Replacing WD Green HDD (rarely accessed storage)

[piokos]

Currently I use a 256GB M.2 drive for OS and programs used often and few 1TB WD HDDs for all the other stuff: games, photos, videos, VMs, databases etc.
I bought a 500GB SSD for games, VMs and DBs I use often. This leaves me with over 2TB (and growing) of files that I rarely need. But I'd still like to keep them inside the case.

I would like to replace all my HDDs with a single bigger one (~4TB). I'm hoping for low vibrations and noise in both idle and load, but performance has lower priority.
Back in the day I used to buy WD Green for this exact scenario (low vibration and Intellipark).
What's the best choice today? Red? Other brand?

 

[Insert_Nickname]

I bought a 500GB SSD for games, VMs and DBs I use often. This leaves me with over 2TB (and growing) of files that I rarely need. But I'd still like to keep them inside the case.

How often is "rarely accessed"? Is keeping the drive within the case strictly necessary? You can get 4TB 2.5" drives that can be entirely bus powered, and with UASP an external drive is indistinguishable from an internal one.

I would like to replace all my HDDs with a single bigger one (~4TB). I'm hoping for low vibrations and noise in both idle and load, but performance has lower priority.
Back in the day I used to buy WD Green for this exact scenario (low vibration and Intellipark).
What's the best choice today? Red? Other brand?

HGST or WD. A Red would do fine. WD has merged their Green and Blue lines, so I'd think a Blue would be fine too.

 

[piokos]

How often is "rarely accessed"? Is keeping the drive within the case strictly necessary? You can get 4TB 2.5" drives that can be entirely bus powered, and with UASP an external drive is indistinguishable from an internal one.

Rarely accessed as in: putting the VMs aside (I haven't installed the SSD yet), I haven't used this drive since Sunday.
It contains photos and I usually edit the new files around Saturday.
I have a few external drives as well, but I try to have important stuff on the PC for quick access (even if rare). ;-)

HGST or WD. A Red would do fine. WD has merged their Green and Blue lines, so I'd think a Blue would be fine too.

Red vs Blue - I'd get the Red for sure. Price difference isn't that big and I like the fact it's confirmed to work properly on consumer NAS (it's a possibility next year).
HGST... I'll have to read some reviews. I've been WD exclusive for a decade. I don't even know their current product line names. But I'll read a bit tomorrow. 🙂