How long will a Harddrive last, and is mine about to bite the dust?

[WutWuzDat]

Okay all you Hardware-Savvy subbers....

I have 2 HHDs on my system. On is a WD 40 Gig Main (Win XP home SP2), and the other is a WD 80 Gig. I've had the 40 gig and used it as my main for about 3 or so years (IIRC), and the 80gig for about 6 months.

So anyway, I noticed things were starting to bog down a bit, so I desided it was time for a reformat (It had been over a year... way over due for one). This made matters even worse. Well, I thought maybe I screwed something up, so I reinstall again. Still no help.

The HHD access light is on about 75% of the time the system is running.

For example, if I click on a MP3, it takes Windows media player or Real Player about 2-3min to load. Now I ran some "tests" by opening the Ctrl-Alt-Del windows task manager (and it took about 2 mins to load just now) and looking at the CPU usasge. It's very low (2-5%) while the media player is loading. So I really don't think it's a software problem. FF and other programs seem to take forever to load. But, once it's in the RAM, it runs smooth. If I open a playlist, it runs smooth once the player has loaded. Once FF loads, I can browse the net just fine.

I ran the Disk checker thingy and it didn't help any. I also checked defrag and it said it didn't need to do it.

I haven't had it corrupt any files or anything (yet).

I run ZA Pro, Spybot, Ad-Aware, and Avast. All clean.

I'm thinking of getting a 350 gig and using the 80 for the main. but do ya'll think that will fix my problem?

[AG124]

That kind of failure is hard to predict, from my experience. I have an old 6 Gig in a 233 MMX that has been running fine for about 10 years, and I have seen one of my old 20 Gig drives die about 4 years. The 200 GB and 120 GB ones I am using in my main system aren't demonstrating any of problems yours have been showing, but they are relatively new. Maybe someone with more experience could give more specific information here. I myself wouldn't rely on a HDD for more than 4 or 5 years, just in case. In your case,maybe you should upgrade while you have the chance (or at least have a good backup ready - which you should always do anyway).

[Immacolata]

Download the latest version of Speedfan. Inside you have SMART monitoring tools, and you can use that to test your harddrive health.

[scandium]

Basic rule of thumb for HDs: if there's any bad sectors its dying, and otherwise its fine. I've only ever had one hd die a premature death, and that was a Samsung 160 GB SATA that went bad after 3 months. Usually, with hard drives, you can get at least 3 years out of them before its time to start thinking about replacing it.

CD/DVD drives/burners are a whole other story for me... I don't think I've ever had one last longer than a year and my current LG dvd burner is already going flaky after only 9 months.

[Drebbel]

Normally they will break down 1 day before you decided to finally make another backup

[WutWuzDat]

Originally Posted by Immacolata

Download the latest version of Speedfan. Inside you have SMART monitoring tools, and you can use that to test your harddrive health.

Warning: Raw Read Error Rate reached, in the past, its threshold. Worst value is 1 and threshold is 51.

This is an unusual situation because it looks like your hard disk, in the past, failed the S.M.A.R.T. status check, but now it appears not to be failing. You should double check it. A backup of your data is strongly suggested.

The overall fitness for this drive is 90%.
The overall performance for this drive is 98%.

:hmm:

[Immacolata]

It might indeed be ailing. I would heed their advice, or suffer dataloss. If it is a drive that has unimportant data you could keep running with it untill it dies.

If it is important data, I would seriously consider dropping the cash needed for a new drive.

[tycho102]

Originally Posted by AG124

That kind of failure is hard to predict, from my experience. I have an old 6 Gig in a 233 MMX that has been running fine for about 10 years, and I have seen one of my old 20 Gig drives die about 4 years. The 200 GB and 120 GB ones I am using in my main system aren't demonstrating any of problems yours have been showing, but they are relatively new. Maybe someone with more experience could give more specific information here. I myself wouldn't rely on a HDD for more than 4 or 5 years, just in case. In your case,maybe you should upgrade while you have the chance (or at least have a good backup ready - which you should always do anyway).

