Subj : It's not just you - your HDD really is getting less durable
To   : All
From : TechnologyDaily
Date : Tue Mar 21 2023 16:15:03

It's not just you - your HDD really is getting less durable

Date:
Tue, 21 Mar 2023 16:10:57 +0000

Description:
The way hard drives are manufactured has changed in line with storage 
demands, and component compression has its limits.

FULL STORY
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New approaches to developing hard disk drives (HDDs) and solid state drives 
(SSDs) are making the former less durable, and more prone to failure, new 
research has claimed. 

A report from Secure Data Recovery cites the dogmatic pursuit for increased 
storage capacities and access speeds as the reason for changes made to 
production processes, and increased stress placed on components. 

Testing 2,007 drives from six leading manufacturers, including Western 
Digital and Seagate (who shipped 80% of all drives in 2021), the average hard 
drive spun for 25,233 hours before failing, around two years and ten months. 
New drive manufacturing processes 

The report notes that the storage drive manufacturing industry is constantly 
in search of the next cutting edge technology to make exponential 
improvements to products in the face of physical constraints - chiefly, size. 

Note that most drives available to buy have been in a 3.5 or 2.5 inch 
industry standard form factor, despite storage capacity only increasing. 

Wanting larger capacity drives without actually making them larger is always 
going to be tricky. When more platters and read-and-write heads are being 
compressed into the same space, these components can end up damaging and 
wearing each other. 

The first major development on this road, in 2005, was Conventional Magnetic 
Recording (CMR), offering high densities than previous methods of data 
recording and making the release of the first 1TB hard drive possible in 
2007. 

But now the industry standard is shingled magnetic recording (SMR), 
characterised as having a more complex, overlapping platter surface, making 
wear more likely. Read more 

> Exclusive: Western Digital could be looking to mix tape and HDD tech to 
create 100TB+ media 

> The race to 30TB: Seagate to blow WD's new record-breaking HDD out of the 
water 

> Weve also listed the best data recovery software right now 

SSD wear is easier to analyse - a finite amount of data can be written to 
them, and so ultimately lifespans can vary from a couple of years to over 
five, depending on how theyre used. 

As physical storage continues to become less and less reliable, its important 
to invest in cloud storage and backup solutions. Secure Data Recovery note 
the 3-2-1 rule: Keep three copies of important data on two devices, with one 
of those copies saved offsite. Weve also listed the best external hard drives 
right now



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Link to news story:
https://www.techradar.com/news/its-not-just-you-your-hdd-is-getting-less-durab
le


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