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IBM 120GXP Revisited
Andrew sent us a link to an article about the
IBM 120gxp controversy.
This is about the fact that the drive has been declared unfit for server use,
and to back that up, IBM says you should only use it for 333 hours a month.
This is a good summary of the issues and worth a read.
I think part of the trouble here is that IBM is selling these drives as OEM parts, and not retail drives. OEMs generally don't sell systems to the enthusiast market (The group most likely to leave systems running all day). In your average Dell/Compaq/Cow computer, it's preset to go on standby after an hour or so, powering off the drive. Since all of us "power users" don't like those performance-detracting ACPI/APM functions, we always disable them.
Furthermore, the DeskStar isn't intended to be a server part - IBM makes the UltraStar for that.
So, in essence, it's buyer-beware with OEM parts. Just like with the ATI video card debacle - You're buying parts that aren't intended for *you* to use. It's your fault if you're tryin' to skimp a couple of bucks out of IBM/ATI/whoever by buying on the grey market.
Now, that said...it's pretty fscking ridiculous to be making these drives and all but marketing them as the fastest ATA drives on the planet. That's practically hyping it up to the enthusiast market right there. And I really think it's asinine to expect these drives to *only* be run 8 hours a day. Factoring in the average lunch break when the computer will most likely get left on, that means that the drives are generally running out of spec on a regular business day in your average workstation.
"Mod, mod, mod...and another troll bites the dust."
Late last year when it was Quantum Fireball drives that were dropping like flies in our office I got on the phone with a drive repair center in Canada. We were going through the "How much will it cost us to actually retrieve the data from these drives?" discussion and I thought to ask him what brand of drives he sees the *least*.
"SCSI" was his response. "Oh sure," he said "there are fewer of them out there -- but we hardly see any at all."
One of the other interesting things he told me is that the drives included in Quantum's Snap Server appliances, despite being IDE, are *NOT* drives you can buy off the shelf. And he hasn't gotten in a single Snap Server drive in the two years they had been selling them.
I switched from Quantum to IBM drives at the time (ugh!) but had the forsight to put them all in a RAID-1 configuration. We've sent three DeathStars back for repair so far. The good news? IBM had replacements to us in under a week.
I recently switched from IBMs to Maxtor (making sure I wasn't buying Quantum's old stock) and have already had one of their 80Gb drives fail. For the record they are not as responsive as IBM in the RMA department.
So what's the answer folks? You get what you pay for. If you care about your data buy an Adaptec 1200A RAID-1 controller and two drives, or spend the money on a SCSI controller and SCSI drives. So far I haven't found any IDE drive vendors that can sell you a reliable drive (I have dead fujitsu drives around here as well, but must admit that I still haven't tried Western Digital.)
I am not interested in articles about life extension advancements.
Yep, I had two D540X drives die on me in the space of two months (the second was the replacement for the first). Incidentally, the reason for the allegedly high die rate on those drives is that they are QUANTUM FIREBALL drives. At least, that's what Maxtor's RMA website told me...
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
And that's the crux: it's alright having the drive under warranty & returning it, but who's to say that any drive they replace it with is not as faulty?
Same thing with Maxtor.
I had a 40GB Maxtor (D540X) die on me three months after buying my computer. They sent me an advance replacement, and two months later that one died. When I called to RMA *THAT* one, and to complain about the short lifespan, they asked if I wanted a "new build instead of a refurbished drive" this time. My response was... HELL YES!
Given that comment from their customer service rep, it sounds like most drives under warranty are replaced with refurbs.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
I used to be in the clone mfg business. One thing we determined is that companies go through cycles. For instance, WD has at various times been among the best AND the worst of the manufacturers out there. Seagate has made some wonderful drives and some absolute crap.
Here's a resource I've been watching lately. If anyone has similar things (published reports of reliability from places that deal with dead drives) please follow up to this message.
http://www.driveservice.com/bestwrst.htm