Google Claims Hard Drives Don’t Fail Because of High Temperature or Usage

[Alec§taar]

ANOTHER GOOD READ (less techno) ABOUT THIS SUBJECT FROM STORAGEREVIEW.COM

BrandMostReliable:

http://faq.storagereview.com/tiki-index.php?page=BrandMostReliable



* They seem to tend to also contradict GOOGLE's findings as well as the other paper, lol!

(In that, yes, heat/wear & tear do matter as well as use patterns & such, but rather than handling during shipping & also conditions of use as far as shock (CompletelyBonkers notes this above) matter more, which is what I drew from THIS article @ least vs. that from GOOGLE & USENIX.ORG's article on the subject @ hand here!)

APK

P.S.=> Personally, I think it's a GOOD combination of ALL of each of the 3 article's points: How the disk is handled during shipping + manufacture & yes, conditions it's used in, as far as 'shock/bonk factor', also heat & use patterns as well during usage, & lastly, how well it's made from the 'get go' in terms of parts quality & engineering used... apk

 

[AshenSugar]

With the exception of a few models with outright design problems (the IBM 75GXP for one) or the odd bad batch, most hard drives from all manufacturers are similar in reliability when they leave the factory. There is no point saying Maxtor is more reliable than WD or Seagate is more reliable than Maxtor unless you have used hundreds of hard drives and have a sufficient sample to draw from. Most people drawing on their experience with a dozen drives will come to a completely biased conclusion because their sample is not even remotely representative of the population

from your artical apk

i have had exp with HUNDREDS of not THOUSANDS of drives, and in my exp WD has the highest fail rate (non raptor drives) the rest are pretty even on fail rate, a bad batch here and there but nothing drastic.

the IBM deathstar drives where made by hitchi, so some people infer that the hitchi deskstar is a "deathstar" when this isnt true, hitchi made those drives to IBM SPEC, they had a high fail rate because IBM ORDERED CRAPPY IC's the burnt themselves out, you could make them worth for YEARS with a simple SMALL heatink on 2 of the IC's.

i still have 3 deathstar ibm drives out in the wild on systems i setup for people, 15-30gb drives, the 15-20gb where the most prone to burn out, and with a small sink stuck to those ic's the fail rate went down to the same level as other brands.

also after hitchi stoped making drives for IBM i conntacted hitchi about a dead ibm branded drive(problem model) they took down the seiral, got back to me in 3 days and sent a replacment NO CHARGE didnt even want the dead drive back, the replacment was 1/3 larger then the one it replaced, and came with full retail kit(5.25 mounts,cables,the works)

the drives i truely miss are fujutsu, great drives and CRAZY GOOD SERVICE!!!

they are south of me maby 1hr drive tops, they sent an airmail container fedex to puckup the drive, then sent one back the next day after fedex drove it down( i would have driven it down, but noo they wouldnt let me drive down and get a tour as they rma'd my drive )

 

[Alec§taar]

from your artical apk

Not "my article", per-se... I just put out others for you guys to take a peek @!

(Plus, I am interested in HDD technology myself - slowest part of a PC or not, I find it the MOST fascinating & largely the work I do depends on FAST disks, as its mostly file based in nature, writing code)

i have had exp with HUNDREDS of not THOUSANDS of drives, and in my exp WD has the highest fail rate (non raptor drives) the rest are pretty even on fail rate, a bad batch here and there but nothing drastic.

Well, you make a point on WD & in your personal experience (pretty vast, decent sized sample set)? It may be right... for SOME lines they may have made. Most every diskdrive OEM has had, 'bad runs' from what I have seen...

(& I'll make one later that I did earlier here iirc, about WD doing ME right once, REALLY right in fact on RMA)...

The reason(s) I went w/ Raptors is the speed first, but also the "enterprise class" warranty - anyone that put one out like they did for SATA FIRST mind you, of THAT length (5 yr. length - was a precedent/a first for THAT class of disk) is VERY CONFIDENT in their hardware imo... a good sign!

