# What factors can decrease an HDDs life?

## Iron_DragonLord

We've had a lot of PCs here, old ones too. None of the HDDs have failed. Just recently, however, mine died.

We got this PC around 2000-2002, so it's much newer than the 1996ish ones we got, and their HDDs are still live. I can't figure out why this one just decided to die.

How likely is it for a software RAID-0 to murder a HDD? That's the only thing I can think about that may have done something....

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## ikaro

I can think of two things, the quality of the components and temperature inside the cabinet.

The only disks that died on me were from IBM, ive since never purchased IBM disks.

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## GordSki

There are a few things that can kill HDs

Temperature, poor quality drives, power spikes, etc.

I don't think raid-0 would contribute, although wear is always a possiblity.

I remember reading a usenet thread a while ago with a very similar subject to this. One of the replies said that power cycling the drive a lot can cause a lot of damage.

G.

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## Iron_DragonLord

Well this is kind of funny... My HDD that died is an IBM too. Heh. "IBM Deskstar" 40 GB, damn it.  :Sad: 

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## po0f

Google it and you will see why people have nick-named these drives "Deathstars".

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## Primozic

Deathstars indeed!  I've had two of those things die on me.

There's no forgetting that "click click whirrr" sound when you turn on the PC.

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## Tiger683

2 more Deathstars here....  :Razz: 

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## Iron_DragonLord

I don't suppose there's a waynto fix it?

It looks like the heads move out, then back in again. So the disc looks safe, and it's data.

...yeah, I opened up the hard drive. I figured it was dead anyway and so was my warranty. Those screws are hard to get off!

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## Cintra

 *Iron_DragonLord wrote:*   

> I don't suppose there's a waynto fix it?
> 
> It looks like the heads move out, then back in again. So the disc looks safe, and it's data.
> 
> ...yeah, I opened up the hard drive. I figured it was dead anyway and so was my warranty. Those screws are hard to get off!

 

Yeh! A six inch nail  :Very Happy: 

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## theneb

I had a maxtor die sometime last year. It was on a server providing routing for my home. Disk just simply fully corrupted.

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## Waldi

 *Iron_DragonLord wrote:*   

> Well this is kind of funny... My HDD that died is an IBM too. Heh. "IBM Deskstar" 40 GB, damn it. 

 

Same thing happened to me. Was kinda mechanical problem. Now I got a Western Digital WD1200JB, great performance, silent and stable. In use since summer '04. I guess thinks like defragmenting (under windows) stress the hdd very much.

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## John5788

O_o i have a deskstar 80gb, i hope it doesnt fail. its been running fine since 2002

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## FourARSEDSheep

ive been running 2x120 deskstars on raid since 2002 also... hope they dont die.. aha!

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