Prolong the life of HDD’s

Re: Prolong the life of HDD’s

What do you call excessive..4 times a day, would "Stand by" mode be preferable to shutting the computer off.

 

As I said in an earlier post in this thread, I use Standby all day, and shut down when I go out or to bed.

 

Proactive replacements? I just don't see it provided one has some sort of decent imaging solution that is utilized on a regular basis. I mean, you could easily buy a new drive that goes dead immediately after installation & restoration or dies within a few days thereafter.

 

Have found the manufacturers tools much more reliable than say HD Tune ,which is constantly on the verge of predicting a disaster.
The diagnostic tools will or should also be able to repair bad sectors and inform of platter quality.
If the bad sectors become more frequent and cant be repaired-time for a new disk.

I dont worry about how often I turn on and off-if it happens thats it.
I am not really concerned whether the disks last 2.5 years or 3 years,by that time its generally advantageous in any case to buy new ones,due to technology advances.

Generally I just shut down at night,but plenty of restarts,which of course do not turn off the disks.Just be protected by a good backup system.

 

I would say for times a day is pushing it. That is 1460 times a year. The drives WD drives we buy have a 5 year guarantee but we can’t take a chance. When we get them we burn them in for a week before they pass our QA.

What about the other components of your system? You are brutal on them. As systems evolve they will not be able to take this abuse.

Use “stand by” mode but change the settings to NOT turn the disks off.

 

Re: Prolong the life of HDD’s

I had a tech support guy for xxxxxx-xxxxxxxxx tell me to use a Hitachi HD diagnostic to send a report of the condition on my Western Digtal HDs, and the report showed I had no files on my HDs

Tonight I did a full backup with Acronis.

 

RE2 drives?

To spot early failures?

 

Something wrong-what did the Western Digital Data Lifeguard Dignostics have to say?
There are tests for errors and a report-usually some bad sectors can be repaired-but as I said if the bad sectors keep growing,you should get a new disk.
You should perform these tests for safety and save the report log-this should be useful-cant understand what the tech support guy was talking about-quite likely there were no files because you used the Hitachi diagnostics.

 

its caused by the paranoid, not by power ups and shut downs.

excessive antivirus scans, excessive defragmenting, excessive disk utilities, excessive formats/restores.

you get the point.....

excessive HardDrive usage, will wear it down in comparision to normal usage.

its basic stuff.

 

So really what it amounts to is that for the home user,any normal or even abnormal usage is OK.
In the highly unlikely event of disk failure,all disks have a warranty for 3-5 years,so as long as you have a backup,its not important,except for the inconvenience factor of time and effort.
I would say the risk of a disk breaking down is much greater within the first 60 days or so,as with all computer hardware.
For me, in 14 years of usage the only occurrence of disk failure was with a new disk
Few of us ,if any are operating in the same environment as described by Groomlake,which no doubt also employs the heavier duty drives.

Do whatever you like-its OK .

 

You can format a disk a zillon times without causing any harm

Manufacturers' utilities aren't that reliable. Samsung's utility reports errors, bad sectors on the brand-new F1 because of a firmware incompatibility.

 

Think you may be generalizing-my Seagate utility worked fine,as did WD in those days
What do you recommend that can restore bad sectors and give a reliable report

 

I do use the manufacturer's utility, but I don't put blind faith in it.

http://forums.storagereview.net/index.php?showtopic=26454&hl=samsung+1tb
http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=41140&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=240

 

Re: Prolong the life of HDD’s

It was at that point that I went to the Western Digital website and downloaded Lifeguard Dignostics, I sent the tech support guy a copy of the report to prove there were files.