How Long Do Hard Drives Last?

[@Magnetar83]

Wow. My HD will be 10 years this summer. I've been using it almost every single day.

[@toshineon]

Nothing is safe anymore.

[@FatalDeath]

+toshineon No more hard drives= No world...

[@georgeabraham6808]

this is why i dont use c0ndoms.

[@GimiBsk]

Never has been

[@FIetch2002]

My HDD is 17 years old & it works fine with windows 98...

[@FIetch2002]

It's a Quantum Fireball with 6.7GB's

[@xparade0de]

read out the operating hours, if the number is to high it will fail soon, save Your data to another drive !

[@InsaneFire10YT]

how do u survive with an OS that is 19 yrs old???

[@crazyskullgamer7927]

InsaneFire10yt Because it looks great. much better than any newer one

[@silasmcgee3647]

xparade0de I have looked at the operating hours on my IBM’s western digital 400 hard drive I think it may have well over 10 K I can’t remember I’ll have to check it again when I get home from my dads

[@darianalexander5503]

Omg, my 8 year old hard drive failed two days after the release of this video...

[@ThioJoeTech]

Darian Alexander Wow the odds of that... were actually not that surprising!

[@darianalexander5503]

***** Oh I gets freakier. You know your newest video about Windows 10? I ened up geting an early build of Windows 10, to replace the operating system that I lost due to the hard drive failure. THEN I SAW YOUR VIDEO! Freaky.

[@DJBla2e01]

My parents have a 2006 custom built PC with it's original 80 GB HDD with Windows XP and it's pretty much full and it still works!

[@darianalexander5503]

Dylan Byrne nice bro.

[@DJBla2e01]

Darian Alexander Yeah it's mostly full of programs, files, etc. Some of them are my files, the rest is my parent's stuff! They're upgrading the hard drive as well as some other stuff in the PC soon and they're going to get me to do it :)

[@macrowave9427]

Hard drives can last almost forever, depending on their quality and how you take care of them. I have a old Maxtor 20gb drive that is 17 years old, and it is still working perfectly fine, and it has been used A LOT. The drive fell on the floor two times in its life (when it was off), and it still works with no issues. I bought a 2.5 inch Seagate 1tb drive, and it failed after two years, even though I never dropped it on the floor, and never moved it when it was running. I had another drive in a laptop that failed, and it was because the laptop was jostled around so much.

[@aaryanrh]

your 17 year old drive is a ghost and can live forever😂

[@Pryside]

You are talking about HDD Tests from Servers. But Servers run their HDDs 24/7 but almost nobody does this with their computer.

[@ThioJoeTech]

***** True, they're not perfect tests. But also, they probably don't have the drives running 24/7 if there's no data being backed up to it.

[@Pryside]

***** I dunno. Because the Drives always have to be ready. And a HDD needs a few seconds to start... So maybe they shut them down while nobody uses the Data...

[@whovaintimelord]

They also have drives in RAID so the data on one could be copied to another and a test could be made on one of the hard drives.

[@mturgeonferland]

***** There are drives that will slow RPM and even stop it (often called green drives) And we had a lot of problems with them in servers because it takes a lot of time for it to spin to wanted RPM when you need them. Therefore we stopped using them. I guess any serious company would not use them because of that.

[@Pryside]

Win Stabell What has dust to do with the lifetime of a HDD? They are usually sealed because there is sometimes special gas in there... And even windows has a feature and turns of ur HDD, when it's not used for a certain time

[@Moxzot]

i have a 12 year old hdd running 24/7 for 7.5 years working just fine and still runs nice and cool not getting hot at all

[@chandrakantchandrakar9352]

I am running it for 9 hours I was scaring

[@marwi16a53]

My oldest hard drive from 1980 still works. I have a ton of hard drives from 1990 to today and not very many failures.

My old pc had it's first hardware faillure after 14 years, and that was the hard drive. 14 YEARS!!!!

[@DJBla2e01]

Brïan Bultman My PC is 14 years old with the original drive in it and it's still alive to this day :)))))

[@realgroovy24]

Brïan Bultman Its not about how old it is its about how many hours its been powered on for, I've got drives a decade old most of them are anyway with 200 or so hours on it and I've got some with several years on it as for my drive its had 2.7 years power on time and is from 2005.

