HDD size vs durability question

[tinpanalley]

I'm looking into getting another 3.5 internal HDD to continue storing music, photos, and videos. A drive I'll be reading from and writing to often. I've never considered this before but is there a storage size beyond which a platter based harddrive no longer functions as reliably? Is there such a thing as a HDD that's just too many terabytes before it starts suffering from overheating, long read times, fragmenting issues, etc?
All that being said, I actually only want 1 or 2 TB because it's all I can afford. Is there a site somewhere people refer to for currently preferred brands and model numbers?

 

[dma0991]

I have a Samsung F3 1TB that I like but is currently having corrupted files when it is written on these affected areas, and a number of Samsung F4EG 2TB, WD Green 3TB and Seagate 3TB (in order of age) that are still working just fine. Samsung F4EG is barely a year older than the Samsung F3 1TB.

If a HDD dies before warranty, its probably manufacturing defect as it is never 100% perfect. The best solution is to make backup copies or if mechanical failure is your only concern, RAID 1 provides some safeguard but periodical backups are better.

 

[Charlie98]

I'm looking into getting another 3.5 internal HDD to continue storing music, photos, and videos. A drive I'll be reading from and writing to often. I've never considered this before but is there a storage size beyond which a platter based harddrive no longer functions as reliably? Is there such a thing as a HDD that's just too many terabytes before it starts suffering from overheating, long read times, fragmenting issues, etc?
All that being said, I actually only want 1 or 2 TB because it's all I can afford. Is there a site somewhere people refer to for currently preferred brands and lodel numbers?

Not really... ALL HDDs suffer problems, some maybe more than others (.11 Barracudas, for example) but overall I wouldn't have a problem any of the major brand HDDs today. Find one on sale in the size you want with, preferably, free shipping and go on with life. You can get 1TB regularly on sale for $60 and 2TB on sale for $80 or so; every once in a while, you can catch a 3TB on sale for $99 if you are patient.

 

[KingFatty]

One factor is how many platters. So you could have the same overall capacity, but use a different number of platters to reach it.

So with fewer platters, you have higher storage density on each platter, which could affect reliability due to trying to squeeze more and more information into the same place.

However, with a higher number of platters, you have a higher number of heads that can crash, higher spinning mass, etc.

So who knows?

 

[Blain]

Perpendicular recording is the hero of HD platter density, yet the bane of their reliability.
IMO... Longitudinal recording offered much more forgiveness, thus longer HD life.

 

[tinpanalley]

Thanks everyone, further questions in light of recent discoveries...
I want to give as much info as I can, so please bear with me on all the details, I'm trying to give as much useful info as possible.

I just did a CrystalDiskInfo and HWinfo64 test on my two 1TB HDDs...
C: System drive showed a Current Pending Sector Count of 100 (data=5)
D : Storage drive showed a Current Pending Sector Count of 100 and an Uncorrectable Sector Count of 100 (data=3) as well
The C drive has always had about 240 GB in use. Looks like that's all I've ever needed for my system drive.
The D drive always hovers around 900 GB full.

Questions:
1. Are my HDDs in critical conditions?
2. Is there an SSD/HDD combination I should be considering instead of just HDDs?
3. Any recommendations on just internal HDDs if that's my only option?

Thanks!

 

[tinpanalley]

PS: In the meantime, for the 2TB, I'm looking at the Seagate ST2000DM001. For the 1TB the Seagate ST1000DM003 or ST1000VX000
Any thoughts on those?

 

[tinpanalley]

Would you guys have any problem relying on an SSD as a system drive? The fact that if and when they stop working they just STOP working with no warning scares me a bit.
I'm looking at a WD Red WD20EFRX NAS drive for the 2TB storage. But I'm concerned about this Intellipower thing. That's not a full 7200rpm, is it.

 

[Blain]

Would you guys have any problem relying on an SSD as a system drive?

no problem at all

 

[Red Squirrel]

SSDs are very safe as system drives. Just make sure nothing is going on that writes a lot to it as that's what kills it and makes it stop working. No moving parts, so less chance of random failure. Just research, since some SSDs are known to be bad such as the OCZ ones.

In fact I put SSDs in my servers now, as it's safer than a single spindle drive, and I don't really like having to deal with hardware raid so for the OS I don't use raid. For data I use software raid.

At some point I want to look into PXE or iSCSI boot, you can completely eliminate having a system drive.

 

[tinpanalley]

SSDs are very safe as system drives. Just make sure nothing is going on that writes a lot to it as that's what kills it and makes it stop working.

Well, exactly, other than when I install programs and read them obviously, hardly no writing and deleting goes on on my C drive which is what I'd use this Samsung EVO for

 

[tinpanalley]

What do you guys think of this combo?
Seagate ST2000VN000
Samsung 840 EVO