it.

##The -NEBB/WD80EMAZ "White Label" discussion

There is what I'd call "some debate" over these drives. The general consensus is they're fine for most users as long as you're aware of what you're getting. The issues of discussion include:

• Some people think these are relabeled HGST drives, refurb'ed Reds, Red's that didn't quite meet QA requirements, Red's with a missing feature or two... all sorts of theories. My theory: They're all right. Supply for hard drives is not consistent. The white labels are probably drives sourced from a number of channels, tested to meet a minimum standard, and then labeled as WD80EMAZ where it fits. There's also a good chance that White Labels are Reds, just labelled differently for some models to mess with people shucking the drives and then reselling them. The real point of discussion about these drives is the 3.3v pin.
• The 3.3v pin "issue." These drives, when shucked, have been known to have problems with some SATA backplanes. They're fine with some, bad with others. A very YMMV point. To quote u/deebeeoh:

Also of note the 3.3v issue is not so much an issue as a feature in the sata 3.3 spec. Your psu/backplane may or may not be sata 3.3 compliant however.

3.3v chart:

Device	Works or Not?
Dell R510	Works (/u/chipware confirmed)
Dell R710	Works (/u/bosshauss confirmed)
Drobo (All?)	Works (/u/wehooper4 confirmed)
Lenovo SA120	Works (/u/nomar383 confirmed)
Lian Li BP2/BP3SATA (*)	Works (/u/ollidab confirmed)
Norco 4220	Works (/u/312c confirmed)
Supermicro 846 (BPN-SAS2-846EL1)	Works (/u/chedorlaomer confirmed)
Synology DS1817+	Works (/u/vadocity confirmed)
Synology DS218j	Works (/u/nycalex confirmed)
QNAP TS-453A	Works (/u/behalter confirmed)

(*) : Included in cases such as the Lian-Li PC‑Q25B, these items are optional add-in devices for many Lian-Li cases that "convert" a drive cage into a hotswap bay.

(Writer's note: Please feel free to comment with known to be working or not working devices for the 3.3v talking point!)

Why is this a thing? Thanks to u/breakr5 for calling out u/MrKazador 's previous comments from here and breaking it down more clearly.

The issue as the HGST document explains is that P3 (Pin 3) functionality was re-defined for SAS spec, and then later it was pushed into SATA Rev 3.3.

Q: When was this feature introduced on SAS HDDs?

A: With the introduction of 12G SAS, a new SAS standard, SAS-3, redefined P3 (Pin 3) from “3.3V Power” to “POWER DISABLE”, i.e. “Reset”. At that time, the STA (SCSI Trade Association) researched the marketplace and determined that there were no conflicting legacy concerns.

It was known that there could be legacy compatibility issues. It seems this re-defined P3 spec was pushed on manufacturers by datacenter owners that wanted to save money from having a tech forced to manually pull and reseat a specific drive (reset) under limited cases of drive lockups.

##"Modifying" the drive to work with PSU's/backplanes that don't support SATA 3.3

u/OptionalCookie made a great post explaining visually what to do to work around this issue without performing any destructive acts. Direct Imgur link. If your drive works in the Easystore shell but doesn't work in your hot swap bays or with your PSU's power adapters this is a great solution.

As u/service_unavailable and u/deelowe both point out on that post comment thread, using Kapton tape would be a better solution if you'll be purchasing tape to do this.

##Shucking?

Advisory warning: Shucking the drives puts your warranty in risk. If you're really careful while taking it apart then putting it back together it's possible no one will be the wiser, but if you're going to do this it's best to assume that the steep discount you got was the cost of loosing the warranty. Do note, I say puts the warranty in risk. Thanks to u/HAARP_Made_Me_Do_It for this info:

fyi shucking does not breach the warranty. the burden of proof is on the Manufacturer to prove any modification to a product caused it to fail. Manufactures take advantage of lazy and uninformed consumers with "warranty void if seal is broken" stickers. they do not holdup in court. Take WD to small claims if they deny you warranty claim based on the fact you shucked it, you will win. See the Magnuson–Moss Warranty Act for more details.

Although he's right, you very much can take them to small claims court, I think it's safe to say many of us wouldn't do that. It's totally up to you.

I'm not going to redo the work as /u/tokyotaco did us all the courtesy of making this visual guide to shucking the Easystores.

##Not Shucking?

Personally I haven't shucked my Easystores. I'm using them as backups for my home server. As such I really don't care what the drives are, it's just cheap drives to copy data to and throw in the closet. If you are also going to use them as I do, the internal drive shouldn't matter much. If you're going to leave them shelled but active 24/7 (a Raspi NAS?) the better drives will help but only to a small degree.

##Changelog / Areas to add to this compendium?

• 11/30/2017 9am Eastern: Added another NAS to the 3.3v working chart
• 11/29/2017 9:30am Eastern: Updated OS X info for getting drive information.
• 11/28/2017 12pm Eastern: Changed the 3.3v pin "working or not" chart. It's gonna grow like crazy but it should be easier to read. Also added OS X command to get drive model and changed around the formatting of that section a bit.
• 11/28/2017 10am Eastern: A few more minor corrections, cleaned up a few sections, and updated current price.
• 11/27/2017 10pm Eastern: Added some more info about the 3.3v pin topic (specifically why it's a thing) and a couple devices to the does work list.
• 11/27/2017 5pm Eastern: Clarified a few more things, added the beginnings of a 3.3v working or not chart, added some info for finding out what internal drive is before shucking
• 11/27/2017 2:30pm Eastern: Added "What's in the shell?" section/chart, clarification on warranty, reorganized order a bit so it's hopefully more linear for new folk, cleared up the white label points (thanks for the info u/knightcrusader).

If you have any suggestions for items to add, points to be made, or corrections to make please comment below! I'll try to keep this updated and accurate as best that I can!