My old HDD is used a lot. I was kinda addicted to rollercoaster tycoon.

[@realgroovy24]

Brïan Bultman Yeah but in total its probably been powered on for about 800 hours to 1500 hours which is what the average user uses within a couple of years.

on this pc i have 1200+ hours on steam in 8 months and i used the old one a lot. I only turned it off at night.

[@doomguy8324]

Wow..tapes are the best way to save data...We're going back to the 80's lol...leather and metal el' make a come back soon...

[@theratscratch]

I have eight hard drives that have been living under my bed, all different brands and models, and all between 9 and 12 years old. They all still mount just fine! I think usage has a lot to do with how long a drive will last.

[@GraphicManInnovations]

exactly, i really disagree with a some info on that video, asl leo channel is saying just the opposite

[@slimeball6408]

More than 8 years (my computer)

[@mitchell7194]

slimeball lucker

[@fightttttt]

yeah my first pc lasted like 12 years and only got rid of it because it was old, I think you need to be unlucky for this to happen but still interesting

[@slimeball6408]

i onlt have 160 gb out of 750 XD

[@Surms41]

slimeball I have a 10 year old drive that operated at 90c for 8 years. Still works, and still 'fast'... I don't know how.

[@31878Network]

9years my computer 125gb hard drive has serious issues

[@abebabe3069]

Came to get a comparison between drives, Got an instruction on how to also long-term archive my data. Great Vid!

[@cookiemonster33496]

My hard drive just failed yesterday and my hard drive is like 8 years. Never knew about this!! Thanks for the video

[@14xx07]

Thank you so much for such a compressed knowledge and for sharing them with us!

[@framedheart]

"You want to back up your data", let's say it clearly "You want to back up your data on a NEW hard drive."

[@muralikrishnaa]

Thank you, Thio.. It was so interesting. I was searching about this topic on the internet last month and finally u made a video about it this month. Great job dude!

[@AshEivani]

The most informative video regarding the HDD ages,...Awesome mate. Thanks

[@theswordlessshinobi3589]

can you make an updated version of the video? for the 2018 HDD/SSD products. thanks in advance. useful tech information :)

[@SilentCheechGaming1991]

I still have an old DOS pc from the late 80s, I used it as a child throughout the 90s, and i occasionally fire it up for some old school gaming, and the HDD still works to this day.

[@feelsaxelman]

Sell it to me? I need to get my hands on a dos pc. I need to learn how to use dos (And for some good old school gaming! Hehe! PCMASTERRACfromthe80s

[@bowmanruto]

my hdd is 7 years old... guessing i have a lucky drive

[@realgroovy24]

bowmanruto Its not about how old it is its about how many hours its been powered on for, I've got drives a decade old most of them are anyway with 200 or so hours on it and I've got some with several years on it as for my drive its had 2.7 years power on time and is from 2005.

[@wokesheep]

@@realgroovy24 how to check power on time?

[@realgroovy24]

@@wokesheep download HD tune. It's probably the best tool out there.

[@themomorain]

Same here 6 years old

[@svlf1freak]

I love how your videos are clearly and simple explained Thanks :)

[@RadekZielinski.]

Never actually known about these type of tapes. So interesting.

[@mendyc158]

I still have my 10GB HDD with Windows 95 running on my old PC (which I use for MS-DOS/Win95 games) working like new

[@ricko13]

I got my pc back in 2012, I use it everyday and stills working fine :)

[@globetrotterbengaluru]

Mine's 2013. Running fine too but I'm afraid its life is coming to an end soon.

[@sandrostumpo3779]

Great video. I can't believe how much I enjoyed this video. I just realized I am a nerd, lol.

[@storm6113]

Thanks for the info ThioJoe. I'm probably might buy a different hard drive because of this video.

[@Ciiads]

In my opinion hard drive is fine if we take care of it. that's is the one and only affordable solution for the majority I think. always keep multiple mirrors and in the clowd for additional back up and security.

