[X4U] Re: Lifespan of Harddrives? (a bit off-topic)

[Randy B.Singer]

nk said:

>yeah, clearly there is much fibbing going on in the world of hard  
>drive sales.
>far as I'm concerned, short HD life spans is deliberate..why else  
>would something that runs so hot be built without a fan?


All hard drives are built without a fan.  The fan is only added when the 
drive is put into either a computer's case or into an external drive 
case.  The MTBF rating from a manufacturer either doesn't take into 
account how the drive will be mounted, or it assumes a certain level of 
available cooling.

I have an external FireWire hard drive sitting right here that has no 
fan.  It uses its stout aluminum case as a heat sink, and it seems to do 
a very good job at that.  As a side benefit, the drive is really quiet.  
And, since it doesn't have a fan, it won't die because of a failed fan 
(something that isn't uncommon.)

I don't think that any manufacturer is stupid enough to deliberately 
design drives so that they fail prematurely.  But I do feel that some 
manufacturers don't design their drives to be as robust as others. (For 
cost reasons.) Currently I prefer Seagate drives because they all come 
with a 5 year warranty.  All of the Seagate drives that I've purchased 
and installed for myself, or for clients, in the past two years have been 
100% reliable.  (Considering their features, it's amazing how cheaply you 
can get these drives!)

My understanding, from industry insiders, is that we would be appalled by 
the failure rate of consumer hard drives.  This is acceptable for most 
manufactures, as they sell based on volume and they don't take a big 
financial hit by replacing failed drives under warranty.




Randy B. Singer
Co-Author of: The Macintosh Bible (4th, 5th and 6th editions)

Routine OS X Maintenance and Generic Troubleshooting
http://www.macattorney.com/ts.html