Is there no point in trying to find most reliable HDD?

STRONG_SMASH

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Nov 26, 2015
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I was looking throu HDD reviews, "VS" threads and stuff, and results are quite confusing.

If you do the same research, you find that there is people who will say that brand X (WD, Seagate, Hitachi, Toshiba) is most realible brand and they love it, and you will also find people who say brand X is the worst brand ever that will fail in 1 or 2 years.

The only one brand/series that seems to get only positive feedback are WD Black. They are also one of the most expensive kind of HDD you can find.

User reviews on the store pages also not helping. Most of them are "Positive side: seems like a good HDD. Negative side: stopped working after 1yr/2yr." And those kind of reviews are everywhere i look, on every popular model of every manufacturer. Maybe there are 1% of people whos drives are failing, and those people are the ones who write reviews, while other 99% not having any problems? Just a thought.

Is there a up to date consensus about HDD reliability? Will all HDD fail after 2 years? Is there a point in trying to choose between manufacturers?
 
Solution
Just don't worry too much about it. Get a Seagate Barracuda, WD Caviar Blue or Hitachi Ultrastar HDD and you'll be fine.

If you are very nitpicky and do a lot of research you'll see questionable things about almost any parts. From power supply to motherboard. You always have failing ones.

RCFProd

Expert
Ambassador
Just don't worry too much about it. Get a Seagate Barracuda, WD Caviar Blue or Hitachi Ultrastar HDD and you'll be fine.

If you are very nitpicky and do a lot of research you'll see questionable things about almost any parts. From power supply to motherboard. You always have failing ones.
 
Solution

migronesien

Honorable
There isn't really a most reliable HDD. Most people seem to go with WD blue/black. I personally always bought Seagate Barracudas and never had any issues with them. My oldest HDD (also Seagate Barracuda) is like 5 or 6 years old and still works without any problems.
Having 3 of these in my PC without any issues. :)
 
The problem with hard drives is that they have moving parts. Moving parts inevitably break. Unfortunately, it is difficult to predict exactly how long that will take. One drive might last two days while another of the exact same production line lasts twenty years. The same can be said for components without moving parts but it tends to be less of a guarantee. Its a lot easier to find, say, a CPU from 20 years ago that still works after 20 years of 24/7 use than a hard drive or case fan of similar age and usage.

There is not a point with choosing between manufacturers. They all have good drives and they all have bad drives. They don't necessarily have equal proportions of good to bad, but that is more dependent on the specific model than the company. For example, if you buy an enterprise SATA drive, it has a much lower chance of failure regardless of which manufacturer it came from than a lower end model from any manufacturer.
 
You are correct. What you read are ANECDOTAL reviews, meaning personal, and how many bad reviews you read, 50? a small sample size out of millions? And people having no problems tend to keep it themselves. There is a "study" (larger sample size) out there somewhere that says the Seagates are having more problems, but then these days companies constantly tweak their products, and what they sampled may not be what Seagate is selling TODAY, and Seagate won't admit, yeah that batch number 76245 wasn't the greatest.

So my religions is, don't lose any sleep over it. All HD fails, is matter of when not if. So as long as you buy insurance (maintain backups), buy whatever you like based on price/features. So, spend your extra money on insurance, not perfection.
 


Are you referring to the Backblaze Study (Link)?

Please read the responses by Jack Naylor PE down near the bottom of This Post (Link). Jack explains why that "Study" is set up so poorly as to be totally irrelevant.

I have been using the Seagate 'Cuda in my sig for about 3 years now and I have not had any problems with it. It is very quiet and reliable.

Yogi

 


You're welcome!

Good luck with your new HDD and with selecting a Best Answer!

Yogi