[@abalbaid9930]

It is best video about data storage , thanks

[@shaynes.9773]

This is exactly what I need to know as an audio and music professional-- I already knew that hard drives would not be a good archival medium. And that was a shock when discovered that online-- I didn't realize how short of a shelf life they had. Back when CD-R was the format Plextor drives and Mitsui discs where the audio industry standard. Mitsui changed hands and Plextor moved away from making optical drives. Do you have a recommendation of current brand(s) of Blu-ray burners and blank discs that are highest recommended for professional archival purposes? Thank you for the informative video. Cheers. :-)

[@lonewolfsstuck]

Weird my WD (i think its blue) i have had for 8 years.. no issues of any kind.

[@imranhq13]

wolves1001and1 WD hdd's r really good

[@realgroovy24]

wolves1001and1 Its not about how old it is its about how many hours its been powered on for, I've got drives a decade old most of them are anyway with 200 or so hours on it and I've got some with several years on it as for my drive its had 2.7 years power on time and is from 2005.

[@xparade0de]

SSD´s i tryed: errors or defect after 1 month, but read out the number of operating hours, if they are to high make a backup CrystalDiskInfo6_5_2ShizukuUltimate-ja

[@FluorescentGreen5]

+xparade0de sometimes i wonder if ssds are actually more reliable than HDD's

[@TheGreatNathan]

my wd blue died after 10 months, but i wouldnt say wd is bad, cause no hard drive is safe

[@Nautricity]

I must be the cool kid, 20+ Year old drive still works. Used a ton.

[@Firegunsgames]

HDMG OK ya that might be cool for back then but how much is the memory I don't think it passes 100gb or even 50 in fact. :(

[@Nautricity]

Maditara It's 40 GB Drive :L

[@Firegunsgames]

HDMG well i was right lol soon someday windows will be too big lol what r u running on it

[@realgroovy24]

HDMG 40gb? sure they had 40gb drives back in 1995 and earlier but my guess it would be from about 2004-2006 I've got a drive from 1998 which is only 4.01GB in storage.

[@Firegunsgames]

Sony Trinitron I'm not sure back then I think the maximum was 20gb but ik for sure they had 80gb in 2000

[@sunil951]

Thank you . Something new

[@verandi3882]

i have 350 gb hard drive that has been running perfectly fine for 11 years , it is very used and i download a lot of stuff , my friend talked about data loss and this got me concerned , think i should compress my files and back them up

[@samitechcookie9758]

In every case!

[@janX9]

350 GB in not very much date these days, and compressing it would be pointless. The time spent compressing data is very time consuming. I'm not even sure why you would mention compression?

[@JeremyWhy]

AWESOME INFO! I had no idea about any of this stuff. Thanks homie.

[@standimitrov678]

My oldest SSD is 60GB Corsair Force LS from 2013 and still in use in my main PC. I transferred it across at least 5 different PCs. Because of my work, I wiped the free space at least 600 times during these years and it is still holding strong. BTW, the small capacity is the main reason why I still use it - because small free space wipes faster.

[@alphaprinters9765]

Very helpful tutorial...

[@Scotts.Christianity.Teaching]

This is really helpful. I thought about not buying a 240GB SSD and buying a 1 or 2 TB HDD instead.

[@____wookie____]

My HDD is just 1yr old, I used it for backing up my PS4 games and if I use the HDD to connect it another device it would say "this drive cannot be used and needs to be repared" but when I click this I get another notification saying "it needs to be formatted" but dude! I have imp s! in that ;-; ima cry my entire life now

[@MrSpaceSentry]

My dads hard drive actually went the day you posted it, still trying to get all of his taxes and shit from it lmao.

[@oliveiraqmatouoleao]

My Samsung HDD is almost 6 years old, i am kinda surprised it still works. I'm just waiting my hd to die to have a definite reason to buy a new one.

