Description
WD_BLACK performance storage is designed to enhance your PC experience across heavier computing tasks whether you are a digital artist, video editor, photographer, or gamer. Available with up to 256 MB of DRAM cache on higher capacity models, the WD_BLACK drive is optimized for drive performance so you can spend more time experiencing the things you love most. Enhance your PC’s performance even further when you combine a WD_BLACK drive with an SSD for a dual drive configuration, allowing you to benefit from the additional caching of your operating system onto the SSD for increased performance. All together, the WD_BLACK drive gives you the hard drive performance, capacity and an industry leading 5-year limited warranty for an inspiring three-in-one storage solution.
From the manufacturer
Performance HDDs Built for the Way You Play
WD_BLACK HDD is the perfect storage solution for your gaming system by offering up to 10TB of storage to save all your games. You can also store large multimedia files like photos, videos, music, and applications or programs because with a WD_BLACK drive, you get to get back into action faster.
Dre –
Video Review of Sound and Speed Test (170MB/s)! (Review Updated)The media could not be loaded.
I decided to replace my primary drive in my Windows 7 PC with a 500GB SSD. I had two 1TB factory hard drives currently in my machine and I was using the SSD as my C Drive. To go along with the SSD, I wanted to replace my old factory drives with a single 2TB drive so that I had equivalent space. I had recently purchased two Seagate 2TB Drives (ST2000DM001 – Fast 2 Platter Version) for external backups and media drives. They were fine, but I was looking for a more reliable drive for my internal drive that would get a lot more use. I decided on the WD Black 2TB and opted for the newest WD2003FZEX model. Upon reading several reviews, it seemed like the drive was fast and overall a good drive, but there was a question of how noisy the drive was. I decided to test out the drive in a USB 3.0 Docking Station to see how fast and how loud it was. Attached to this review is a video of my results.In the video, I am running a speed test and recording the sound with my iPhone 5 to see how loud the drive is. During the speed test, which has sequential and random tests, I move the phone closer to the drive to be able to hear the sound better. At the end of the video, I show two CrystalDiskMark speed tests. The test on the left is of the Seagate 2TB Drive and the test on the right is of the WD Black 2TB Drive.Speed Test Results – As you can see from the video, the speed of the WD Black Drive (test on the right) is pretty amazing with results of 170MB/s from a USB 3.0 Hard Drive Dock using a 500MB test size. When compared to the cheaper Seagate Drive (test on the left with a respectable 148MB/s), the speed is significantly faster, so you really get what you pay for in this case.Sound Test Results – I didn’t experience any abnormally loud sounds from the drive sitting right on my desk. You could hear it, but it was not any louder than the any other drives that I have used. When I get close to the hard drive with my phone, it gets a lot louder as you would expect, but I am essentially about 1 inch from the drive at that point. Once I put this drive into my computer case, I doubt I will hear it at all. In my opinion, while this drive isn’t silent, it is no louder than any other 7200 RPM drives that I have used, and the sound is more than acceptable for the extremely fast speeds.Overall, I am extremely impressed with this drive based on my initial tests. The speed is amazing and the sound is just fine. That, along with the 5 year warranty, makes this drive worth the extra money in my opinion for a primary drive that will get a lot of use. As with all hard drives, reliability and longevity is a concern, so I will update this review as I continue to use the drive.=========================UPDATE (12/27/2013):So after Christmas, I finally got around to doing my system reconfiguration, which consisted of replacing my two factory installed Seagate 1TB hard drives with a Crucial M500 480GB SSD and this WD Black 2TB WD2003FZEX Hard Drive. Hardware installation was a snap. After I installed the drives and installed Windows 7 via an HP Recovery Disc, I copied all of my media and data to the WD Black drive and got really fast speeds and no problems when transferring well over a terabyte of data. I have an older HP Elite PC with an SATA 3GB/s interface, so I am not getting the fastest speeds, but a speed test of the WD Black Drive shows 137MB/s while installed internally. The previous test was via USB 3.0 which apparently has a faster throughput on my machine. Just to give you an idea of the speed increase that I am experiencing, my old factory installed Seagate drives had speed test results in the 80-90MB/s range, so I’m easily getting a 