Just shucked my first Western Digital Elements drive using this guide

Was a nice simple process, took about 5 minutes. A jimmy tool is key! I had one from ordering a macbook disassembly tools kit a few years back.

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Yeah Iā€™ve gotten pretty good at shucking. You want a nice metal prybar with a thin edge. Not my idea of a good time, and the waste bothers me, butā€¦ what are you gonna doā€¦ the $ savings are undeniable.

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I just shucked my first WD drive last night! And with my iFixit tools :heart_eyes:

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Did you face any issues with 3.3V pin while putting into enclosure?

I had the 3.3v issue on one of the 2 that I shucked. So one went internal and the other got reassembled and is just remaining an external since I didnā€™t have any kapton tape to mask off pin 3. The other one is working great in the system.

The more interesting part is that when I shucked the drives, one of these 12TB drives was actually a 14TB model in the case. I wish there was a way to flash the drive BIOS and unlock the other 2 TB but oh well. I got these 12TB drives on sale for $199 so no complaints here.

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Is there something against just using it as a external hdd to farm?

No, but it becomes increasingly difficult to manage the more drives you have. I bought a few Sabrent 5 bay USB 3.2 enclosures. They are SO nice. The USB to SATA adapter boards come in super handy for other projects. Neat little side benefit.

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Youā€™ll also use 1/5 of the electricity when farming as well using the Sabrent yes?

Do you recommend that one?

Thanks!

Absolutely recommend! Itā€™s a little pricey but itā€™s all metal, you can stack them, and they daisy chain the USB-C connector.

Thanks for this. Iā€™m going to move forward and purchase one of these.

Iā€™m also getting some plots done on a service so the drives will be coming in ā€˜fullā€™ of plots. Will I be able to just slide the drives in and it will just ā€˜workā€™? I donā€™t want to have to reformat the drives and lose the plots basically.

Youā€™ll have to add the plot directory. Assuming the key matches, they will sync up and be farming.

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I dunno ā€¦ w/r/t these docking stations, honestly you are better off using cheaper (but not too cheap; get a quality USB interface chipset) individual drive connectors and a quality powered USB hub.

$249 for 5 drives is still $50 per drive! I guess it depends how large you plan your farm to eventually be.

And as much as the JMicron chipset in the WD shucked enclosures is terrible (it is)ā€¦ itā€™s effectively freeā€¦ so if it works ā€œgood enoughā€, then thatā€™s $0 additional cost per drive.

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Iā€™m a fan of these Yottamaster enclosures so far because theyā€™re only $110 each, and they actually look really nice/mac-like:

thereā€™s a space management aspect that is appealing, too. Nearly bought one of your NASes, but I couldnā€™t justify it. Iā€™m not likely going to outgrow the bays in my computer as a micro farmer, heh.

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How many of these devices can you daisy-chain together?

I imagine the limit all depends on your CPU/chipset/board/OS? These enclosures are not the most cost effective solution. I do like them though and despite the price I am happy with them. They look good too lol.

it gets more and more handy after I shucked 20-30 diskā€¦
Later it only took me 3-5 seconds to complete the task of shuck it up from the shellā€¦
But it also means we gave up the warranty as wellā€¦
so not recommend for doing it any moreā€¦

Also I have problem linking to an NAS with around 150T of plots and the time is too long over 5 seconds and there is nothing I could do to optimize it but to move the HDDs to another machine for having farming /harvester structureā€¦

so DO NOT link you main farmer to a NAS with too many plotsā€¦!!!

I did read somewhere that ppl were successful to registered the hddā€™s inside via the manufacturers website for warranty but havenā€™t tried myself

Thanks, really usefull guide.