Seagate Skyhawk vs WD Purple

For my specific setup, should I go with Seagate Skyhawk or WD Purple?

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Nomen Nesico

Nomen Nesico

n3wb
Oct 13, 2020
24
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USA
I read Choosing Hardware for Blue Iris on the Wiki which stated to use either WD Purple or Seagate Skyhawk for HDD storage. I was originally planning on going with WD Purple because that's what was suggested in Newbie Starter Guide to IP Cam Systems as well as the Cliff Notes.

However, the issues that I am hoping to get video footage of have a significantly higher chance of occurring during the daytime, e.g under good lighting conditions. So I'm planning to get 8MP/4k cameras (just 3), not because I have Megapixel Mania, but because I've read here that those perform better under good lighting conditions/daytime compared to lower MP Starlight or DarkFighter cams. The reason why this is causing me to second guess getting WD purple drives and get Skyhawks instead, is because of some of the statements on the product page for WD purple:

"Tuned for write-intensive, low bit-rate, high stream-count applications typical to most surveillance applications"
My setup will be the opposite of that–high bit-rate low stream-count.

"WD Purple drives have an enhanced workload rating that supports systems built to run for only short intervals, not the harsh 24/7 always-on environment of a high-definition surveillance system."
I will be running the system 24/7–which again, will be not only HD but 4k.

I have not found similar language on the product page for Skyhawk drives.

Figured I'd post to see if anyone has any input.
 
I think they used the wrong terms for the Purple drive.

Just above what you quote that is on the WD Website it says

OVERVIEW
Engineered for the Extreme Demands of 24/7 Surveillance Systems

Also the Purple specs are above the standard Skyhawk but then the "Skyhawk AI" drive is above the Purple in Yearly workload data.

I personally have never had that much luck with Seagate drives over the years. Would give them another go some time. Using a Purple drive in my CCTV setup.
 
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Actually looked at the specs again on WD.
Up to 180TB/year on capacities up to 6TB, and up to 360TB/year on 8TB and above

So up to 6TD Purple is the same as the standard Skyhawk drive. The 8TB and above are double at 360TB/year.
The new Skywark AI drive is rated higher at 550TB/year.
 
rocky500 said:
Just above what you quote that is on the WD Website it says

OVERVIEW
Engineered for the Extreme Demands of 24/7 Surveillance Systems
Click to expand...

Yeah, I saw that too. The thing is the Skyhawk product page has similar language about being capable of 24/7 recording–WD is the only one that contains statements about how it's not for that, plus the remark about many low bit-rate streams.

rocky500 said:
Actually looked at the specs again on WD.
Up to 180TB/year on capacities up to 6TB, and up to 360TB/year on 8TB and above

So up to 6TD Purple is the same as the standard Skyhawk drive. The 8TB and above are double at 360TB/year.
The new Skywark AI drive is rated higher at 550TB/year.
Click to expand...

I'm leaning towards the Skyhawk AI drives, due to the higher 550TB/year. Plus having the AI features doesn't hurt, even if they may not be used. On Amazon the price for an 8TB Skyhawk AI is only $14 more than the standard Skyhawk. I'll of course want to look at WD Purple vs Skyhawk beyond just the product pages before coming to a final decision. Perhaps they did just use the wrong terms on the product page for WD Purple. This site is proof that people are using them and prefer them, although their setups are probably not similar to what mine is going to be–that being only 3 high bit-rate cams. So far the poll is 2-0 in WD's favor.

Good to know your experience with Seagate. I haven't bought HDDs since 2011 and they were Seagates that I didn't have any issues with. Never actually bought WD before believe it or not, wasn't avoiding them I've just not bought many drives. I did hear about their Red NAS drive controversy regarding shingled magnetic recording.

I'll see if I get any more feedback on this thread before buying anything.

Incorrect products pages cause companies to lose sales all the time. How else do they learn to correct them/get them right the first time unless they lose money over it?