[@mcreations573]

Funny that you mention that HGST was found to be the most reliable of the 3 brands because I had a HGST drive that crashed after 9 months of use. It was a laptop drive, but it never had to withstand any kind of abuse because I am careful with my expensive technology. Fortunately, it was under warranty, and I was able to get a replacement with only the cost of shipping the drive to their center. Additionally, I had a WD drive that starting to drastically slow down due to drive problems after a little more than a year of use. I also had a Hitachi that started having problems after 2 years. (these were all laptop drives)

[@pcgamerindia]

I need help.... 😭😭😭 one week ago when I start my computer it was showing a message a problem of hard drive has detected... i checked in internet and see my C drive was full of corrupted files and error files... do I ... scan it by chkdsk /f and agree to scan in next reboot.. i was taking too long to check error and unfortunately my niece shutdown my pc.. when I turn it on... nothing showing... expect .. harddisk error message.. i have formated that hdd by dban and installed win 10. when installation complete its showing error again.... hard drive can be fail at any time help me please 😭😭😭😭

[@luminumlx2604]

Use your niece as a hard drive

[@samitechcookie9758]

Hello! I know it is very late. But have you made a backup of your data using a live rescue system?

[@stregaheart2300]

Hard drives can be unpredictable. Some can last through the toughest abuse, I even hit one a few times with a hammer to get it unstuck from an old case. Then there are others that if you just look at them wrong they die. I have had some old hdd's beat the odds against time that are still working, while a few new hdds self-destructed. From some research and personal observation; the psu you are using, heat, dust, and vibrations can prematurely end a HDD.

[@MustacheVerra]

Interesting. Thank you.

[@damagelight2320]

my hdd is 10 years old and still runs..

[@ShovoRock]

Which brand? How much gb?

[@umar7182]

@@ShovoRock seagate 1 tb I bought it in 2011 and its still work fine

[@rymeax8446]

@@umar7182 Seagate FTW, I have multiple drives from them going on 10+

[@yadiyyussof95]

Is your hdd still working?

[@aanchalkhatiyan4636]

@@yadiyyussof95 mine one is 7 year old still it is at 100% health. Tip to keep hdd last longer is that properly defrag your hdd and create many volume as you can and divide data among them. Run bad sector checker once a month! And your hdd will last longer than 10-15 years.

[@jackharpe3rd233]

I'm predicting the Archive 💿 he speaks of is probably be the 8k Blu-Rays once were finally ready for 8k 📀s at home which I think will be by late 2020's. I look forward to rewatching this video and reading thus comment by then!

[@TheFazil99]

I agree with your opinion about Seagate is the highest product failure rate, I used to work at Read Rite where we are the vendor to the hard drive company ,end of quarter seagate requested to lower down production test spec to meet customer orders,

[@souvikc734]

A big thumbs up for this video.Really,very informative and helpfull....!!!!!!

[@BluTrollPro]

Good video. My next build I am planning on going pure SSD for my gaming rig with 2x500gb m.2 drives. My current rig is 7 years old but my 24/7 NAS/HS I have just replaced all of my HDDs with 4x Hitachi Ultrastar 7k3000 2tb in raid 5. Just backed up all of my data to the NAS. I am just waiting on AMD to release its Polaris & Zen platforms before I fully decide what I am going to build for my next PC (Current rig is an old AMD Phenom X4 + 5870x2 REALLY needs updated, with an old 512gb crucial drive from 2012 as well as a 2tb WD black circa 2010)

[@ishankhan3537]

Bro gave the whole information ✅

[@CRAZYREY78]

i went on a 8 month deployment and the ssd in my ps3, ps4 and thinkpad were fine

[@mrbiggoggles314]

Great video, I want to actually thank you for making it

[@user-te6kb3cg6p]

i have a western digital that is 8 years old that was not used much at all and is working like brand new

[@bellcc]

I have two computers from 1998 who's hard drives are at least 11 years old. I both use them regulary, but so far no problems! :)

[@ToniML200]

I have a 20 years HDD that still lives to this day. I don't really use it, but I used it 'till 2013 every single day at least 2 hours.

[@filipmac1545]

i have this vintage IBM personal computer in my garage, it runs MS DOS 3 and its hard drive is 30 year old and it still works just fine

[@bertnijhof5413]

It is about the time the HDD is actively used and has nothing to do with the age of the disk in your PC. Mechanical things only wear out if used.

[@ShashwatShukla10]

Hey...Great video! Lots of new info for me...... Another question from my side! How do the internal drives used in a computer (which have been externalised) and an external drive compare? Life duration-wise?

[@JohnDoe-uq3mx]

Whenever I buy a used PC, I run HDDScan on it to get everything refreshed again, and also to see if any sectors are damaged. I also run HD Tune to check for any SMART errors and other cool stuff like for how many hours the drive's been in use.

