Deskstar Reliability

[J.Clarke]

On 20 Jul 2003 06:21:56 -0700

I'm thinking of picking up a new disk drive
(it's amazing how quickly you can fill up
40GB) and found a few good reviews for the
Deskstar GXP180 line, suggesting the drives
were faster and quieter than comparable drives.

I dropped into a local computer shop and
mentioned the name to the two guys, which
prompted them to look at me as if I'd suggested
trying to procure a small child for a Black mass.
They claimed that these drives were incredibily
unreliable, and had even led to the deaths of
several people in a New York hospital!

Can anyone tell me why the Deskstar would
produce such antipathy, and are these reliability
rumours true?

If you search Google Groups on "Deskstar" you'll find numerous tales of
woe. Personally I've never had a problem with a Deskstar that I
couldn't trace to an external cause or handling damage, but others
tell a different story.

As for Deskstars leading to deaths in a hospital, any hospital that uses
single consumer-grade drives for anything whose failure can be
life-threatening deserves to have its license revoked, and I seriously
doubt that that story is true.

This has become a religious issue with some people and you are going to
get more heat than light I am afraid.

 

[Paul Moloney]

I'm thinking of picking up a new disk drive
(it's amazing how quickly you can fill up
40GB) and found a few good reviews for the
Deskstar GXP180 line, suggesting the drives
were faster and quieter than comparable drives.

I dropped into a local computer shop and
mentioned the name to the two guys, which
prompted them to look at me as if I'd suggested
trying to procure a small child for a Black mass.
They claimed that these drives were incredibily
unreliable, and had even led to the deaths of
several people in a New York hospital!

Can anyone tell me why the Deskstar would
produce such antipathy, and are these reliability
rumours true?

Cheers,

P.

 

[Arno Wagner]

I'm thinking of picking up a new disk drive
(it's amazing how quickly you can fill up
40GB) and found a few good reviews for the
Deskstar GXP180 line, suggesting the drives
were faster and quieter than comparable drives.

I dropped into a local computer shop and
mentioned the name to the two guys, which
prompted them to look at me as if I'd suggested
trying to procure a small child for a Black mass.
They claimed that these drives were incredibily
unreliable, and had even led to the deaths of
several people in a New York hospital!

Can anyone tell me why the Deskstar would
produce such antipathy, and are these reliability
rumours true?

The 75GXP and 60GXP series had a massive problem, which IBM
did never admit. There is speculation that it was the main
reason IBM sold its storage business. Personally I have
seen every (3 of them) 75GXP and 60GXP I ever used going
bad and some additional ones going bad as well.

Since IBM never admitted the problem, it is unclear whether
and to what extend the problem was fixed. And it still
is a reason to distrust the later models.

Arno

 

[Chris Hill]

I'm thinking of picking up a new disk drive
(it's amazing how quickly you can fill up
40GB) and found a few good reviews for the
Deskstar GXP180 line, suggesting the drives
were faster and quieter than comparable drives.

I dropped into a local computer shop and
mentioned the name to the two guys, which
prompted them to look at me as if I'd suggested
trying to procure a small child for a Black mass.
They claimed that these drives were incredibily
unreliable, and had even led to the deaths of
several people in a New York hospital!

groups.google.com is your friend.
Personally, unless I see compelling evidence I would avoid ibm/hitachi
drives. The new series may be better than the older stuff which a lot
of people had problems with, but with wd, seagate and maxtor in the
business, why would a sane person even want to try?

 

[Adam Leinss]

(e-mail address removed) (Paul Moloney) wrote in

Can anyone tell me why the Deskstar would
produce such antipathy, and are these reliability
rumours true?

It's true: I had a 75 GXP and it went belly up in under a year. The
replacement drive from IBM went belly up about a month later! They
then sent me a brand new drive which was a different model which I
promptly sold on eBay. I still have a 20 GB Deskstar that is still
humming to this day. Something in the batch for the 75 GXP series went
horribly wrong.

