VERY bad luck with HD failures

[tangomango]

In the past two years I had a 500GB Maxtor fail and just over a month ago I had a 640GB Seagate fail on me.

I just purchased a 150GB WD about a week ago and I've already got two BSOD (this was a preliminary to my Seagate HD failing). I noticed that my PC either BSODs or restarts when I am extracting large files that are around 4-5gigs (rapidshare parts).

I just had my computer restart and at bootup it was telling me to insert a bootable drive. I shut down for about a minute, then started up...well, here I am! Working fine and dandy.

I'm about to go out and buy an another HD just in case this one fails as well. But I'm wondering why all the BSODs and the restarting during extraction of files?

Thanks greatly to anyone who can help! I'm fed up with HD failures.

 

[Paperdoc]

This is not normal. Start looking for other sources of trouble in your HDD system. Any bad data or power supply cables? Loose or dirty cable connections? Any possibility the mobo is faulty?

Just another thought triggered by your file size comment. You don't have the disk formatted for FAT32 File System, do you? FAT32 can only handle files up to 4 GB, so if you tried to extract a 3.5 GB .zip file, thus creating a 5.5 GB new file, a FAT32-based File System would have big trouble.

 

[tangomango]

Hm, no, I don't have the disk formatted for FAT32.

I firmly reattached all cables. Some others told me that it may be a problem with the power supply. Is this possible?

 

[Paperdoc]

Well, yes, a weak or failing PSU could cause you intermittent problems. So could intermittent RAM chips. Try downloading and running Memtest 86+. Set it to run all its tests in sequence and let it run overnight to see if it finds any RAM errors. If it does, repeat the test using only one stick of RAm at a tie to see if you can identify which stick has trouble.