Also, as far as WD disks (edit part here)? I have a shoebox FULL of 242-424mb WD IDE Caviars that STILL RUN FINE to this very day... I put them into a 486 I have here (one of my first machines in fact: VLB Diamond SpeedStar 64 Windows Accelerator, 486 Dx/4 133mhz, 32mb FastPage 30-pin RAM 70ns speed, ISA/VLB mobo, & VLB TekRam Caching IDE controller w/16mb RAM onboard in SIMMS (fastpage 60ns ones))

the IBM deathstar drives where made by hitchi, so some people infer that the hitchi deskstar is a "deathstar" when this isnt true, hitchi made those drives to IBM SPEC, they had a high fail rate because IBM ORDERED CRAPPY IC's the burnt themselves out, you could make them worth for YEARS with a simple SMALL heatink on 2 of the IC's.

Yea, I remember that 'scenario/shenanigan'... reminds me of the Micheal Douglas film "DISCLOSURE" in a way, & what happened to the Cd-Rom readers the company in the film had problems with.

AND, what Hitachi did, also reminds me of the "Mazda Rotary Engine" in a way too... Wankel (its designer for use in automobiles) tried to sell it to the US "Big 3" Chevy, Ford, & Chrysler in the 1970's iirc (I used to see it advertised in comic books no less, believe it or not, on the pages between the panels for the comic where adverts are).... none of them 'bit'.

Mazda did, debugged whatever it was that the "Big 3" were unable or unwilling to do, & made a HIT of it.

also after hitchi stoped making drives for IBM i conntacted hitchi about a dead ibm branded drive(problem model) they took down the seiral, got back to me in 3 days and sent a replacment NO CHARGE didnt even want the dead drive back, the replacment was 1/3 larger then the one it replaced, and came with full retail kit(5.25 mounts,cables,the works)

I have a tale to 'regale you w/' on that note also, but from WD, & regarding 1 of the 1st 2 raptors I bought (first gen. 36gb units, back in 2002-2003 iirc): 1 went belly up in 3-4 weeks time or so, & what did WD do?

LOL, they did me WAY right - they did me an RMA & sent me back a FASTER & 2x as large 74gb unit SATA Raptor... gratis/NO charge!

Can't beat that!



I am still running BOTH disks, to this day mind you, almost 5 yrs. later in fact, nearly NON-STOP on the 74gb unit in fact, in an external drive SATA/SATA 2 capable external enclosure... in my 2nd home lab machine here, the original 36gb unit also runs, but not all the time. ONLY when I need to do some learning work here, or playing catch up ball @ home for jobs.

Still, that first & OLDEST 36gb unit saw a GOOD 3-4 yrs. of CONSTANT uptime/turned on use, when my 2nd lab rig (now a SQLServer2005/IIS6.x on Windows Server 2003) was my primary rig, 2002 - 2006.

the drives i truely miss are fujutsu, great drives and CRAZY GOOD SERVICE!!!

I think much of this is also "luck of the draw", but when a manufacturer has a GOOD line, w/ good reviews & good solid performance plus durability & you have good experiences over time w/ them?

You tend to STICK BY THEM...

(They all have had "bad runs" outta production on various models though, @ least, I would hazard a good guess this is true to @ least SOME extent!)

APK

 

[AshenSugar]

time to "break" the 36bg b4 the warrs up

and seagate had 5 year warr on ALL drives when wd was still 1year or 5 year, the wd put 3 year on SOME drives(watch it some still state 1 year, saw one at frys a couple weeks ago ROFL)

and i stick with anything but wd, really in my exp the seek time diffrance between seagate and WD and maxtor and hitchi and samsung and on and on is VERY CLOSE for normal drives, the new seagate drives(and hitchi based on same tech) are GREAT, but seek times are missleading if you go by the published marketing specs,

seagate lists TRUE avg seek times, hitchi same, WD well in my exp they list Min seek times as avg(this can be done by partitioning the drive so the tests only acctualy done on the fastest parts of the drive for each test)

maxtor, well they use to use avg, then they went to min then back to avg, duno about now, but on a whole i have had good exp with them since the 8gb days, very fast service, very durable drives(ever seen a 200gb get so hot the paint on the bottem starts to peel then the drives still useable? )

anybody with dead hdd's take them apart and remove the magnets ^^ strong little magnets great for all sorts of projects


and APK take a look at the SDram drives if you need max speed, i have seen them as large as 300gb recently, that would be INSAIN, ur board couldnt keep up ROFL

 

[Alec§taar]

and i stick with anything but wd

I stick by whatever does the best in reviews & others words CURRENTLY mostly, but WD has done me right & again: I have disks from 1992-1995 or so of WD IDE variety that STILL RUN FINE TO THIS DAY, see above.