[@nunyabiznis817]

I have a 12 year old 120GB western digital still kicking. But all my other WDs last no more than 4 years. Interesting to hear that Seagate was the worst. I always thought they were supposed to be the best.

[@adamfletcher4262]

I think Google data centers use tapes for backing up important data like accounts and videos.

[@gizmoboy253]

I plan on getting a new hard drive for my laptop and by seeing this video I don't know what to by now.

[@JustinGone]

This video was great! Thanks!

[@lucklessflight]

is seagates failure numbers high because it sells more or is it a low quality drive?

[@tennicktenstyl]

What about battery powered RAM drives? They also need power from time to time, are blazingly fast and can sustain tons of data constantly rewritten on them.

[@Terry.W]

Interesting vid. I had no idea hard drives are and could be so temperamental.

[@Crazymindplow]

I got a USED WD green about 3 years ago. still works like a champ. (but I'm gonna add RAID 1 this christmas)

[@feelsaxelman]

I have about 6000 hours and growing on my gaming pc's SSD but thats mostly because I don't write to the disk TOO often. I have about 8 months total usage time on it!

[@master2dope]

Does it apply to Game console HDD's ?

[@scientia_potentia_est]

super informative, awesome videos!

[@RaptorZX3]

i have a 840mb Quantum Maverick HDD here in my 486 computer, and still doing fine!

[@bad001bd]

Hey Thio, why don't you do a video on how to properly back up your storage, I've noticed that with Windows 10 coming up and your video on the clean install you've mentioned backups a lot. I think that this would make sense to do. Anyway, awesome video as always, and I hope you have a great day.

[@matthiassukkau2540]

You mention that SSD's don't have a long term shelf life because the need to have energy. What if I had it plugged into my PC and kept it plugged in all the time? That way it would always have the energy it needs. Would that be a good idea or is that just nonsense? Thanks :)

[@politic17]

I literally searched your title, amazing

[@aarjith2580]

Are u planning to buy a hdd?

[@SlayerHaxFTW]

If some SSDs will fail within 3 months of being on a shelf, does this mean there is a chance of buying a SSD that is broken straight out of the box depending on how long the vendor has had it?

[@sonicfan653]

What about a USB Flash drive? I have a 128GB SanDisk Cruzer and I use that for basic backup use..

[@foamersimpson6690]

Thio i cant look at your face and belive you are giveing honest info

[@rkmugen]

As far as internal drives go, are hybrid drives any better? What about the orientation of the drive in a computer - resting flat on its surface (metal side facing up)... or propped-up on its three narrow sides (the 4th side is where the data and power cables go)? In a single drive setup (not more than one HDD or SSD in a system), is it possible to partition a mechanical drive both for better performance AND for longer life?

[@justanothererd01]

What about shelf life of Flash Drives and SD Cards, still only a few months?

[@RoddersKD]

I think you meant serial access for the magnetic tapes not sequential. Could be wrong though.

[@violian5]

I'm confused why an SSD could lose data if it isn't powered up for 3 months. I found an old college thumb-drive that I hadn't plugged into my computer for 5+ years. I plugged it in, and was able to see what was on the thumb drive, and transfer it to my computer.

[@JokaGaming2K10]

I have a hdd from 2008, was powered on by 4 YEARS! and still works without bad sectors

[@ethanfirst7839]

Thx +ThioJoeTech I was going to get a 3TB Seagate Hard Drive but now I'm thinking about something else

[@sebastiancofino1341]

Hello everyone, and thank you for this interesting video ThioJoe! I just bought a WD 2-TB external drive, and use it for backing up all my precious movies. How often should I be investing in new drives?

[@Cirap1]

beerunning a 1TB Samsung HD103SJ for about 6 years now, using the computer daily. the disk itself was manufactured in2009. exppecting it to die any month basically, but it show no signss yet...

[@epiccomputing123]

Does this count for laptops?

[@Xoan_Cosmed]

Which is going to last more, a LTO tape or a M-Disc (similar to Archive Disk) ?

[@JesseBugden]

Pretty sure a study on hdd lifespan doesn't need to be double blind. Can a hdd experience placebo effect?