50-60% speed increase. On top of that, my Crucial SSD is showing 270MB/s speeds and 30 second Windows 7 reboots. Pretty amazing. In addition, the sound of the hard drive seems completely normal to me now that it is installed in my computer case. If you are interested in injecting some new life in an older Windows 7 PC, I highly recommend this combination of SSD and WD Black drives.One tip that took me about 3 hours and a lot of pain and suffering to figure out. If you use a factory recovery disc to install your operating system onto your new hard drive and after install, you can’t get Windows Update or Microsoft Security Essentials to work, you may need to update your hard drive controller driver like I did. I searched high and low to figure out how to fix this and even did a Windows 7 reinstall. There were a ton of people having the same problem and after several frustrating hours, I figured out that I needed to update my Intel Rapid Storage Technology drivers. Five minutes later, everything is working perfectly. What a huge waste of time. So if you are having problems like I did, give that a try and hopefully save yourself some headaches.Long story short, this is a great drive so far and I am extremely happy with its performance and pairing it with an SSD. Highly Recommended!=========================UPDATE (01/26/2014):One month using this setup and I love it. The WD Black drive is a great workhorse drive that I do most of my saving to while my Windows 7 OS runs off of the Crucial SSD. Everything is really fast and reboots that used to be a chore are no hassle at all anymore. I wish I would have done this a long time ago, but now that SSD prices are dropping, I would do it again in a heartbeat. If you are looking for a nice boost of speed, I recommend getting a good SSD and pairing it with this WD Black Hard Drive. Just make sure to backup, backup, backup. While these hard drives are great so far, I trust no hard drive and have redundant backups locally on an always attached USB 3.0 Hard Drive Docking Station, plus a second copy that I update occasionally in a fire safe, and an Online Backup solution using CrashPlan.=========================UPDATE (05/08/2014):I have now been using this SSD with WD Black Drive configuration for about four months now and everything is still working perfectly. The speeds continue to be great and I have had no reliability issues with either drive. I churn Terabytes of media files through this WD Black Drive and it handles everything without a hitch. It really makes a great workhorse drive to combine with an SSD. I really love the setup and I doubt I would ever go back to a non-SSD configuration ever again, especially considering the continual price declines of SSD’s. It is still early in the life of the drives, but so far, so good. Still Highly Recommended!=========================UPDATE (11/08/2014):Just a quick update. I have been using this 2TB WD Black Drive and this setup with the SSD for 10 months now and everything is still working perfectly. No complaints and still loving it.
qdeezie –
Excellent audio hard drive after break-inI am using this hard drive to play FLAC and WAV files on a KDlinks A400 media player. I consider myself to be something of an audiophile and I love good quality audio. The hard drive that I had been using prior to purchasing this WD Black was the Seagate Barracuda ST2000DM006 (A 2TB hard drive). The Seagate was solid and reliable for roughly two years and I had no complaints.The reason I decided to upgrade to the WD Black 6TB hard was because it was specifically made for multimedia and I wanted to ensure I was futureproof with regards to available hard drive space, so I decided to splurge on the WD Black.When I initially installed the hard drive in my A400, I was disappointed, because the sound was bright and shrill sounding. However, I heard all sorts of detail in my music that I never heard before and overall, the volume was louder as opposed to how the Seagate sounded, so I was a bit conflicted. I had to change the settings on my receiver (Pioneer SC-79) to try to remove that bright and shrill sound. There were a few factory settings on the receiver (Upsampling, Hi-bit32 are what I remember) that I had to turn off or to the lowest setting because they were processing the sound and making it sound artificial along with it sounding bright and shrill.These changes made it sound better, but it was still bright and shrill. I was really disappointed in the WD Black, but I remembered that some electronics require a break in (especially for audio purposes), so instead of giving up and returning the hard drive I figured I’d keep it and hope that it would break in.After about 90 days (not 90 days straight without shutting it off, but just playing it whenever I had time to listen to music or wanted music playing in the background), I noticed a magical thing.One morning, I sat down and