The WD lines (CMR only), Red Plus, Red Pro, Purple and some white labels. Have been compared to the Ultrastar DC HC500 series. But my question is this, are they ACTUALLY HC DC500 series modified with different firmwares and drive speed modifications? I'm talking about the 8-14TB models. I checked the 14TB. The Ultrastar DC HC530, Purples, Red Plus, Red Pro and white labels have the EXACT same r/N number, US7SAP140. Does this mean they are all the same drive with modifications? The Red Plus specs 8-14 TB all say the spindle speed is actually 7200 but will show up as 5400 to "reflect previous performance class designation." Bottom line, are the Purples, Red Plus, Red Pro (and the white label shucks) just DC HC500 series drives? Comes down to the r/N number I guess, what it actually means.

I don't know for certain, but I suspect that the drives are essentially identical, and that WD doctors the firmware to generate artificial performance classes.

What I'd like to know is how WD manages to seamlessly integrate "NASware 3.0", a 6-year-old (?) WD firmware feature, into current native HGST firmware. Is this real?

https://documents.westerndigital.com/content/dam/doc-library/en_us/assets/public/western-digital/product/internal-drives/wd-red-plus-hdd/product-brief-western-digital-wd-red-plus-hdd.pdf

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A backup a day keeps DR away.