WD PiDrive 314GB HDD Especially for Raspberry Pi Community

WDLabs, a business incubator of storage solutions Western Digital Technologies Corporation, announced availability of the WD PiDrive 314GB, a storage device engineered to serve the Raspberry Pi community with low-power USB operation, affordability, reliability and ease of integration.

“Adoption of Raspberry Pi computing devices is expanding at a tremendous rate, reaching eight million units in about four years1. However, the millions of Raspberry Pi users are finding limitations from storage devices (SD card, USB HDD or cloud storage) originally designed for other applications,” said Dave Chew, chief engineer, WDLabs. “The WD PiDrive 314GB HDD is designed to support Raspberry Pi growth by addressing barriers to HDD adoption such as affordability, power loading and system set-up. In addition, we’ve maintained the key strengths of HDD technology, including mass-storage value, high data integrity and reliability.“

“With the extended capabilities of Raspberry Pi 3, we can’t wait to see what new projects our community comes up with,” said Eben Upton, CEO, Raspberry Pi. “WD PiDrive 314GB gives our members a low-cost, purpose built HDD solution that helps them develop even more innovative and unique ways to use Raspberry Pi.“

“The innovative work being done in the Raspberry Pi community is extraordinary and we applaud participants,” said Melyssa Banda, head WW marketing communications, WD. “That work has inspired problem-solving engineering through our WDLabs group and, with their insight and collaboration, we are focused on taking new solutions to market. The WD PiDrive 314GB is a great example of real-world innovation from WDLabs.“

Raspberry Pi 3 nano computer

Engineered for Raspberry Pi
The WD PiDrive 314GB device is based on Western Digital’s high-volume 500GB platform with design changes made specifically for Raspberry Pi. Customizations made to the drive’s magnetic recording and electrical system operating set-points align with Raspberry Pi’s USB data and power design to reduce the electrical power load of the HDD on Raspberry Pi, while still maintaining sufficient performance to deliver maximum USB data transfer rate. Platform design flexibility and the manufacturing tuning process enabled WDLabs to create this specialized product for Raspberry Pi efficiently without compromising quality and reliability.

Unique software solution for new users
WDLabs and the author of BerryBoot, a free software solution that simplifies the loading of multiple software applications, have created a special version of BerryBoot for WD PiDrive device customers, which includes software applications featuring the use of mass-storage devices with Raspberry Pi. Many OSs and software applications can be stored on the WD PiDrive HDD, taking advantage of the 314GB of storage. Upon system boot-up, the OS can be selected from the BerryBoot menu and launched with a couple of mouse clicks.

Compatibility, price and availability

Designed for Raspberry Pi, the PiDrive 314GB HDD is compatible with all PiDrive cables, cable kits and WD PiDrive enclosures. MSRP is $45.81 with a limited-time discount of 31.4% for a net price of $31.42. The PiDrive 314GB HDD comes with a two-year limited warranty and, along with PiDrive accessories, is available online at the WD Store.