turned it on and I noticed for a few hours that I did not get up because my music was sounding especially good. My music was extremely clear, the music had excellent detail (far more than the Seagate) and the volume was louder than the Seagate. The sound coming out of my speakers was something I was not prepared for (in a good way).I figured maybe I was just in some sort of a good mood and wanted to listen to music. Well, I made it a point to turn on my system for the next few days as time permitted and it sounded so much better (as opposed to Day 1) to the point of not wanting to get up and move on with my day.Another observation I noticed after the break-in is that the music has a “darker background”. it’s hard to describe what I mean but think about it like this. If you know what “white noise” is in the background, this hard drive seems to deliver less of that sort of sound. You hear more of the artist and instrumentation.It even made the difference between FLAC files and WAV files less pronounced. What I mean by this is that some albums I have ripped in both FLAC and WAV. WAV is the absolute best sound (between the two), but FLAC is close. it was far more noticeable on the Seagate drive, but less noticeable on this WD Black.In closing this review, if anyone is buying this for audio purposes, I suggest exercising some patience with the break in and if you are using a receiver, turn off anything that is processing the sound (similar to what I mentioned above). The audio output from this hard drive is pure. Read the owners manual and find any audio processing settings that are turned on as a default. There may be some things you leave on and you may also have to do some EQ adjustments, bass, treble, etc. but the result is well worth it. Exercise some patience with your receiver and you will be rewarded. As for my A400, there are some settings on that for optimal audio output that I’ll be covering in my updated review on that whenever I get around to it. It is seriously a good piece for music.I did NOT expect anything special from a higher end hard drive other than available storage space, but I have been pleasantly surprised and I no longer regret my purchase as I did on Day 1. I highly recommend this hard drive for audio purposes. in fact, I cannot recommend it enough.Hope this helps with your purchase decision.
Jack*619 –
Excellent Drive!!Replaced an old Seagate that after 12 yrs completely failed. Not sure bout other reviews but mine was packed well enough and this drive is super quiet at all times and super fast.. Should of bought 2.. For the price I have to Highly Recommend!!!
Susan –
These Keep Holding UPI order these for my son. They last forever and he puts them into every computer he makes. No returns, no complaints. They LAST. Order Western Digital. You’ll be glad you did!
Deep Wang –
Works Like A Dream. A Somewhat Noisy Dream.I needed a bigger HDD for the huge influx of 4K footage I’m working with. Got it in a cardboard box and a non-static/spill-proof metallic sleeve. Two plastic shock absorbers were located at the top and bottom of the drive.Date of manufacture was dated 20 FEB 2022. Looks like they’re pushing in the new stuff now.Installation was easy, just crack open the PC case and slip it into the rack. I knew about the noisy reputation that WD Black Drive’s had, so I ordered a couple of noise-isolating screws and rubber washer to help mitigate the impending cacophony. After slamming everything together, I shoved it all into the PC.Storage size and transfer rate is top-notch, I can both watch and edit 4K movies with no trouble at all. The only problem (which is honestly a non-issue for me, but maybe not for you) is the noise it makes. Every so often, maybe every 5-10 seconds the disk head moves and you can hear a slight “thunk”. You get used to it after a while, and this IS a performance drive, so noise like that is to be expected. Might be a bit jarring to people who weren’t around when your computer sounding like an old muscle car starting up was standard.When going through heavy loads, the HDD spins to a high speed, but thanks to those noise-isolating screws and washers, I barely hear it. And since I’m only using this drive for editing, when I’m not editing Windows automatically turns off the drive so the “thunking” isn’t around unless the drive is on and in use. No “scratching” or similar noises have been heard from the drive yet, and I’ve been using it heavily since Day-1. Only Whirling of the disks and the every present “thunk”.This will give you good storage and speed with the only trade-off being noise. Keep that in mind as you eye that “Add To Cart” button.
MusicMan –
Works greatI am using it strictly as a gaming drive. I was worried it was going to be too slow compared my SSD, but it is not noticeable when playing.
K Cook –
Works great.After other drives started dying, bought this. Very happy with product.
