What are the best methods & software to test new Hard Drives before using for work?

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I am looking for a little advice on some of the best methods or preferred software that can be used
to test brand new Hard Drives for any problems or issues and to properly determine the speed of the
Hard Drives before putting them into real world use. eg. RAID, Data Storage, Working Files etc.

I am looking to setup a 3 drive RAID internally in my Mac Pro and use the forth bay for backup
and a couple of older drives for external backups. The RAID is just for Data. I have an Accelsior for Boot & Apps.
I have already purchased 4 of the same drives that I will be using and have started testing
them to pick out the fastest 3 drives to use in the RAID and the 4th for the internal backup.

So far I'm using Disk Utility (Zero Out Data & 7 Pass Erase), diglloyd Disk Tester,
Black Magic Disk Speed Test and SpeedTools Utilities v3.6.

Any advice, comments and personal experiences would be much appreciated.

 

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Just checking in on this thread hoping to get some advice on how to prepare HDs properly before putting them into use for work.