I can't knock that.

really in my exp the seek time diffrance between seagate and WD and maxtor and hitchi and samsung and on and on is VERY CLOSE for normal drives, the new seagate drives(and hitchi based on same tech) are GREAT, but seek times are missleading if you go by the published marketing specs,

Not for the Raptors I use they're not... 10,000 rpm WAS an "industry first" for SATA, period, & this one I am certain of. Heck, it still is a first - nobody else has this on SATA that I know of, unless you know of another that does & seek time?

HUGELY dependent on revolution rates. This is WHY 15,000 rpm offerings from the SCSI world blow away even my Raptors on that account (seek/access).

Afaik & still (for SATA/SATA 2), an industry precedent by Western Digital.

As far as HDTach testing here though we did?

I pretty much 'swept the floor' on most all tests here w/ my setup, OVERALL!

Seek times were one of the factors where I took a "1st place" in the field of contestants (& here I really "blew away" all others)...

CPU usage was another I took "1st place" in, but I use a CACHING CONTROLLER w/ 128mb RAM on it, that has its OWN "I/O Brain/CPU" onboard for offloading the mainboard general purpose CPU running disk I/O as most systems do... so, that said? I can't claim that first place of mine (2nd of two in the tests) was a result of the drives themselves. It was the controller.

Transfer & Burst rates, the new 'perpendicular recording' disks too me out though... but, not so much I was like "in last place" in those areas, & not by a long shot iirc.

Like I said, overall, in our "real world test" here (as real as benchmark tests get @ least)? Overall, I took the most 'firsts' & overall, had the highest avg. placement of all testers in all categories tested (4 iirc)... some guys came close, but no cigar beating my setup disks wise.

seagate lists TRUE avg seek times, hitchi same, WD well in my exp they list Min seek times as avg(this can be done by partitioning the drive so the tests only acctualy done on the fastest parts of the drive for each test)

My experience isn't solely really based on specs alone though (I know folks & companies tend to 'puff things & bend them up' a bit in their favor, this is natural):

Like you, it's based on actual tests we did here, & an overall aggregate of all the tested areas in HDTach (except writes, this I wanted to do as well, but we didn't)... & of course, years in the field like anyone else w/ time served in it.

My seek times, if you look up the test? LITERALLY were "orders of magnitude faster" due to RPM speed of the raptors I use.

and APK take a look at the SDram drives if you need max speed, i have seen them as large as 300gb recently, that would be INSAIN, ur board couldnt keep up ROFL

I'll take a peek but... I have a Solid-State disk!

It's an older one by CENATEK called a "RocketDrive", how I use them is noted in my signature below!

(I did a review on them in fact they featured for AGES on the front page of their corporate website, done initially back in 2003, which they featured on the FRONT PAGE no less over many others like it from other sources of great respect no less for it & know what they're about, from 2003-2007, but no longer, lol... they must have gotten wind of me talking about the DDR-Drive now, oh well!)...

An Independent User's Review of CENATEK RocketDrive

Page is down now, it was linked from a server I have had some trouble w/ the webmaster 'moving things around' on it periodically & messing that up (3rd time this has happened now)... oh well! Write them if you wish... no biggie. They'll verify it.

Original URL was here -> http://www.avatar.demon.nl/cenatek.html

(Time to write the webmaster & see wtf happened to it, ugh!)

They knew who I was from the mid 90's when I did a software ramdisk based off the MS DDK prototype driver, w/ a GUI reparameterizing front end for it... when I called them they said "Yea, we know who you are, a competitor"... it was funny when I told them I wanted to do a review of their board & they felt I was 'competition'...

