As I'm sure you know, laptop drives are designed to be reliable during frequent stopping/starting, while the life of conventional desktop drives can be reduced considerably under such conditions. Are desktop "green" drives also less reliable when stopped frequently? Their low-power modes imply that they might be more reliable than conventional drives in such applications, such as when "sleep disks when possible" is set.
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Are "green" drives more reliable when frequently started/stopped?
- Thread starter bigwig
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The WD Caviar Green 1TB spins down when not accessed. If in the specs you see similar MTBF ratings between a "green" drive and a regular one, then this shouldn't concern you.
I doubt you'd see a noticeable difference in life, but it's an interesting proposition at the least.