When you are shopping for a new hard drive, there are several factors that you should first consider. Are you wanting an internal or external drive? How much space do you need? How fast of a drive do you want? How important is your data? Will you be running a RAID configuration? How much money are you looking to spend?

The answers to these questions are very important in helping you find the right drive(s), but now there is another question that you might want to think about: how much power does a particular drive consume?

"Going green" is the latest trend in the computer and electronics market (and many others as well). As various components become more advanced, they also require more power to operate. According to Western Digital, the average 1 TB hard drive has a power consumption rating greater than 13.5 watts. Western Digital's new GreenPower drive, which we will be looking at here today, claims to shave 4-5 watts over typical drives in the same category. Any power saving is a welcomed addition, but will the drive's performance be hampered to accomplish this?


We received an OEM version of the Western Digital GP 1 TB SATA 300 7200 RPM 16 MB hard drive for review. As is typical with all OEM hard drives, the only thing you receive is the drive itself, which comes sealed in an anti-static bag. There are no SATA cables, adapters, extra jumper pins, etc. Below is a complete list of features and specifications, borrowed from Western Digital's website.










Continue ahead as we take a closer look at Western Digital's new 1 TB GreenPower hard drive...