HOWEVER, I am waiting on the DDR-Drive X1 PCI-e 1x to release! I think it's going to be "the superior warrior" out there when it comes out for THIS type of drive.

The maker (DDRDrive/Chris George) has communicated w/ myself in "PM'ing" here directly, & w/ W1zzard as well... they're a bit behind schedule @ this point, but I am patiently waiting for it...

The DDRDriveX1, imo, has a better BUS (PCI-e 1x, vs. PCI 2.2 on my CENATEK RocketDrive), Faster RAM (DDR400, vs. PC-133 SDRAM) & the RAM is a better match to its bus speed, than is say the others from HyperOS III &/or Gigabyte (IRAM) as well!

seagate had 5 year warr on ALL drives when wd was still 1year or 5 year, the wd put 3 year on SOME drives(watch it some still state 1 year, saw one at frys a couple weeks ago ROFL)

Could be... I just know about WD putting them onto the 36gb & to me? It was a first, for them @ least. In any event, like I said above? Any oem that does that, doubling (almost iirc) the competition's warranty length has good product odds are, & is confident in it.

Anyhow - time to SLEEP!!! Catch some "ZZZZzzzzz²²²²'s", FINALLY! G'nite, talk to you in A.M. or later if you reply... as usual, nice LONG conversations between us, many GOOD points etc. et al & detail.

APK

P.S.=> I tested the CENATEK RocketDrive here on that test, but in another thread w/ another user, & lol, I think I put the link to it into the HDTach formal test we did... HDTach couldn't even GET a reading (it did but MEGA LOW & MEGA FAST), it got 0ns in fact, for seek time on it... apk

 

[Mussels]

A REALLY REALLY LONG POST

My god alec, your posts are very well written and informative... but... you might make peoples heads explode, that thing is LONG.

*ahem*

However its unfair to compare regular WD drives to raptors - they ARE enterprise class, and reliability would be a mile above any normal desktop part.

 

[Alec§taar]

Devil's are in the details... I don't let them happen, IF I can help it!

My god alec, your posts are very well written and informative... but... you might make peoples heads explode, that thing is LONG.

See my subject-line/title above for this reply I guess... I try NOT to "miss a trick", because of that.

I get busted on for it @ times, & you're NOT the first!

It's largely my use of quoting!

It doesn't help for length, but... it does for me replying to the poster I am replying to - so I don't miss any of their points, because I am replying, point-by-point!

(It makes me wonder, if folks feel my posts are long, what they must go thru reading article's @ say, Microsoft TechNet, or even reviews from various websites for "other things computing" etc. et al?)

However its unfair to compare regular WD drives to raptors - they ARE enterprise class, and reliability would be a mile above any normal desktop part.

They're SATA, & just another diskdrive: Albeit, a FASTER one in terms of seek speed & revolution rate being where many UltraScSi drives are is the reason WHY... they go hand-in-hand (rpm & seek/access).

APK

P.S.=> One thing you'll note is, that when AshenSugar & I "go @ it" especially? The conversations get VERY long... lol! I find him interesting to talk to/with, & he generally gives me a HELL OF A RUN FOR MY MONEY, everytime! apk

 

[AshenSugar]

its called having no life and a head full of what most people consider "useless knowlege" i have even had bosses that said "i knew to much shit about to much random shit" lol, wish i could get payed for knowing all the crap i know

 

[Alec§taar]

its called having no life and a head full of what most people consider "useless knowlege" i have even had bosses that said "i knew to much shit about to much random shit" lol, wish i could get payed for knowing all the crap i know

Ah, keep looking man... & hell w/ those bosses giving you guff (they're probably afraid of you taking their job, lol)...

You will one day, if you have not already made decent money for something you LOVE & UNDERSTAND (ala Lynyrd Skynyrd tune lyric - best place you can be in this life imo!)

Work, is work, is work... might as well make it as enjoyable as you can, because when you come RIGHT DOWN TO IT?

We're ALL 'prostituting' ourselves, & selling the most precious thing there is: OUR TIME (which IS limited)...



* You're "A-OK" in my book...

APK

 

[Mussels]

We're ALL 'prostituting' ourselves, & selling the most precious thing there is: OUR TIME (which IS limited)...

