Hard drives

draggar · Nov 14, 2009

I've had two WDs go out (heat issues) in a row - one was less than 2 years old and the other was less than 2.5 years old. One was a 5400 RpM 500GB and the other was a 7200 RpM 160 GB. IMO drives like this should last longer than that.

Both were Western Digital. I used to love their drives but due to this and I've seen a higher percentage of them fail at work (mostly laptops) I'm thinking of going with a new vendor (I'm very brand loyal).

At work I think most of our drives are WD, Seagate, Samsung, Hitachi, and Fujitsu. I see Hitachi and Fijutsu drives fail all the time and an increasing number of WD drives (the drives are either 5400 RpM IDE (older laptops) or 5400 / 7200 RpM SATA - all 2.5").

This leaves Samsung and Seagate. I had a Seagate SSD (USB) and it worked great for years until the cable started to wear out and I've never had a Samsung drive (as far as I know).

Any suggestions on who the top / most reliable vendor is?

south · Nov 14, 2009

Friends don't let friends use western digital. My stack of dead WD's is much taller than my stack of dead seagate/maxtor/quantum. Yes, Maxtor bought quantum (they used to make the best scsi imho), then they bought Seagate. Dude, get a seagate. Preferably the enterprise version. It will cost you about 40-50% more than the standard drive, but worth the peace of mind. And stay far away from the samsung! Ditto for hitachi (formerly IBM if I remember correctly)

The vendor is irrelevant. They sell the same drives to everyone. If you can;t find the ES drive locally, let me know. I have an account with them directly, or could order from one of my vendors.

Cheers!

draggar · Nov 14, 2009

By vendor I meant manufacturer.

I've had VERY back luck with Maxtors in the past - when I worked at Staples we had so many come back and go bad within a year - but that was what, 13-15 years ago? This is when I went to WDs and they were great.

The sad thing is that earlier this year I purchased a WD "green" 1TB drive (going at 5400 RpM). I think I should start looking into a mass-backup option (DVD-RWs?) A month or so ago I bought a WD external 500GB drive for work, too. Before that I had a 60GB Maxtor external that I used for work, it went bad once in the warranty period and they sent me a replacement but it lasted me 5 years and I replaced it when it started to "beep" (power issues). I'm sure I could still use it for short-term storage but I wouldn't trust it with anything important.