I thought I would run a poll to see what peoples opinion are about which external hard drives are the best.
I know which ones we use with the minimum failure rates, but am interested to see which ones you guys use.
We have a data recovery division so we see literally thousands of failed drives per year.
I will just put down the manufacturers here and see what you fine people think.
Regards,
Simon
I can't genuinely say which are best, but we use Seagate drives…the Nearline ones which are supposed to be server grade. (They have NS at the end of the model number)
They've been fine, although we've had a couple fail recently
I am sure that most of you know this but be very careful of the 500Gb 7200.11 range of Seagates. There is a firmware issue with them.
I wont give away any more than that for now….
Regards,
Simon
PS If you drives have failed… you know where to get the data recovered from!
Kroll Ontrack yeah?
Given that I've had
3 seagate failures
2 LaCie (though they're largely WD drives)
2 WD failures (raptors strangely enough)
in the past 10 days I'm going to go out on a limb to say that it doesn't matter what kind of hard drive is 'the best'. The truth is they all fail, and the only thing that matters is whether or not you've got a backup.
Cynicism aside I've been a seagate fan but I hear hitachi's are somewhat solid.
Kroll Ontrack yeah?
LOL!
I had 3 maxtor hard drives fail on me personally and by in large the most faulty drives Ive seen professionally have been maxtor. So more through a sense of superstition than science I always avoid these, and thru the same twisted logic having never come across a faulty western digital, they are my drive of choice - (used to be LaCie wink )
But this is probably accurate
The truth is they all fail, and the only thing that matters is whether or not you've got a backup.
"I am sure that most of you know this but be very careful of the 500Gb 7200.11 range of Seagates. There is a firmware issue with them."
The 7200.12 are very good and have resolved the .11 firmware issues. They had not had them on 1TB and 1.5TB on New Egg until recently so I am not sure how they have been performing overall in a larger consumer base.
Greetings,
I generally stick with one type of drive until it lets me down consistently. WD Passports, MyBooks, Caviar (Green and Black), and three VelocioRaptors have all been working well for me. The Passports and MyBooks were heavily used during collection trips to Asia that required reliability and they kept delivering.
-David
But this is probably accurate
The truth is they all fail, and the only thing that matters is whether or not you've got a backup.
Sssshhhhh Dont tell everyone!