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    HDD life

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by pitz, Jun 6, 2010.

  1. pitz

    pitz Notebook Deity

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    So I've now burned through a pair of HDDs (Hitachi 120gb 7200rpm, and a Fujitsu 160gb 7200rpm) provided by Dell, and they will be providing me a third replacement.

    The drive in my laptop gets approximately 5 cycles a day, and runs for ~12 hours a day. Each drive lasted only a little over a year. So 1300 cycles or so.

    Anyone else experience the same? I've upgraded my personal machine to a SSD hopefully to mitigate the issue, but am I just unlucky or do laptop drives really have significantly shorter lifespans?
     
    pitz, Jun 6, 2010
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  2. MaxGeek

    MaxGeek Notebook Evangelist

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    An SSD should be more durable from shock since there aren't any moving parts, but the life span is unproven. In theory both SLC and MLC drives should be able to handle enough writes to last a long time, at least in a PC.

    A regular harddrive is affect by heat and shock, two things laptops don't really help with.
     
    MaxGeek, Jun 6, 2010
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  3. sgogeta4

    sgogeta4 Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    Actually, SLC has been proven to last longer than HDDs. They've been using them for decades now without problems. MLC though, is still rather new, but if theory holds true, we still have some time before we will see failures.
     
    sgogeta4, Jun 6, 2010
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  4. sean473

    sean473 Notebook Prophet

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    its depends.. ur dell must be running so long that the HDD temps are too high killing the drives quickly.. SSD's should run cooler and faster but if u have faulty cooling for HDD , they might die too..
     
    sean473, Jun 6, 2010
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  5. pitz

    pitz Notebook Deity

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    My laptop doesn't sit on a desk all day; it gets used as a laptop, with a hundred flights a year, gazillions of power cycles, etc. I just never envisoned a laptop hard drive as a component that would need to be replaced more frequently than the battery, lol.
     
    pitz, Jun 6, 2010
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  6. Deks

    Deks Notebook Prophet

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    Well, do take into consideration that you were moving your laptop quite a bit when you had the hdd's.
    Check the temperatures once in a while though so we can see just how high of an impact it might have in your case (also, how often do you clean out your laptop of dust?).

    Furthermore, getting an SSD was a good idea because they lack moving parts, run cooler and faster in contrast to regular hdd's ... it's likely a much more ideal solution for your needs.

    But as I already said ... check the temps using HWMonitor and/or RealTemp.
    Clean out the air vents and use a compressed air in a can.
     
    Deks, Jun 6, 2010
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  7. Krane

    Krane Notebook Prophet

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    Although the SSD will have some advantages over HHD they still cost significantly more. In addition they have far less storage capacity when compared to the average HHD. When deciding which works best for you, you should keep this in mind.
    Indeed they have, however they are extremely expensive.
     
    Krane, Jun 6, 2010
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  8. sgogeta4

    sgogeta4 Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    Price is pretty much the only drawback since capacity can scale as well or better than HDDs (but of course we're talking astronomical prices). While some businesses can justify the cost, most consumers cannot, so you'll have to settle for the much cheaper MLC (albeit still much more expensive than HDDs) and risk data security.
     
    sgogeta4, Jun 6, 2010
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  9. yotano211

    yotano211 Notebook Evangelist

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    I always find external hard drives that get used for internal drives on laptops last alot shorter then internal ones. Every external drive that gets used for internal always fails much faster. I only buy internal drives from now on.
     
    yotano211, Jun 8, 2010
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  10. pitz

    pitz Notebook Deity

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    Dell sent me a WD Scorpio Black Edition as the replacement, manufactured April 4/2010 with shock sensor. So wish me luck!
     
    pitz, Jun 9, 2010
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  11. sean473

    sean473 Notebook Prophet

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    i would say super replacement.. good luck!
     
    sean473, Jun 11, 2010
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  12. oceaneez

    oceaneez Notebook Geek

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    I hope some one can help me. Can anyone comment on the Western digital essentails passport 500GB external HD?

    The LG 500 GB HD?

    And the Seagate free agent to go 500GB HD?

    Thank you for anyhlep you can give me. Would you recommend any of these, and if so, why or why not?

    Thanks a lot.
     
    oceaneez, Jun 12, 2010
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  13. sean473

    sean473 Notebook Prophet

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    both are USB but from what i saw the WD is smaller.. i would also get WD as its less likely to fail.. Seagate drives have had a great fall in quality and fail quite quickly.. wouldn't trust Seagate.. i have a WD My book which is working very well after 1 year.
     
    sean473, Jun 12, 2010
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  14. Tinderbox (UK)

    Tinderbox (UK) BAKED BEAN KING

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    Tinderbox (UK), Jun 12, 2010
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  15. oceaneez

    oceaneez Notebook Geek

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    Thank you for your help.
     
    oceaneez, Jun 12, 2010
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  16. 1shado1

    1shado1 Notebook Consultant

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    Aren't most "external drives" simply standard drives put into a case, instead of in a laptop?
     
    1shado1, Jun 12, 2010
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  17. oceaneez

    oceaneez Notebook Geek

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    I have just purchased a Toshiba 3GB flash drive today. I want to use it for a back up to re-install my OS system (I am getting Blue screens. The 32 GB Toshiba appears to be very slow. I downloaded 4.83 GB from my Laptop to the flashdrive and it seemed like it took forever to do it. I have a 16 GB Lexar and it seems to be faster. Does anyone know anything about teh 32 GB Toshiba flash drive?
     
    oceaneez, Jun 12, 2010
    #17