HDD failed after ten years or so, need recommendations!

Manbatius · 20 Mar 2018 at 20:42

Hi all,

My 2TB Samsung HDD has died, or is about to, (I got the clunk noises earlier) error message in windows, It was purchased between 2006-9! so has done well.

All my purchases since then have been SSDs! So... Samsung are now owned by Seagate it seems?

Use and requirements:

To be used in my media server, only ever 1 stream at a time, usually old tv series. Photo and music storage
1TB (I had 2tb but it used to be a games drive as well, now media only using 600GB)
Suitable for always on
Under £60

I see a few options:

Cheap as possible:
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/toshiba-1tb-p300-performance-hard-drive-hdwd110uzsva-hd-044-ts.html

Something more robust:
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/seag...nternal-hard-drive-st1000vn002-hd-36t-se.html

Something with a 5 year warranty
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/seag...ive-for-pc-and-ps4-st1000lx015-hd-373-se.html

If I went with the last one, I would likely ditch my 300gb laptop OS drive, as it's of unknown age and install all on that. If I went for one of the others I would likely switch the OS drive to a ssd from a spare machine.

TLDR:
Drives break, need new for media server, samsung does not make drives now, under £60 1TB.

Thanks in advance!

mrbazmondo · 20 Mar 2018 at 21:06

Before the disk breaks, set it to read only so windows doesn't push it over the edge. Look in computer management to see the disk number.
Run diskpart
select disk X
attribute disk set readonly

Definitely install onto an SSD as a replacement boot drive. It makes a massive difference. 120GB minimum.
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/team...gbps-3d-nand-solid-state-drive-hd-003-tg.html
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/team...gbps-3d-nand-solid-state-drive-hd-004-tg.html

If the main storage is just for storing media then I'd get an archive disk, unless you can get a performance one for similar money. An archive disk work just as well and you'll get more storage for the same money, especially at the larger capacities. They just don't like lots of random write access, which you won't be doing if you're just writing media once and reading it later.

mrbazmondo · 20 Mar 2018 at 21:08

To make it read/write again if you need to, run diskpart again with "attribute disk clear readonly"

Manbatius · 20 Mar 2018 at 21:29

mrbazmondo said:
To make it read/write again if you need to, run diskpart again with "attribute disk clear readonly"

Thanks for all the info, machine is turned off for now but I will do that tomorrow when I turn it on, just finished backing up.

For the ssd links I may just buy one at that price instead of switching one out of the laptop, having to clone it etc.

Yeah just for media storage, are archive disks just the cheap ones like in my first link? Or something specific I should look for, such as smaller cache therefore cheaper? Sorry that drive was the last mechanical one I bought! Last 4 have been ssds!

Doogles · 20 Mar 2018 at 21:35

Get the cheapest possible and keep it backed up, anything will be faster when compared to that older drive.

mrbazmondo · 20 Mar 2018 at 22:21

Manbatius said:
Yeah just for media storage, are archive disks just the cheap ones like in my first link? Or something specific I should look for, such as smaller cache therefore cheaper? Sorry that drive was the last mechanical one I bought! Last 4 have been ssds!

They use different tech called SMR to cram more data on a platter. Its so close that when you write it has to read the adjacent data and rewrite it again. Its fine if you're writing large files though. Its typically used in external and archive disks. Check the manufacturer specs on their site to see if they mention SMR.
Heres some light reading for you:
http://www.tomsitpro.com/articles/shingled-magnetic-recoding-smr-101-basics,2-933.html

JasonM · 21 Mar 2018 at 01:29

Manbatius said:
To be used in my media server, only ever 1 stream at a time, usually old tv series. Photo and music storage

1TB (I had 2tb but it used to be a games drive as well, now media only using 600GB)

Suitable for always on

Under £60

What I would personally do, I would buy a clean pull Western Digital RE4, you can get 1TB for under £30, 2TB for around £40.

You need a bit of a six sense as your buying a second hand drive, however providing it's a good seller and drive has past all tests I would trust it. I've done this quite a few times now and every drive has been perfect, and would prefer this option over a new cheap consumer drive.