[@ThioJoeTech]

Yea someone else pointed it out, I just kind of said it without thinking too much.

[@விஷ்ணு_கார்த்திக்]

I've heard freezing it works.

[@deltactarchives1328]

I've had my hp 620 for 9.5 years and hasn't had a failure after like power cuts without battery (which are hundreds a year) after our battery went bad... And no corruptions... It's really tough to break old laptops...

[@panzerfaust375]

I don't know about this. In the shop they sell SD cards surely they would sit on shelf from more then 3 months. I have SD card in my video camera and I often don't power it up for 3 or 4 months at a time.

[@geoman1420]

I have 5 MacPros from 2006 equiped with 250GB SATA hard disks running for 9-11 hours daily since 2007...

[@oliverboudet6778]

I have have a macbook pro mid 2010 still have that 500gb hdd running without failures

[@atorbtech]

I just recently purchased Sandisk Proffesional G drive. Can it last 10 to 15 years if I just use it for 5 to 10 minutes every day just to copy my data for long term storage.

[@haidara77]

Use it once every 3-6 month for better long term storage

[@atorbtech]

@@haidara77 thank you

[@haidara77]

@atorbtech your welcome, but remember to place the hard disk far from magnets and far from dusty area, the ideal storing temperature is 15-35 Celsius "rom temperature"

[@atorbtech]

@@haidara77 oh ok i didn't know that, thank you so much

[@mikemoseley3007]

So this applies to physical platter type hard drives and not SSD drives, there is a lot more that goes into the SSD drive, if you run an SSD drive that is more than 90% full then that hard drive is very likely to die very early in the cycle. An SSD drive fails much quicker at full capacity then when it is less capacity, say 70-80% max the longevity goes past 5 years if you only allow it to be at the 70-80% max for most of its life. Due to the way a SSD drive stores and moves around data on the drive when it has that extra space it has a less chance to run out of sectors that can be used as bad sectors. Some extrememly good SSD drives actually have a reserved amount of sectors that it does not allow the drive to use for this particular reason.

[@VincentAndre_HK]

well, I can tell you that trying to put back all my archived disks (DVDs) I have quite a few which are simply unreadable anymore, so saying that optical disks is the best way to store data, I won't support at all.

[@garrisonwalter]

what if the less popular and less readily available drive brands have a lower failure rate because there are less in circulation?

[@politic17]

One GOLDEN TIP For anyone from a person using hard drives for decades: DO NOT drop or shake your external hard drive. - If you ever dropped your EHD, at any distance, I don't care, just go and replace it, as fast as you can , it's gonna die on your desk when you're not expecting it to. I leant this lesson the harsh way. - Treat your EHD as an infant, when you carry it, slowly and without hitting everything in between. - Hard drives are WAAAAAAY sensitive to damage. - That's why, I keep their place ventilated as well as keep them in a special cabinet above my computer. Also, I always clean their place, the cabinet, and make sure that it is free of dust, which can cause damage from the small particles " I you do that, +10 years of life is guaranteed by me "

[@MMaheshThakur]

I don't know why my 2tb wd is failing to play movies. It also giving speed like 200kbps when I copy files and computer freezes when I plug in. I always taken special care never dropped. Is filling full caused this issue. It has 25gb free space . I also used defragmentors software so that any file read in sequential manner. I didn't use it more than 300 hours in last 2.5 years . I m very unhappy. My data is going to loss.

[@amgadelbatrawy9854]

I really want to believe you but someone like Mahesh Thakur show up and make me hesitate again ... I want to buy 1tb EHD but afraid from it's expiry and short lifetime and failures that I hear everywhere?!!! I even think in buying flash drives instead!

[@uofm49426]

Also matters if its 3.5 or 2.5 laptops move more then desktops I have laptop hard drives that last 2 3 years max but have I have 2 ide drives that are 10 years old still work fine

[@Dark_Angel555]

I have a hard on my pc for 10 years and 3 months now... still working... never failed... and I use it almost daily.... is it normal or I am just super lucky ? I also don't see any difference in performance... works the same... my cpu also has 10 years and 3 months and still works... only changed the thermal paste once every 1-2 years