Today, we're going to remove the internal hard drive from a Western Digital EasyStore
8TB external drive. This removal is colloquially known as
"shucking" the drive. By removing it, you can use it as an internal hard drive in
your desktop PC, workstation, server, NAS device, or wherever you need a
3.5 inch SATA drive. This particular model is only sold at Best
Buy as of the fall of 2017. The tools that you'll need are some guitar picks, a
throwaway plastic card like this gift card, and you'll also need a Philips head
screwdriver, as well as a pair of pliers. Before we start, I have a disclaimer,
which is that opening the case will void your warranty. That's why I always test
the hard drive with a diagnostic program like HD Tune before taking it out of its
enclosure, because you can easily return it if there is indeed something wrong
with the drive. If you test it after you shuck it, and you find out there's
something wrong with the drive after the fact, then you run the risk of the
retailer denying the return, or the manufacturer rejecting an RMA exchange.
With that said, I'll be as non-destructive as possible when I shuck
the drive. That means you'll be able to reassemble the hard drive to its
original state, or even reuse the case with another hard drive. The enclosure is
made of two parts, and they're held together by four retaining clips. All you
have to do is wedge your guitar picks where the four tabs fasten the two parts
of the case, and they'll just slide apart. There's no screws or other fasteners, or
even glue that hold the two halves together. The first step is to pry open
these edges of the case. I'm using the thinnest guitar picks I have available,
which are about a half-a-millimeter thick. The first pick will be the hardest
because it needs to create a gap between the two shells. Once you have it jammed
into the edge, you need to slide the pick until you feel some resistance, and
that'll be the first tab. With a slight gap caused by the first pick, you'll be
able to slide in the second pick, and slide it along the edge until you find
the second tab. You'll want to keep the two picks in position.
Then you'll proceed to do the same thing for the other edge of the case. Once
again, slide your picks along (and inside) the edge, and feel for the tabs. Locate
the third and fourth tabs. After that, you'll need to use the plastic card to
pry the two halves of the case apart, at the top or the bottom of the case, like
this. The objective is to create a gap that you can see here. You'll want to
then flip the case over, and use the card again to pry open the other side. The
guitar picks will fall out - which is fine - you can then use your hands to slide the
two shells apart. There will be some friction, but they should slide apart
pretty easily, since there's no glue or anything like that holding them together.
Once you expose the insides, you'll notice that this is a Western Digital
8TB Red drive, and in my case this is a Red drive made in Thailand, which
presumably has 256 MB of cache. There is also a Red drive made in China,
which is said to have 128 MB of cache. The country of manufacture is
indicated on the drive label, but it's also on the box itself, so theoretically
you can determine which drive you'll get without even unwrapping the box. However,
I can't guarantee what you'll find inside your case, because who knows what
Western Digital will do in the future. In fact, there's no guarantee that it'll be
a Red drive at all. Next, you just pop out the drive like you see here. Once again,
there's no fasteners or screws or anything like that, so it's completely
tool-less - so far. Now here, you will need your Phillips screwdriver to remove the
screw on the small SATA board. You can then pop out this little clear plastic
rod by hand, which simply acts as an LED light pipe, then gently slide the PCB
board off of the SATA port. and then set that aside. Finally, you'll need to remove
these rubber shock bumpers, and then remove the screws that hold them onto
the drive. These are Torx screws but since I don't have one,
I'm using these pliers, which work just fine for removal purposes. Et voila - an
8TB SATA hard drive that you can use as an internal drive.
I hope you enjoyed - Thanks for watching!