Thanks for your input.
 
I had the same situation when I built my system. I read just as many complaints about either drive when researching - one didn't stand above the other to me. Personally I had a couple Seagate Cheetah's fail me in the past (10 years ago) - just regular PC drives so I went with Purple's for that biased reason alone LOL. I think it's just random luck if one craps out or not.. I could have easily gone with the Seagates but didn't.
 
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bradner said:
I had the same situation when I built my system. I read just as many complaints about either drive when researching - one didn't stand above the other to me. Personally I had a couple Seagate Cheetah's fail me in the past (10 years ago) - just regular PC drives so I went with Purple's for that biased reason alone LOL. I think it's just random luck if one craps out or not.. I could have easily gone with the Seagates but didn't.
Click to expand...
Yeah lol, that's what it's seeming like.
 
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Nomen Nesico said:
I read Choosing Hardware for Blue Iris on the Wiki which stated to use either WD Purple or Seagate Skyhawk for HDD storage. I was originally planning on going with WD Purple because that's what was suggested in Newbie Starter Guide to IP Cam Systems as well as the Cliff Notes.


Figured I'd post to see if anyone has any input.
Click to expand...

Also consider the well known fact hat WD have been very untrustworthy in recent times, just lookup the NAS RED SMR drive class action, WD really miss-lead the industry and lots of NAS folk had enough and started class action, which could have easily been avoided if WD exhibited more honest behavior to start with....https://www.pcgamer.com/au/wd-rebrands-its-red-hard-drives-after-getting-hit-with-a-lawsuit/

At least Seagate never mislead the industry which recording technology they used in their products, and have always disclosed etc....
 
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I've had both fail on me. Some drives just go and go, some crap out. You hope you get a good one and there you have it. I still stick with purples.
 
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Nomen Nesico said:
My setup will be the opposite of that–high bit-rate
Click to expand...

3 4K cameras isn’t anywhere close to “high bit rate”.

That system will require in the realm of about 40Mbps data write rate to the drive — on the order of 3% of the real-world transfer rate of SATA magnetic HDDs.

I wouldn’t worry too much about hitting any bandwidth limits with the system you describe, whatever disk you choose.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
News emerged last week that WD, Seagate and Toshiba are all shipping hard drives using Shingled Magnetic Recording (SMR), a slower form of HDD technology that can result in reduced performance in some types of workloads, but without disclosing that critical bit of information in marketing materials or specification sheets.
 
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Maybe we need to go back up to 5.25" specifications from Win 3.1 days. LOL then they can get more TB's without shingled magnetic recording. :clap:old_hdd.jpg
 
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I run 2 x 5TB CMR wd purple drives with 6 x 4k 8MP IPC at highest frame and bit rate, continouus recording and have zero issues...
 
Last edited:
I've used both Seagate and WD drives since PCs came along with, probably, equal failure rates with both. That includes both in PCs and in storage arrays for corporate servers. I am using WD Purple for video storage and they've been rock solid.
 
WD Purple here because had problems with older Seagate drives many years ago and probably ok now but the past failures has put me off a little.
 
I believe a few years ago, WD quietly switched their WD Red drives to SMR and people with RAID setups saw a drop in performance. WD got caught and now has WD Red Plus drives aka CMR. That said, I noticed my latest 6TB purple and 10TB Red Plus are much noisier than earlier ones. Can hear purple clunk every so often, while the Red sounds like it's grinding all the time, like the old SCSI drives. Heard that they figured out a way not to use helium with the newer Reds, thus are louder.
 
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sebastiantombs said:
I've used both Seagate and WD drives since PCs came along with, probably, equal failure rates with both. That includes both in PCs and in storage arrays for corporate servers. I am using WD Purple for video storage and they've been rock solid.
Click to expand...
Yeah I've also used HDDs from both for years with equal failure rates, but this was my first time using surveillance drives from either and some of the info on the product page for Purple concerned me, so I made the post.
 
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