APK

Woo, i'm a nerd-whore!

 

[Alec§taar]

Woo, i'm a nerd-whore!

"Programming-Prostitute" here, lol...



* By the way - that term's NOT mine, I got it from other coders I have met... it made me laff, because it IS largely true!

(Our pimps? Headhunters!)

APK

 

[DRDNA]

Alec§taar nice job doing your research !!

I also run Raptors ,74's wanting to get 4more big girlz (150GB)

I absolutely love them !! I have the 74's on my vapo-rig and raid-0 and i clock that wattage sucking baby of mine with crazy crashes when I am a tinkering and putting the fiddle to her and them babies have never -ever failed me in any way!!! The raptors in a array are just the $h1T way better than any single ide I have ever had .
I cant wait to array this rig or maybe my next one with the 4x150's(big girlz)

PS
normally the whole inside of my vapo rig is a min of 15 Celsius , so any drive would be getting spoiled in there,but still.

 

[Alec§taar]

Alec§taar nice job doing your research !!

Ah, "'twas nothing", & nothing anybody else could not have done really... plus, I got lucky on the SLASHDOT article, stumbling upon it & "things disk" tend to attract me!

Plus, & I knew about StorageReview (great side for comparing disks before you buy - IF you have never stopped by there, & like disks? DO! Their comparison DB is awesome, & easy to use, & tests MANY kinds of use-patterns w/ legit results from some VERY respected testing programs out there (for server types, & end user types too)).

I also run Raptors ,74's wanting to get 4more big girlz (150GB) I absolutely love them !! I have the 74's on my vapo-rig and raid-0 and i clock that wattage sucking baby of mine with crazy crashes when I am a tinkering and putting the fiddle to her and them babies have never -ever failed me in any way!!! The raptors in a array are just the $h1T way better than any single ide I have ever had

They're GREAT disks, I absolutely agree, OR I would not have bought them...

However, there IS 1 feature I would LOVE to see incorporated into them:

Perpendicular Recording Technology that Seagate has... it DOES work, fast transfers!!!

Our HDTach tests here showed me THAT much, I couldn't dispute that...

Only question I have on it, is longevity - it IS a new technology is why I am wondering & waiting to see failure rates on it for... with disks that use it, that is.

My guess is, it was tested by folks @ Seagate & DOES last... hopefully!

Would be NICE to see incorporated into WD 10k rpm disks too, like Raptors!

I cant wait to array this rig or maybe my next one with the 4x150's(big girlz)

PS
normally the whole inside of my vapo rig is a min of 15 Celsius , so any drive would be getting spoiled in there,but still.

Sounds like it is a hellish system, especially on the 'advanced cooling' stuff!

I am not a Hydro-Cooler OR Refrigeration user etc. (air man here)... & sounds as if you are about to make it "that much better" in time!



* Nothing wrong w/ that!

APK

 

[DRDNA]

I am figuring or rather hoping that they release a firmware update that would allowe perpendicular recording for what I already have !lol ..Seems to me that it should be possible or no?

 

[Alec§taar]

I am figuring or rather hoping that they release a firmware update that would allowe perpendicular recording for what I already have !lol ..Seems to me that it should be possible or no?

I don't think it's doable... I am not an 'expert' on it, but I did some brief reading to see HOW it is achieving it, & it is HOW it 'lays the data down', almost like 'stacking it'...

You'd have to read up on it, & see the illustrations to see what I mean... they can pack a LOT more into 1 area (increasing 'aereal platter density' iirc, is the correct tech term)!

Thus, the heads pass over a LOT MORE DATA in smaller areas than std. disks can put down into the SAME amoutn of area, & it allows them to pick up MORE @ once!

(Something VERY like that, & I don't think you can just firmware change how that works...)

APK

P.S.=> In any event, I'd love to see either WD using that tech (probably can't, patents & what-not) OR to see Seagate intro. a perp. tech. disk w/ 10k rpm speeds for faster seeks... they rule the data transfer area because of perp. tech., but it remains to see how durable that new tech, really is... pretty new, & thus, subject to seeing how long it lasts etc., imo @ least... apk

 

[DRDNA]

lol DARN