Testing a new WD drive (6tb)

Hello,

I just bought a WD 6Tb Nas Red internal drive.
I read on various forums that I should test my drive before using it.
First I made it GPT then formated it in NTFS.
After I downloaded and intalled “Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for Windows” from here :https://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?p=3

Now on the extended test, it seems to take for ages and displays me 164h remaining after 3 hours I wanted to know if this was normal :confused: ???
wdtest

Thanks in advance for your feedback

Cotp

Hi Tistou

Try using Download Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for DOS (current version 5.27) it is a more reliable tool to use than Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for Windows.

Here are the instructions.

Follow the instructions to create a bootable USB.
Turn off you computer and remove the sata power connector from all the hard drives.
Connect the hard drive that you think may be defective or want to test.
Turn on the computer.
Set your bios to boot from a USB device.
Type dosdlg.exe

Select WRITE ZEROS TO DRIVE and do a full erase.

It should take about 12hrs to 15hrs depending on the computer (2 to 2.5 hours per tera byte).

It not only erases the hard drive but it also checks to see if it is working properly.

if the drive is defective it will come back with an error code that WD support wants for a RMA.

NotaCanada

Thanks NotaCanada for this details instructions.

Here is what I did.

  1. Installed the file on USB

  2. modified bios to boot on USB

  3. ran dosdlg.exe

  4. Quick test (5min 0 erros) passed

  5. Extended test (12 hours 0 errors) passed

  6. Now I did not write zeros to drive yet, should I do it now or is it not necessary (since it is a new drive) and could I just quick format it ? In NTFS okay ? I don’t know whenever I format a drive if I should use quick or extended for formatting…

I will use this disk for backup purposes and stock it somwhere , after could you use it as a spare disk in a NAS in case one other disk crashes inside the NAS

Thanks in advance for your answer (not sur why it did not pass the quick test before in windows)…

Cotp

Hi Tistou

To answer your questions

  1. Now I did not write zeros to drive yet, should I do it now or is it not necessary (since it is a new drive) and could I just quick format it ?

It is not necessary to run Write Zeros To Drive and do a full erase.
Yes you can just do a quick format.

  1. I will use this disk for backup purposes and stock it somewhere , after could you use it as a spare disk in a NAS in case one other disk crashes inside the NAS

That very much depends on the NAS.

NotaCanada