It was purchased in October 2021 (212 euros) to replace a Toshiba 4Tb (HDWE140UZSVA) as online storage for the desktop because I needed more space and didn't want to have a second 4Tb HDD.

Bulk packaging as usual, it was opened and connected - as I always do with new hard drives - externally to my old Coolermaster CM690 II Advanced case (as shown in the photo).

As always, as soon as it was connected, my hand was on it to see if it had booted from the vibrations. When I didn't feel anything, I thought, OK, after 30+ years of experience with hard drives, this is the first DOA. A visit to Disk Management proved that the disk had booted and was spinning/working normally. So, first shock for me, it's the first HDD out of the dozens I have purchased that has ZERO vibrations.

Second shock, the noise. I had read various things on the internet about these drives, and after a year with a Toshiba X300 4TB, I was skeptical (which for me was on the verge of annoying). I don't know if mine is the exception, but I don't hear anything when it's idle (it doesn't "whisper") and a little when it's reading, and I am extremely sensitive to such noises. When it's idle (just spinning), personally I can compare it to an internal 2.5" disk that spins at 5400rpm. When it's reading, there are slight "clicking" sounds, and when it's writing, it sounds normal, but for me, it's not excessive (obviously, this is subjective, but it can be heard).

After a standard format (NTFS) in Windows, the disk showed a total available capacity of 7.27Tb.

As with all new drives, I ran HDD Sentinel Surface Test (Read) before starting to write data, and the disk was flawless with no bad or weak sectors.

Now, in practice, it's slightly less "warm" than the Toshiba X300 4Tb, not that there's an issue with the latter, it's just that none of them are as "cool" as my WD Blue 4Tb drives (which is logical, 5400 vs 7200rpm).

In terms of speed in the HDD Sentinel Surface Test (Read, we're talking about 7.5 to 11 hours in a row depending on the disk), the WD Gold 8Tb (WD8004FRYZ) started at 250MB/s and finished at 120Mb/s. Comparatively, my Toshiba X300 4Tb drives start at 190Mb/s and finish at 80-85Mb/s, while my WD Blue 4Tb drives (WD40EZRZ) start at 170-180Mb/s and finish at 78-80Mb/s. All of these are purely indicative, in practice it's different. So far, with my usage, the Gold seems slightly faster than my Toshiba drives, but as I said, that's with my usage. As specifications and on paper, it's significantly faster everywhere.

For further observations, reliability, etc., I will update over time. The drive has a 5-year warranty and I registered it on the WD website on the same day I received it.

UPDATE 6/1/2022: After 3 months of full usage, I must admit that for my usage at least, the Gold is indeed significantly faster in write and especially in read for any type of files compared to my Toshiba drives.

I have the WD GOLD 8TB (256MB cache) hard drive for about 3 years in NTFS format. I am completely satisfied with it, without any issues. According to reviews, its speed is around 180-250MB/sec, but please note that this speed is only for large files. For small 4K files, the speed is 1-5MB/sec, like all HD drives, although sellers don't mention it. Only SSD drives are faster, as well as the Seagate Barracuda, but I consider that company unreliable. The WD GOLD drives are among the fastest drives, and I recommend the 8-10TB ones. Now I bought the WD Ultrastar HC510/10TB, but I haven't tested it yet. You can see the comparative tests of drives here: [link provided]. In general, during its use, I can't tell if I have an SSD or HD drive, as there is no delay at all for small files (1-50MB) that I work with, such as documents and PDFs. For large files (200MB-2GB), there is a 2-3 second delay. I can record HD videos without any freezing or other issues. The other drive I have is the Samsung 960pro M2/512GB with a speed of around 2500MB/s according to reviews, but in my everyday use, I don't see any difference compared to the WD Gold, except for large files. You can see the comparative tests here: [link provided]. The WD Gold drive is recommended for desktops and gaming. If you want to record from cameras, you should get the WD PURPLE, which is cheaper. See the WD Gold drives here: [link provided]. The Gold series has been discontinued, and now the WD Ultrastar HC320 and HC510 are being released, which are similar but slightly slower than the Gold drives and have Helium. I suggest choosing the HC510, which has slightly better specifications. See them here: [link provided]