Interesting report about hard drive reliability

[theSeb]

This topic comes up often with lots of anecdotal evidence from posters. Here is an interesting read

Hitachi drives crush competing models from Seagate and Western Digital when it comes to reliability, according to data from cloud backup provider Backblaze. Their collection of more than 27,000 consumer-grade drives indicated that the Hitachi drives have a sub-two percent annualized failure rate, compared to three to four percent for Western Digital models, and as high as 25 percent for some Seagate units.

Full article
http://arstechnica.com/information-...ty-to-the-test-shows-not-all-disks-are-equal/

I wonder how WD's purchase of HGST will impact the reliability

It might not be best to run out and buy Hitachi drives for their reliability, either. Hitachi sold its drive business to Western Digital last year, and Western Digital subsequently sold the 3.5 inch drive division to Toshiba, and it's too soon to know whether this has had any impact on their longevity.

 

[Weaselboy]

Thanks for the post. Interesting read.

Here is the source if anybody wants to look it over.

 

[Scepticalscribe]

Very interesting read, and thank you for posting it OP.

As one who has indeed experienced HDD 'issues' in the past, I like to keep an eye out information on such matters.

 

[priitv8]

I've been allergic to Seagate since late 1990-s, when they were massively used in Gateway 2000 computers. Good to know, some things don't change
I bet the HGST fares so well in quality department because it is the former IBM Storage division.

 

[Bear]

I've been allergic to Seagate since late 1990-s, when they were massively used in Gateway 2000 computers. Good to know, some things don't change
I bet the HGST fares so well in quality department because it is the former IBM Storage division.

Actually HGST made their own drives before they bought the IBM storage division. And don't you remember the IBM DeskStar drives that were failing like crazy?

 

[priitv8]

And don't you remember the IBM DeskStar drives that were failing like crazy?

Don't remember them, but I remember we had some strange SCSI drives in AS/400 whose heads glued to platters.

 

[Bear]

Don't remember them, but I remember we had some strange SCSI drives in AS/400 whose heads glued to platters.

The technical term for sticking to platters that was used is "stiction". This happened to at least a couple of brands of disks.

 

[spaz8]

Actually HGST made their own drives before they bought the IBM storage division. And don't you remember the IBM DeskStar drives that were failing like crazy?

I never owned one, but I remember the "deathstar" term.

I have used WD pretty exclusively the last several years.