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Re: Selecting a hard drive

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On Sun, 11 Sep 2011 10:51:07 -0400, Haines Brown wrote:

> My initial query seems to have disappeared, and I apologize if this is a
> duplicate.
> 
> I'm thinking of installing a second hard drive in my system for
> installing linux, and I have some simple questions for choosing another
> drive. I'm presently using a Seagate Barracuda SATA 3.0., 32 MB cache,
> and I've been happy with it.
> 
> I have no compelling reason to move from Seagate, but I see some
> complaints about Barracuda reliability. Seagate Constellation is
> apparently an upgrade, but is too new for much feedback. Is WD
> considered more reliable these days than Seagate?
> 
> The Seagate Constellation supposedly has higher data integrity, but is a
> bit mysterious about just what is involved. Is there anything I have to
> worry about in switching to the new Constellation regarding such
> features as "PowerChoice" that might be incompatible with my existing
> hardware and operating system?
> 
> 64 MB cache is available, and it seems to have much better read/write
> times, but I can't always find the data to compare. Is a move from 32 to
> 64 MB an obvious step to take if affordable?
> 
> There is also the option to move to SATA 6.0 from 3.0. My impression is
> that my kernel, 2.6.32-5-686-bigmem provides a controller for SATA 6.0,
> but wonder if anyone knows of problems. I assume the cable interface
> remains the same.
> 
> I imagine a slower rotation speed is good for drive life, noise, etc. as
> long as the specs are otherwise the same. What are the advantages of
> choosing one speed over another?
> 
> Haines Brown

I've had 3 or 4 1TB Seagates die on me, the last one was a replacement 
drive that Seagate sent me when I RMAed a dead drive. It lasted 4 days 
before it died completely, I haven't bothered to RMA it or my other bad 
Seagates because I've completely lost confidence in them. I've just had a 
Hitachi 2TB/64M cache drive die on me last week, I have several others 
which are still OK and I replaced the bad one with another Hitachi however 
I've lost confidence in them also. A have a couple of new machines with 
2TB Western Digital drives, however I haven't had them long enough to say 
if WD drives are reliable or not. Frankly I'm not sure if anyone builds a 
reliable drive anymore. I backup everything critical to multiple machines 
both on and offsite so a drive failure never causes me any trouble, just 
the time to swap out and commission a new drive (I always run badblocks on 
a drive before I format it, a single pattern on badblocks takes about 12 
hours on a 2TB drive so that's what I run. The default is four patterns 
but that would take two days so I don't do that). 

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Selecting a hard drive Haines Brown <haines@HistoricalMaterialism.info> - 2011-09-11 10:51 -0400
  Re: Selecting a hard drive david <none@nospam.com> - 2011-09-11 15:32 +0000
  Re: Selecting a hard drive General Schvantzkoph <schvantzkoph@yahoo.com> - 2011-09-12 00:35 +0000
  Re: Selecting a hard drive Dirk Weber <dirk-weber@web.de> - 2011-09-13 21:40 +0200
    Re: Selecting a hard drive GangGreene <GangGreene@invalid.com> - 2011-09-13 18:42 -0400
      Re: Selecting a hard drive Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2011-09-13 23:00 -0400
        Re: Selecting a hard drive GangGreene <GangGreene@invalid.com> - 2011-09-14 16:20 -0400
          Re: Selecting a hard drive Roger Blake <rogblake@iname.invalid> - 2011-09-15 01:11 +0000
            Re: Selecting a hard drive Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2011-09-15 00:03 -0400
            Re: Selecting a hard drive david <none@nospam.com> - 2011-09-15 10:21 +0000
          Re: Selecting a hard drive Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2011-09-14 23:58 -0400
          Re: Selecting a hard drive David Brown <david@westcontrol.removethisbit.com> - 2011-09-15 09:02 +0200
            Re: Selecting a hard drive GangGreene <GangGreene@invalid.com> - 2011-09-15 05:24 -0400
              Re: Selecting a hard drive Bill Marcum <bill@lat.localnet> - 2011-09-15 09:15 -0400
      Re: Selecting a hard drive Dirk Weber <dirk-weber@web.de> - 2011-09-14 15:15 +0200
    Re: Selecting a hard drive Haines Brown <haines@HistoricalMaterialism.info> - 2011-09-14 07:53 -0400
      Re: Selecting a hard drive Dirk Weber <dirk-weber@web.de> - 2011-09-14 20:27 +0200

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