The older drives had far greater tolerances. The data density was very low.

As for newer drives, all Seagate drives come with a 5-year warranty. The Western Digital "Raptor" drives come with a 5-year warranty. I use exclusively those two manufacturers and drives, and I have had outstanding success with them.

I boycott the Hitachi drives, and I recommend that you do as well. I have had about 6 of those drives go out on me, all right after their warranty expired. I had been using them almost exclusively, so it was to my extra-ordinary dismay when every god damn last drive started failing on me. And it wasn't just one bad batch in the bunch -- I had different sizes, buses, versions, and cooling.

[AG124]

The two HDDs I mentionned are both WD, as were the 20 GB, and a couple of 40 GBs I have lying around. Except for the 20 GB, I have had no failures with any of them. My brother also used to have a 15 GB drive from Western digital and had it for 4-5 years with no problems - he finally replaced it because of its small size.

I've also found that floppy drives last a long time, particularly 5.25" ones. Wish I could say the same for the actual disks - it seemed as if the older 3.5" disks were more durable than the newer ones. I can't speculate on 'newer' 5.25" disks as I believe it is quite impossible to get 'newer' ones.... I don't use either 3.5" (or 5.25") disks very much anymore anyway as I find my USB flash/jump/thumb(?) drive to be more convenient (although I think I need to buy a larger one).

[kiwi_2005]

HDD's can last for a very long time, i have an old 2.5gig hdd stored away with old games on it - quake, duke nukem, etcs and connect it now and then to grab the games of it. I had it running on my PC a few months ago just to store word files. But its easily 10-yrs old and still running well.

When you say the light is always running. Some malware/trogan can make your drive act weird.

[scandium]

Originally Posted by AG124

The two HDDs I mentionned are both WD, as were the 20 GB, and a couple of 40 GBs I have lying around. Except for the 20 GB, I have had no failures with any of them. My brother also used to have a 15 GB drive from Western digital and had it for 4-5 years with no problems - he finally replaced it because of its small size.

I've also found that floppy drives last a long time, particularly 5.25" ones. Wish I could say the same for the actual disks - it seemed as if the older 3.5" disks were more durable than the newer ones. I can't speculate on 'newer' 5.25" disks as I believe it is quite impossible to get 'newer' ones.... I don't use either 3.5" (or 5.25") disks very much anymore anyway as I find my USB flash/jump/thumb(?) drive to be more convenient (although I think I need to buy a larger one).

I'm very fond of WD drives as well, having never had any of the few I've owned give me any trouble; plus they are fast and reasonably quiet. A friend of mine, who is also really big on WD, has been using them exclusively for the last several years and out of the many he's owned, only one has ever gone bad.

My current 160 has turned me into a lifetime loyal WD customer who will buy nothing else; it was a replacement from the store I'd bought the dead Samsung from because they happened to be out of Sata Samsung 160 GB drives and I was only too willing to take the 160 WD they offered instead; and about a month after I got it, it was sitting unscrewed in the drivebay of my open computer case while I was doing a HSF swap when my cat suddenly went balistic and managed to knock the mini-ATX case, and everything in it (which was everything that was part of the PC minus the HSF I'd just taken out) off the top of my entertainment system and onto the floor (a 4 ft drop), and the unscrewed drive had been knocked out of its bay by the fall and become wedged between the RAM heatsinks and the drive cage... I had thought the whole PC quite possibly toast, and if nothing else the drives for certain, but miraculously everything survived unscathed except for some scratches and warping to the case... though this could be why my LG burner is going flaky now only 9 months after I bought it... but as for the HD, not even a bad sector, it is still working flawlessly.

[Immacolata]

What kitten from hell is that you have? Glad Im a dog man. Much more reliable :rotfl:

[WutWuzDat]

Just incase anyone was wondering... I bought a Western Digital Caviar 250 GB, 300 MB/s, 8 MB Cache, 7200 RPM SATA II

Fixed my problem!