HD - unreliable storage

  • Thread starter Thread starter bdemenil
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bdemenil

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Just thought I would share this with you all.
As you all know, audio takes up lots of space. For a while now I've been using IDE HDs for storage. I got myself these removable IDE HD kits to make it easier to swap out HDs.

The thing is, HDs are very sensitive. Taking them in and out a computer and moving them around is a recipe for disaster. Over the last 2 years, I've had many HDs die on me - have lost lots of important data. I've experimented with different brands : IBM, Maxtor, and Seagate - and have had problems with all of them.

My conclusion is that while HDs are fairly reliable as long as they remain in your computer and don't move around, they are not at all suitable for long-term storage and backup.

I record at 24bit 96K. My requirement is that I would like to be able to backup at least one full song to my storage medium.

So what are the alternatives? CDR doesn't have much capacity. Tape is slow and sometimes expensive - especially if you want quality and capacity. I've decided to go over to DVD-R. It's cheap, pretty fast (getting faster), and, if it's anything like CD, pretty reliable for long term storage (as long as don't use it as a table decoration or a frisbee). It doesn't have much capacity (4.7GB), but it's enough to get one song onto - so I can at least store my data in logical units.
 
...striking fear into the hearts of all..
All so true. Gulp.
DVD-R huh?
Wayne
 
Yeah, hard drives should *NEVER* be trusted.

For now it's really all you got...you can do RAID to increase data reliability...and backup regularly and all that shit...

The future are these big flash memory drives, like those used in the new Radar system. No moving parts, silent, sizes up to like 300GB, right now just SCSI but there'll probably be IDE or similar at some point, etc etc. Mega expensive.

Slackmaster 2000
 
Dirves are very reliable, considering the working of them. But swapping (hot or cold) and transport are not the best way to achieve best reliability. Same goes for shocks and monting a drive that has always been horizontal sunndely vertical.

Raid helps only if redundancy is used! Most of the ide arrays used run in striping to increase speed, but reliability drops invers proportional to the number of drives used.

300GB flash??!! Nice. Will it be ne of those or a new car?
 
If HD's are so unreliable, then why aren't people complaing about iPods and similar portable devices dying all the time?

Why dont you use something like this instead?
 
This is an interesting question. I've been using an Alesis HD24 for the last year which writes to standard IDE hard drives. I've had about a dozen drives through it and I routinely juggle 6 drives in and out of it fairly regularly. No problems of any kind so far but that remains to be seen. The majority of the drives I've had in it are Maxtors and Quantum Fireballs. Not sure about the others as they left with clients.
Also as far as archiving goes, I've been using CD-Rs. I track at 24/44.1 so I've generally been able to fit a project on to a single disc, but when they are larger I make two folders and store half the data in one and the rest in the other and put a folder on a disc each. The DVD is looking attractive for that job I must say.
 
every hard drive maker has had runs or models that are known to commonly fail-i have experience with very sensitive drives and less sensitive ones. i remember an old quantum maverick (a quality drive) that i moved that starting howling like a banshee after moving it-i guess a bearing got slightly imsaligned or something. it never gave me an error, though, just made noise until i replaced it.

there are vibration specs that drives are tested to perform to. certain drives are much better than others. ipods may simply have drives that are more suited to jostling. i know in the laptops we were speccing out for highway patrolmen at a place i worked had some kind of gel padding for various parts to increase reliability. they were known as "ruggedized" laptops.
 
brzilian said:
If HD's are so unreliable, then why aren't people complaing about iPods and similar portable devices dying all the time?
Why dont you use something like this instead?
Click to expand...

Brzilian, you make a good point, which is that it is apparently possible to manufacture 'spinning disc' HDs that are more resistant to shock than the standard fare. The IPod is a good example. I don't have one, but I assume it holds up fairly well under harsh conditions. However, price considerations aside, I would still put more faith in optical storage.

And then there is the matter of price...
Price Comparison:
1) Toshiba 5.0GB MK5002MPL Hard Drive(what's in IPod)$189.00
2) 4.7GB DVD-R : ~$0.50

I did get myself one of those external USB kits you can put any IDE HD into. It's too slow to actually work off of - so in that sense it isn't as good as the swappable drive kits. But maybe it puts less stress on the drive than the whole swapping thing.

Anyway, I've had too many HDs fail on me - I'm not taking anymore chances.
 
bdemenil said:
And then there is the matter of price...
Price Comparison:
1) Toshiba 5.0GB MK5002MPL Hard Drive(what's in IPod)$189.00
2) 4.7GB DVD-R : ~$0.50
Click to expand...

umm...i'd like to shop where you're shopping! DVD-R's are about $5.00 a peice everywhere i've looked :P Still a huge improvement over 189, however.

dlv
 
Oops!

Sorry about that!

I was way off on that one! I don't actually own a dvd-r drive so I only see the ad's for them at retail stores..thats a big difference though!

dlv
 
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