Can a HDD Get Bad Sectors by Doing Nothing?

Shaina11 · Jun 11, 2014

So, here's my question. If I have Hard Drives that are used primarily for backups of other hard drives, and aren't being written to or read from that much, would they still develop bad sectors? Or would it develop more slowly?

Also, can it develop bad sectors just by sitting on a shelf in a temp-controlled room not being used? Please reply soon, thanks.

mrmez · Jun 12, 2014

There's doing nothing, and then there's doing nothing.

Theoretically, even an unused drive in a temp controlled environment is still experiencing movement on a molecular level, and thus arguably deterioration, unless of course you stop all molecular movement at 0K (-273c).

In practical terms, all drives have a MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure) number. I.e. The more you use it, the sooner it will fail. Google? did a MTBF HDD study, and as far as i recall, temp seemed to be the only reliable and major factor in HDD lifespan.

To keep a drive running as long as possible, keep it cool and use it as little as possible.
Usually for backup or consumer drives, you end up running out of space before you experience enough bad sectors that the HDD can't work around.

For my backup HDD's... I'll normally replace the drive yearly and store it offsite. All critical files are also backed up online, and the incremental HDD backups mean the drive actually isn't pushed that hard by the ~8 machines, even though they backup automatically every hour.

Shaina11 · Jun 12, 2014

mrmez :

Thanks for the reply. So basically, I'm thinking of replacing my backup HDDs every year, but the ones that I use for my OS I won't replace as often as it most likely won't hold a lot of important data. Some of my backup drives will hold Movies Music Photos and things like that, and there for won't be written to very much.

So even if a HDD is sitting on a shelf not being used it can still develop bad sectors? And can the magnetic field disappear over time?

mrmez · Jun 12, 2014

If it's sitting on the shelf it technically IS degrading, but so slowly we may as well say it isn't.

http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/research.google.com/en//archive/disk_failures.pdf
Read this, it may give you a guide as to how often you should replace.

I'd summarise it as follows...

If you can keep the drive cool, replace BEFORE 5 years.
If you can't keep the drive cool replace BEFORE 3 years.

Shaina11 · Jun 12, 2014

mrmez :

Hoo wee, that's a lot of info right there! Yeah I'm sure I'll remember all of that, what are you talking about?

(Not really.)

But seriously though, thanks.

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