Another reminder...Backup your stuff!

[thermodynamics]

My external HD failed on me today. I've helped people out when HD's have failed on them, but this is the first time one has failed on me.

Symptom: Kachunk............Kachunk................Kachunk

It WAS a Seagate (I've never had issues with any Seagate) 250GB.

Pretty sure the heads and platters are now joined in wedlock.

That disk didn't hold my personal documents or anything critical (that stuff exists on my ThinkPad HD...which I should backup now too). It held my music (which largely exists on CDs anyway) and photos (I backed up everything through 2006 on DVD). So I'll be missing 2007 photos, but I haven't taken that many. I'm still deciding whether it's worth it to have the data retrieved from the disk (~$400)...probably not.

I'm going to replace it with something with RAID 1. I was considering one of the many NAS boxes out there. But I've read quite a number of horror stories about them.

So I'm considering building a PC from scratch to act as a "server" with RAID 1, and all that jazz. It would likely also function as something like a Media Center PC.

BACK UP YOUR STUFF!

 

[looseliam]

I've always been a fan of backing up. I still use tape for it's worked all these years.

It only takes that one crash for you to be anal about backups.

 

[thermodynamics]

So do you have a favorite HD brand? Or are they all about the same? I HAD a "favorite" but now I don't.

 

[looseliam]

Hell, I have always used Seagate Cheetahs and Barracudas. They've been great to me.

I've also had good luck with maxtor, which is now owned by Seagate.

I find IBM drives too noisy. I recently replaced two of my hot-swap drives with Fujitsu and am rather pleased with the performance and lack of noise.

 

[thermodynamics]

What's the skinny on Western DIgital these days? I know they weren't great many years ago, but how about now? ANy horror stories?

 

[Spiff]

I've still yet to become anal about backing up, despite experiencing a hd failure a couple years ago. But after that crash, I realized I lost so relatively little important stuff compared to bulky non-important stuff which could be fairly easily replaced.

So if I back things up now, it's not everything. Rather, just stuff which is important and non-replaceable. And this gets backed up on more reliable media (ie anything not that is not a harddrive).

 

[mike_n_herrin]

Western digital is still the only brand drives that i've tried that have not failed on me. I lost 1 seagate a few years go and i've lost 2 maxtors. a buddy of mine from work had a maxtor one touch fail on him recently. those are the only three brands i've ever used.

any chance of putting it in the freezer for a bit and trying to get the data off it after a bit of cooling? i mean if the platers and things are hitting together...i've heard that has worked for folks before.

 

[thermodynamics]

I tried the freezer trick for a few minutes yesterday. Didn't help. But I'll give it another shot, this time for a few hours. I mean, the thing's already dead--it's impossible to hurt it more.

 

[MikeS72]

My HD gave up the ghost recently and I have bought a new PC since my old one was 5 years old. Having read this Thread I decided out of interest to try to get my old PC working again by freezing the HD. Had it in the freezer for 2 hours but when I replaced it no change in the situation. However I find that I can buy a new 160G HD for £30 ($60) so I intend to have a go at replacing it.
I fully support BACKUP YOUR STUFF! For a couple of weeks my old PC had been 'clicking' which I have now heard referred to as the kiss of death for your HD. I took the precaution of backing up all my important files but I lost a lot of really 'hot' stuff in my crash !