Adam

 

[CJT]

groups.google.com is your friend.
Personally, unless I see compelling evidence I would avoid ibm/hitachi
drives. The new series may be better than the older stuff which a lot
of people had problems with, but with wd, seagate and maxtor in the
business, why would a sane person even want to try?

I agree. Let somebody else take the chance.

 

[Steffler]

Mmmm... Trusty old Deathstars

With the earlier GXPs, yes. Its too early to tell
with the 180GXPs yet. But Hitachi has a pretty
lousy RMA policy, not preshipping the replacement,
so I wouldnt consider using them myself.

I have yet to see a problem with the 180GXP line. I have
4 of the 180Gigs in my server and 2 (raid 0) in my gaming
box...

The75GXP on the other hand. I can't remember how many of
those I've replaced here at work... That was a sucky disk if there
ever was..

Cheers

/S

 

[Rod Speed]

Rod Speed wrote

Mmmm... Trusty old Deathstars

I have yet to see a problem with the 180GXP line. I have 4 of
the 180Gigs in my server and 2 (raid 0) in my gaming box...

It usually took quite a while before a 75GXP
died too. Thats presumably how the problem
managed to get out into the field undetected.

The75GXP on the other hand. I can't remember
how many of those I've replaced here at work...
That was a sucky disk if there ever was..

The 60GXPs werent much better if better at all.

 

[Bob Davis]

Just to give the other side of the story. I have a 75GXP and a 60GXP
in my computer. I've no problems with either one of the drives. It
just goes to show that the problems never hit everyone.

Do you have some wood to firmly knock on? I hate to be a doomsayer, but
tomorrow is another day. If I were you I'd back up diligently.

 

[Michael Cecil]

... and don't taunt the gods by telling about your good fortune.

Don't be superstitious. You'd think such idiotic mentalities would be
a thing of the past in this technological era.

I have 14 different 75GXPs that haven't had problems. They are all in
systems with active cooling and high quality power supplies.

 

[chrisv]

Just to give the other side of the story. I have a 75GXP and a 60GXP
in my computer. I've no problems with either one of the drives. It
just goes to show that the problems never hit everyone.

My 60GXP has performed flawlessly for over 2 years now.

 

[Arno Wagner]

My 60GXP has performed flawlessly for over 2 years now.

Mine too. As a paperweight.

In our department we now have dead 75GXP/60GXPs as a regular event
once or twice a month. With about 40 of these initially installed
that is pretty bad.

Arno

 

[HddGuru]

I guess that there may be a problem because they used cheap GMR heads
in the Deskstar range, ONLY a guess mind you ;O)

 

[Rod Speed]

The GXP180's seem to be fine.

So did the 75GXPs and 60GXPs for a while.

Which is basically why they got out into the field like that.

 

[Nick]

If it's really that common an event then I would suspect either all of
the drives were out of the same batch of drives and this batch had
problems, or you've got something in your systems that's abusing the
drives. Maybe poor power quality or excessive heat.

No, it's a problem in the conception of the drive. The glue that
sticks the magnetic stuff to the platter is not good enough and after
a time the magnetic unsticks from the platter.
Quite bad, huh ?

Nick

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

No, it's a problem in the conception of the drive. The glue that
sticks the magnetic stuff to the platter is not good enough and after
a time the magnetic unsticks from the platter.

Then it has nothing to do with the "conception" "of the drive".

Quite bad, huh ?

Yeah, 'crash'ingly bad.
Not consistent with the bad sector errors that go away after the use of DFT, often even _without_ using spares.

Heads would be flying (pun intended) loose and the actuator arms carve-up the platters in an spectacular audible way if "the
magnetic stuff" came loose from the platters.

 

[berk98]

I purchased a brand new 160gb DeskStar (in a portable enclosure) and massive data loss occurred within a month. I put it into a computer and it would not boot after just 3 months. I also have a 60gb one I bought standalone and used. It failed after 3 months as well! I also have quite a few Western Digital drives that have never failed in my entire computer experience.

My advice: stop using your DeskStar hard drives and get some Western Digital drives.