SSD on top?

[mr.steevo]

I'm considering an SSD for my 2012 base mini. I like watching the beach ball of death but wonder if the other side of seamless processing is better.

Should the SSD be on the upper bay given that they are more work to install but last forever and the platter be on the lower bay given that it takes 4 minutes to swap it when it fails? Or visa versa?

 

[marclondon]

Should the SSD be on the upper bay given that they are more work to install but last forever and the platter be on the lower bay given that it takes 4 minutes to swap it when it fails? Or visa versa?

I wouldn't worry about a drive failing - you'd have to be quite unlucky. But most Minis are shipped with the HDD in the lower bay so if you want two drives you have to take it all apart and so you can put the SSD in the upper bay.

If you want one drive you can just swap the HDD in the lower bay for the SSD, which is easier.

M.

 

[mr.steevo]

I wouldn't worry about a drive failing - you'd have to be quite unlucky. But most Minis are shipped with the HDD in the lower bay so if you want two drives you have to take it all apart and so you can put the SSD in the upper bay.

If you want one drive you can just swap the HDD in the lower bay for the SSD, which is easier.

M.

I've never had a hard drive not fail.

I'll just stick it in the lower bay.

 

[marclondon]

I've never had a hard drive not fail.

Really? How many? I must have used 100 or more hard drives in the past 15 years or so and only one has had a hardware failure, after I dropped it and it was never the same again. I have had many software problems - directory corruption mainly - but that's entirely different.

M.

 

[dyt1983]

edit: To remove personally identifying info not relevant to the conversation.

 

[marclondon]

It is MUCH MUCH MUCH warmer in most of the US than the UK.

I'd like to see evidence that the US has higher disk failure rates. In fact, low temperature seems to be a bigger factor.

M.

 

[smirking]

Really? How many? I must have used 100 or more hard drives in the past 15 years or so and only one has had a hardware failure

That's a pretty impressive streak even if you exclusively use only high end server grade hard drives. I do agree that the OP is exaggerating, but if you only had one failure out of 100, there's a secret that you have that the hard drive companies would pay you lots of money for.

I'd say about 20% of my drives have failed, but none of them without warning. They always give me warning that they're starting to be reaching the end of the lives and I immediately move everything of value off of them.

 

[marclondon]

That's a pretty impressive streak even if you exclusively use only high end server grade hard drives. I do agree that the OP is exaggerating, but if you only had one failure out of 100, there's a secret that you have that the hard drive companies would pay you lots of money for.

I'd say about 20% of my drives have failed, but none of them without warning. They always give me warning that they're starting to be reaching the end of the lives and I immediately move everything of value off of them.

I've had several external drives go down but because of the electronics in the case - breaking them open and removing the drive itself has always produced a working drive. I have often upgraded disks with better HDDs or more recently with SSDs so maybe my secret if not to run them for too long but I still have a collection of old Macs and Windows PCs that boot up fine with old and much used HDDs.

M.

 

[dyt1983]

edit: To remove personally identifying info not relevant to the conversation.

 

[marclondon]

the one location that's both hot and without air conditioning has the highest rate of hard disk failure.

How many Minis and disks are you talking about here? Annual disk failure rates for models that aren't outliers (i.e. with known problems) are only about 1% or 2%. So most people with only one or two computers will probably never have one.

M.

 

[donlab]

I'm considering an SSD for my 2012 base mini. I like watching the beach ball of death but wonder if the other side of seamless processing is better.

Should the SSD be on the upper bay given that they are more work to install but last forever and the platter be on the lower bay given that it takes 4 minutes to swap it when it fails? Or visa versa?

I would do just as you say. Put the SSD on top and HD in lower for this reason. My 1TB HD died after about a year of use in a fusion drive setup. The mini is a confined space and the HD generates quite a bit of heat. Enough heat in my opinion to cause the drive to fail prematurely. Ive since gone with a 1TB SSD in its place.

 

[dyt1983]

edit: To remove personally identifying info not relevant to the conversation.

 

[marclondon]

I have a box of dead Hitachi 500GB 7200RPM drives.

How many? I don't think that's a drive with any reliability issues - you should send them to Hitachi, or WD I think as it bought the business. Bear in mind they were intended mainly as laptop drives, with all that entails in knocks and different temps.

M.

 

[mr.steevo]

Whoa! This turned into much more than I intended.

It's true that I have never had a hard drive that hasn't failed. I use them until they die. My G4 iBook hdd failed in 2007 and my 2007 iMac hdd failed in 2011. I was always under the impression that the standard thinking is that with platter hard drives it's not if but when they will fail.

Now that I think about it, neither of my external drives from 2005 work either.

Anyway. Continue your debate.

----------

I would do just as you say. Put the SSD on top and HD in lower for this reason. My 1TB HD died after about a year of use in a fusion drive setup. The mini is a confined space and the HD generates quite a bit of heat. Enough heat in my opinion to cause the drive to fail prematurely. Ive since gone with a 1TB SSD in its place.

Thanks for the thoughts. I'm torn because one way is so much more simpler than the other!

 

[mr.steevo]

Of course, if he had two hard drives over the course of 10 years and they both failed, his statement would still be true!

That's me. I keep my computers a long time.