I just opened up the last two of my drives from last year and they're both red label WD Red NAS. I didn't buy any new drives this year because I stocked up last year. Also, if you have a Best Buy business account, 8TB easystore externals are currently $125 ($139 for regular customers) and there's speculation this may be the new low price point. That said, 8TB externals are still the cost per TB buy (at less than $20/TB) and since Best Buy had a 10TB WD external for $180 on Black Friday, I expect they're be next year's hot buy. There are a number of fixes discussed in the Reddit link above with the worst case scenario being a new power supply. Not an issue for most users, but some power supplies may not support this (which is a part of the SATA power specs). The other minor (for most) issue is that all the new white label drive use the 3.3V line on the SATA connector to reset the drive and without the additional power line, the drive may constantly reset and never spin up completely. Here's a good Reddit post about the different label types: Relabeled WD Reds (as in the case last year), HGST, or something else in WD's lineup, maybe Green? FYI, unless WD has changed their manufacturing line (unlikely), there is no special run of drives for use in externals. However, I just read that as of sometime early in 2018, the Red label WD Reds were no longer used and no one's exactly sure what the new drives are.

Especially as cheap way to fill a NAS server. I've been recommending removing the drives from the external and using as in internal drive or high quality external case or drive dock. I've been been recommending WD easystore 8TB drives as the go to purchase for the past couple of years because they've been the bargain buy at <$160 in the US (currently hovering around $140 on sale.Plus those with with part #tWDBCKA0080HBK-NESN (vs WDBCKA0080HBK-NEBB) until at last the end of last year almost guaranteed that you'd get a WD Red NAS drives, some red label and others white label.

8tb wd easystore software update