Number of platters in WD Red Plus drives

[Bags]

Hello Everyone
Does anyone have information on the number of platters in WD RED PLUS drives?
e.g. 4, 6, 8. TB
WD40EFPX
WD60EFPX
WD80EFPX

[fzabkar]

Go to WD’s warranty page:

https://support-en.wd.com/app/warrantystatusweb

WD40EFPX-68C6CN0
VENRP2LP ← family name
5400
256M
SATA3
6GB/S
4.0 TB
4HD ← 4 heads
NAS

WD60EFPX-68C5ZN0
VENRP2LP ← family name
5400
256M
SATA3
6GB/S
6.0 TB
6HD ← 6 heads
NAS

WD80EFPX-SPC4ZN0 ← the model number suffix identifies the family
WD RED PLUS DESKTOP
AVALONRP ← family name
5640
256M
SATA3
6GB/S
8.0 TB
8HD ← 8 heads
SINGLE PACK

[Bags]

Thank you
I simply wanted to find out how many platters these drives have before buying. Unfortunately, even WD support refused to help me, which is very strange. I have no idea why they hide such information.
It turns out that only by knowing the serial number can you find out how many platters the drive has, and that by the number of heads.

edit:
so
2TB has 2 platters
6TB has 3 platters
8TB has 4 platters

Nevertheless
it’s very strange that they don’t provide this in the general specification

[cat0w]

@Bags

Searching for information about Hard Disk and Platters should help in finding answers.

HD (High Definition) Definition

HDD (Hard Disk Drive) Definition

what’s inside a hard drive - Google Search

How much information does one platter hold? - Search

A platter in a hard drive can store information on both sides, typically requiring two recording heads per platter, one per surface. The amount of data each platter holds and the mapping of the heads vary from model to model. Modern hard drives usually have one read/write head per platter surface. The current limit for data on a single platter is 1TB

[Bags]

@cat0w

Google can be misleading because over time and progress, the density of recording per platter changes, and manufacturers sometimes introduce the same size drives with different numbers of platters.
e.g.
2TB with 2 platters or…
2TB with 1 platter, etc.
More reliable information is provided directly from the manufacturer, e.g. from the HDD manual or official specifications.

Unfortunately, in this case WD decided to keep such information to themselves.

[fzabkar]

With WD’s HDDs it’s even more complicated. Two drives could have the same base model number, but different model number suffix. This could mean that the two drives are from different families, which in turn means that they may have different numbers of heads and platters.

See https://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?p=283798#p283798

[Bags]

Yes, that’s right.
That’s why I think WD is acting strangely by hiding such information, or at least it seems that way to me. In the case of Seagate, for example, there is no such problem, as the manual is quite extensive and widely available.

[Vegan]

Given the volume of cheap disks that WDC sells its likely some changes are needed for some capacity points in the market.

Smaller capacity disks have given way to SSD which make disks uncompetitive. I believe 8TB is now the smallest being manufactured and even these are giving way to higher capacity.