Green Drives - Best, Recommended, Compatible?

Drobo - End of Sale Drobo FS
1

I need to expand storage on a current Drobo (specifically a DroboFS).

Looking for recommendation or know which of the Western Digital Green drives are compatible (or recommended/best) to use.

I found the following model numbers listed on various sites:
[list=1]
[]WD20EARX - updated version of WD Green 2TB
[]WD25EZRX - 2.5TB WD Green
[*]WD30EZRX - 3TB WD Green
[/list]
The specific ones I’m looking at are over at Amazon here.

It looks like these are SATAIII instead of the older SATAII WD20EARS version I previously installed in my FS.

Does anyone know if the drives above work in the FS-- or if there’s a better model you’d recommend-- and if can they be mixed/matched with the older WD20EARS (I think SATAII) in the same FS unit?

Thx KV

2

Well, nobody answered so I suppose I’ll post my first reply in these forums although, it is probably too late.

Green drives use some kind of variable speed spindles. Because of that they are usually not suggested in any time of RAID environment. That said, many use them and I have one in mine as well but, I don’t plan to purchase any more. I know in my experience with the b800i SAN it will allow about any drive EXCEPT green drives.

That said I do believe SATA III will work.

3

Take a look here: http://www.drobospace.com/forums/showthread.php?tid=2677

There’s a really good discussion, and it covers TLER (which is the real reason to worry about certain drives in RAID and RAID-like systems).

4

Using three of them in my DroboFS (the older EARS ones), and it’s one of the few things that doesn’t cause problems for me.