Hard Drive Reliability

Discussing the reliability of hard drives is akin to discussing the reliability of cars. Which is the most reliable? Which will stand the rigors of the environment they are in? While no one wants to invest in a poor brand, one can safely say that disk drives manufactured today undergo such rigorous testing, and are designed to such high specification, that they are all reliable.

Reliable Branded Disk Drives

However, if you read user forums on the internet, you will always find someone with a sad tale of a failed hard drive and subsequent data loss of even the most reliable disk brand. If you take into account that millions of disk drives are shipped each year (almost 400 million in 2005!), only a tiny percentage failure rate would mean a lot of faulty hard drives!

Safeguarding Against Data Loss

Therefore, our advice is that you prepare for the inevitable. Disk drives are mechanical devices and when you have moving parts, they will eventually break. Unfortunately it is impossible to tell when, however, safeguarding against failure is so simple.

It is not just prudent to ensure that your data is always in two places at one time - it is common sense! If your hard disk breaks, your computer dies or gets stolen and you have a backup, you can simply buy another computer and restore the data. Panic over.

Backing Up Your Information

If you don't have a backup and your computer is stolen, everything is lost. If your disk fails, you can take it to a data recovery agency with prices starting at £400. Yet the current price for a 250GB hard drive is well below £100! You simply do not have a choice when it comes to backing up your data. It must be done to prevent the possibility of utter misery further down the line.