JR –
Mixed analysis & conclusions5/23/14This WD Black 1TB is used as my primary data drive. I use a Kingston SSD as my O.S. / application drive.Win7 volume creation and format went without a hitch. The xfer of ~500GB data from my WD Red drive to this new WD Black drive went smoothly.This new Black drive has much faster read speed and very respectable write speed compared to other 7200rpm SATA drives I have used thus far. I also noticed that when I booted to win7 from it (I loaded a backup boot partition in case my SSD failed) the speed was impressive. No, not nearly as fast as my SSD but much faster than my backup WDSE and WDRed NAS drives which are also 7200RPM SATA3.I’ve had Seagate 7200 RPM SATA3 drives which are not quite as nimble.Alas, it was all too good to be true:(My super speedy Black drive started clicking & chunking after appx. 2.5 mos.Hey … This happens sometimes with hard drives … ok, no big deal, thedrive came with a 3yr. Wd warranty. This is where the fun started:Went to WD website and spent appx. 1/2hr. in RMA process. Very easy.Sent my RMA drive back via UPS label I printed from WD website (very convenient).After appx. 7 days I checked the RMA status on the WD website. WHAT???The model# I sent them does not match the model# they are sending me. I looked up the model# they were sending me and it was the slower / cheaper Blue hdd with only 1yr warranty.I called WD to confirm. They answered the call after a few min of going thru the phone tree. The person I spoke to was very polite and spoke with no language accent issues. He said they didn’t have any Black drives to send so they sent the Blue.I tactfully let him know this was not acceptable and requested a WD Red or SE drive as a replacement.You would think I was asking the United States Congress to agree on something.I have talked to 3 different reps on 3 separate phone calls with no resolution.I have had numerous business dealings with WD in the past. I was in network I.T. for over 20yrs. I have never gone through this much trouble with WD.Politely offering no resolution after hours of my time does not cut it with me. All this over a $90 hdd.I’ll update when the issue is finally resolved.UPDATE 5/28/14I called the corporate WD cust. svc. line this morning. The operator was very helpful and made sure I was connected to a live person, not voice mail. The Customer Service rep was very polite and sympathetic, but most important he resolved the issue within 30 min. The only reason it took even that long was because we were searching for an appropriate replacement drive I would be happy with since they had no (Black) drives to send me. I couldn’t believe he actually offered a very generous upgrade for my time and inconvenience, which I of course accepted.I have always thought very highly of WD products. My faith in WD service is restored.I cannot upgrade the “stars” on my review because I am not receiving a (Black) hdd. I will give WD as a company a very favorable rating and will not hesitate to purchase from WD in the future.Update 5/29/14My replacement drive arrived today, ahead of schedule. The drive is installed as my primary data drive and is loading as I write this. The drive is everything WD promised. I am a happy camper:)Update 11/25/14Since my initial review I have added the following Western Digital hard drives to my systems:(2) 4TB SE NAS enterprise class 7200rpm(1) 4TB Green 5400rpm(2) 1TB Velociraptors 10,000 rpmAll my W.D. drives are performing well 24×7. I run full Lifeguard diags on them once per week and have had no issues.The point is: Western Digital hard drives, as a whole, perform very well under very demanding conditions. I am chalking up the initial issue I had with the Western Digital service department as a one time “fluke.” They really did go out of their way to make it right.UPDATE 6/16/16Since there are quite a few hits / comments on this review I thought I would supply a quick updateAll my WD drives from 2014 are still running great:) 24 x 7.UPDATE 4/6/18Since there are quite a few hits / comments on this review I thought I would supply a quick updateGreen drive failed last month. WD sent replacement with no hassles and quick ship processingAll other WD drives from 2014 are still running great:) 24 x 7.Thank you all for your comments. I am happy to have been helpful:)
Jason Wheeler –
Lots of spaceW.D. drives are always dependable and pretty fast, in my option. This 8TB is the biggest I’ve ever owned. I highly recommend getting it.
Ron –
Best of the WD Black Dirves, IMOI’ve used nothing but WD drives for over 30 years. First one was a tiny 240MB drive and since have been through many upgrades. While most were due to outgrowing the drives, I’ve had maybe 2 catastrophic failures. I had a few drives start to go bad developing bad sectors but were caught in time to preserve data on a backup drive. While I know SSD is the thing now and is my preference for sure for a laptop, I do not find them to be a great advantage for sustained transfers like backing up or cloning a HD. SSD rates are initially very high then slow down after a few seconds. So for a while I will stick with spinning platters.This particular model is very fast rivaling SSD transfers for routine writes to another section of drive, as fast as my SSD laptop is.