HD reliability 5400 vs 7200 rpm

[tart666]

Does anyone have actual failure rate figures for 5400rpm drives vs 7200?

I know 7200 drives run hotter and make more noise. Does than mean I am trading off speed for reliability?

I had a second drive die within 6 months, so now I am looking for reliability over speed.

 

[CraigRT]

That's bad luck.
I've had a couple drives die lately too.. it depends more on the brand than the rotation speed.. IBM for example.

 

[pillage2001]

What drives were you on???

7200rpm will definitely produce more heat but the reliability does not go down with it.

 

[tart666]

my IBM's are doing fine. Both dead drives were WD.

But then again, that's the majority of drives in my house. About 5 out of 8 are WD.

 

[Paulson]

I've had 2 western digitals go on me but I think that was due to stupidity on my part (the drives got very hot)

 

[tart666]

So how do you cool the drives?

My antec case has room for a fan in front of the HD enclosure, but none of the other cases do.

Edit: btw, how did you know they got hot? I don't think WD reports temp under SMART

 

[pillage2001]

Originally posted by: tart666
So how do you cool the drives?

My antec case has room for a fan in front of the HD enclosure, but none of the other cases do.

Edit: btw, how did you know they got hot? I don't think WD reports temp under SMART

Use your hands and feel the side of the HDD. DO NOT TOUCH THE CIRCUIT BOARD (Been there done that. )

 

[Boris691]

i have had 2 7200 drives. one a 20 gig fujitsu and the other a WD 80 gig. i had to return my fujitsu twice and i have have not had any trouble with my WD. so i belive brand has a lot to do with it. quite odd that your WD broke down. but the noise of your hard drive should not be a problem. i dont think i every really notice my Hard Drives noise level.

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: tart666
my IBM's are doing fine. Both dead drives were WD.

But then again, that's the majority of drives in my house. About 5 out of 8 are WD.

Heh, i'm surprised your DeathStars are still running.. then again, only some of the IBM models were affected by the failure rate lawsuit.
older WD drives are crap for reliability. the new WD's should be alot better.

 

[nanyangview]

nah, if u get the new Maxtor DiamondMax 9 Fluid drive, they are very reliable, cool and quiet.

 

[tart666]

Yep, picked up a 40GB DFB Maxtor and an 80GB 8MB WD this weekend.

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: nanyangview
nah, if u get the new Maxtor DiamondMax 9 Fluid drive, they are very reliable, cool and quiet.

Just as long as you don't get the old diamond max
(totally junk) those drives have the worst failure rate i have seen in my own personal experience.. maxtor freaks me out.

 

[pillage2001]

Originally posted by: Yield

Originally posted by: nanyangview
nah, if u get the new Maxtor DiamondMax 9 Fluid drive, they are very reliable, cool and quiet.

Just as long as you don't get the old diamond max
(totally junk) those drives have the worst failure rate i have seen in my own personal experience.. maxtor freaks me out.

DiamondMax 9 Plus are their newest drive I think.

 

[BFG10K]

AFAIK reliability tends to improve with each generation of faster drives, not reduce.

 

[tart666]

Granted, but WD continues to sell current generation 5400rpm drives up to 120GB. linkie

There has to be some advantage, other than being $5 cheaper.

 

[Vernor]

Had a 7200 Maxtor die inside 3 weeks. And a 7200 WD 6 months later.


Before that I had an ancient Seagate drive that lasted 4 years without a hitch.

 

[tart666]

Hmm interesting data.

So does anyone know any place where data like this is collected and averaged into those failure rate vs lifetime plots or whatever? Or is too proprietary for anyone to publish?

 

[nanyangview]

Had a 7200 Maxtor die inside 3 weeks. And a 7200 WD 6 months later.

holy crap....i am scared now, what maxtor is that? the exact model please.

 

[tart666]

my WD 800BB died after about 7mo. It saw some heavy SVCD use, but only about 10 discs. And then dead.

PS: first victim of DVD2SVCD was my crucial DDR stick. and now this. pretty weird.

 

[CQuinn]

tart666,

So does anyone know any place where data like this is collected and averaged into those failure rate vs lifetime plots
or whatever? Or is too proprietary for anyone to publish?

Its not a matter of the data being to proprietary to publish, its more a matter of the collection of that data being
unreliable itself, because any survey that is done can only be a sample that does not take into account many outside
factors that can affect the life of a drive.
Check Storagereview.com for the start of a reliability database, and some comments in the forums there on why it
will probably not be as much value as participants would wish for.

I currently have 5 drives in use in two systems

2 Maxtor DiamondMax Plus (6800 and D740X) (7200 rpm)
2 Western Digital (WD800BB and WD1200JB) (7200 rpm)
1 Quantum (Atlas 10k II - SCSI) (10000 rpm)

all have been running practically non-stop for at least a year. The oldest is the Diamondmax plus 6800,
which I've had for about 4 years, after it was bought used from a second hand computer store. It has
run the longest and help

As best I can tell, there is no difference in reliabilty between 7200rpm and 5400rpm drives as a whole, as long as
the drive is treated well within the rest of the system.

But I still do regular backups anyway...

 

[cmdrdredd]

I've NEVER had a Seagate drive go bad on me nore a Maxtor.

 

[dszd0g]

My understanding is that in general, the faster the drive spins the more heat it produces. The hotter the drive runs the lower the reliability. This can be countered by using HD coolers. In addition, the higher the density the less reliable the drive. I haven't seen hard evidence to support this, but this is what I've seen. It also makes logical sense.

 

[BD231]

Originally posted by: dszd0g
My understanding is that in general, the faster the drive spins the more heat it produces. The hotter the drive runs the lower the reliability. This can be countered by using HD coolers. In addition, the higher the density the less reliable the drive. I haven't seen hard evidence to support this, but this is what I've seen. It also makes logical sense.

I agree with this, I've owned many 5,400rpm drive's and have never once had one fail on me. 7,200rpm and up(scsi) are the only drive's I've ever had die on me. All I use for storage are 5,400rpm drive's now, I don't trust anything fatster with large amounts of data. The extra heat is a big reason I only use one 5,400rpm for storage as well.

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: tart666
my WD 800BB died after about 7mo. It saw some heavy SVCD use, but only about 10 discs. And then dead.

PS: first victim of DVD2SVCD was my crucial DDR stick. and now this. pretty weird.

I had my DiamondMax+60 30GB drive die after 10 months of use.. that pissed me off.. stupid junk drive.. i see those +60's fail all the time. a woman i built a computer for is on her 3rd after a year... utter scrap.

 

[Adul]

i have owned HD from every major manufacturer and I have had at least one of each brand go bad on me.

if you are willing to, the maxtor line supposedly has a million hour MTFB which is the highest in the industry for IDE HD. I forgot what the name of that line is.