Hey, im not the most experienced in data storage, but i have a 3-4 year old hitachi 500gb drive that im using to hold something like 400gb of data, and ive had not problems with it, but i was wondering when i should transfer the data to another newer drive, that way i dont end up having it fail and loosing all that data. I have the drive in a fedora box, and ive done smart monitoring checks on it but the monitoring tool doesnt seem to be working (says a brand new drive has signs of being old and or pre-fail) so im not to sure about how to check the smart monitoring features for the drive. this drive is a sata drive btw if that helps. thanks
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When do i need to replace an old drive.
- Thread starter tony27310
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longblock454
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IMO smart info doesn't really mean much. Make sure you have the important files backed up. With the price of HDs these days there is really no excuse not have a backup with 400gb of data
BTW, I pulled out an old 4g HD the other day that fired up just fine!
BTW, I pulled out an old 4g HD the other day that fired up just fine!
Syntax Error
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If SMART starts detecting degraded characteristics of your drive, it's a safe bet that your drive isn't reliable for data.
And then, of course, there are the sudden delayed write errors, drop-outs, clicking noises, etc.
Other than that, the best way to avoid sudden and catastrophic disk failure like head crashes is to make sure you have backups of your precious files.
And then, of course, there are the sudden delayed write errors, drop-outs, clicking noises, etc.
Other than that, the best way to avoid sudden and catastrophic disk failure like head crashes is to make sure you have backups of your precious files.
the smart monitoring wasnt a problem till i started checking it with fedora's smartmontools package, the new drive passed error check and didnt have any smart monitoring problems before i set up my file server with fedora. hopefully i didnt destroy the drive with reformats. had to do a couple to get the right system set up. is there any adverse affects to deleting partitions and reformatting, that way i can be more careful next time?
longblock454
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You can partition and format all day long.
Syntax said it better than I did. Once SMART starts to detect problems the drive is usually 99% dead. I've had several that just up and died without any SMART data beforehand.
Syntax said it better than I did. Once SMART starts to detect problems the drive is usually 99% dead. I've had several that just up and died without any SMART data beforehand.
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In my experience, smart errors always mean drive is going dead, pull data off ASAP or leave drive powered off and not moved until u can pull data off.
However, a drive can die without smart errors and a drive can have some minor issues and have no smart errors.
And sometimes I get the smart error about old/outdated firmware, but the drive works fine for many more months/years. I still take the message into consideration and use it for unimportant stuff or sell/give it away.
If it's really important, spend the $90 for a 1TB drive and have a second copy at a minimum..
you would rather starve for a week then lose ur data forever...
u can always eat $90 worth of food later... u cant recover $90 worth of data (without spending hundreds or thousands more)...
If you have to ask the question, just buy the hard drive. Just do it. don't waste time debating or thinking or wishing... just do it... and then u wont have any questions about it.
IMHO, it's not about how long til the drive dies, its about how u recover WHEN it dies...
To answer ur original question, a server/computer life is something like 3-5 years depending on environment, cost, risk and other variables. A hard drive warranty is 3-5 years depending on type of drive/cost. I would swap out hard drives at around the 2 year mark, so I can resell it and still have a year of warranty left, or I swap it out when I can get 2x the space for the original cost of the drive (usually 18-36 months).
However, a drive can die without smart errors and a drive can have some minor issues and have no smart errors.
And sometimes I get the smart error about old/outdated firmware, but the drive works fine for many more months/years. I still take the message into consideration and use it for unimportant stuff or sell/give it away.
If it's really important, spend the $90 for a 1TB drive and have a second copy at a minimum..
you would rather starve for a week then lose ur data forever...
u can always eat $90 worth of food later... u cant recover $90 worth of data (without spending hundreds or thousands more)...
If you have to ask the question, just buy the hard drive. Just do it. don't waste time debating or thinking or wishing... just do it... and then u wont have any questions about it.
IMHO, it's not about how long til the drive dies, its about how u recover WHEN it dies...
To answer ur original question, a server/computer life is something like 3-5 years depending on environment, cost, risk and other variables. A hard drive warranty is 3-5 years depending on type of drive/cost. I would swap out hard drives at around the 2 year mark, so I can resell it and still have a year of warranty left, or I swap it out when I can get 2x the space for the original cost of the drive (usually 18-36 months).
well thanks for your help, what im going to do is plug the drive into another computer to make sure the SMART monitoring is working correctly. The one with data doesnt have any smart errors, its the new one that i just bought, which is why i think that linux isn't reading it correctly. but then again it could just be a bad drive never know. anyway thanks for all your help.