Downloading too much *stuff* from the Internet will reduce your hard drive's lifespan.

Downloading "stuff" into your hard drive all the time will not reduce its lifespan. Even filling up the hard drive completely will not make a difference in its reliability.

Hard drives are like a car's fuel tank. They are designed to store data, like the fuel tank is designed to store fuel. Will your car be more likely to die if you keep filling it up with fuel, or even fill it up completely? Illogical, isn't it?

Insufficient power causes bad sectors in hard drives.

Insufficient power or power cuts won't create bad sectors in your hard drives. Whenever there is no power, or insufficient power, the head actuators automatically park the heads so that there is no risk of head crashes on the platters. So, there is no way insufficient power can cause bad sectors.

However, a bad power supply can kill your hard drive. It won't cause bad sectors, it will just fry the circuit board and maybe burn out the motor.

Cheap power supplies will "slowly kill" your hard disk.

Cheap power supplies will NOT "slowly kill" hard drives. If a cheap power supply fries and sends a power surge to your hard drive, it kills the drive instantly.

If your hard drive keeps spinning up and down, that is because the power supply does not have enough power to keep the platters spinning.

The spin-up, spin-down activity is actually a symptom of the hard drive's recalibration process. The hard drive recalibrates to account for changes in temperature (which changes the position of data bits on the platter).

It also recalibrates when it cannot read data off the platters properly. Therefore, if your drive does that a lot, it could be a symptom of a dying hard drive. Do note though that hard drives are often programmed to spin down to save power, and only spin up when there's work to be done.

However, it's unlikely for insufficient power to cause such symptoms. If insufficient power is supplied to hard drives that do not support hot-plugging, they will power down and cause the computer to hang. Even if full power is restored, the hard drive will not resume normal operation. You will need to reboot the computer.

Head parking is the cause of loud clicks from your hard drive.

Loud clicks are usually a symptom of the hard disk drive's thermal recalibration process or it can be due to head crashes on the platters. Head parking is a quiet process in all 3.5" and most 2.5" hard drives.

In some 2.5" hard drives that use ramp load/unload mechanism (to park the drive heads), audible clicks can be heard when the heads park. Manufacturers have successfully dealt with the problem in newer generations of 2.5" hard drives and they no longer produce audible clicks whenever they park ther drive heads.

3.5" hard disk drives that employ ramp load/unload technology, on the other hand, do not produce any click noises whenever their heads are parked.

Thanks, Espen Overaae and mikegas!

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Hard Disk Drive Myths

1.

• Introduction
• Questions & Comments

2.

• Formatting a hard drive will kill it!
• Formatting a hard drive causes a layer of <insert material / dust of choice> to be deposited on the platter surface, creating bad sectors.
• Formatting the hard drive will stress the needle (head actuator).
• Defragmenting the hard drive will stress the needle (head actuator).
• If your hard drive has bad sectors, formatting it will cause more bad sectors to appear!

3.

• Downloading too much *stuff* from the Internet will reduce your hard drive's lifespan.
• Insufficient power causes bad sectors in hard drives.
• Cheap power supplies will "slowly kill" your hard disk.
• If your hard drive keeps spinning up and down, that is because the power supply does not have enough power to keep the platters spining.
• Head parking is the cause of loud clicks from your hard drive.

4.

• The head actuators are powered by a motor that can fail due to excessive use.
• Frequent parking of the read/write heads will make the head actuators' motor fail earlier.
• The hard drive only spins up when it needs to read or write data. It spins down when it is idle.
• It is better to spin down the hard drive whenever you can to reduce stress on the spindle motor.
• Sudden power cuts can cause bad sectors!

5.

• Bad sectors can be repaired just by reformatting the hard drive.
• There is nothing to worry about bad sectors because you can "erase" them by formatting the hard drive.
• You must format your hard drive every <insert duration of choice> to improve performance.
• The hard drive can only be installed in the horizontal position.
• If you want to use a hard drive in the vertical position, you must first reformat it in the vertical position!

6.

• Scanning for viruses several times a day can kill your hard drive.
• "Excessive" head movements are bad/dangerous for high-speed hard drives.
• The small holes on the hard drive allow dust to enter and damage the hard drive.
• It's okay to drop a hard drive as long as it is not running.
• Hard disk drive companies cheat in the way they calculate storage space!

7.

• If your hard drive dies, freeze it and it will buy you enough time to retrieve its data.
• Hard disk drives run better / last longer below ambient temperatures.
• You will lose 64KB of storage capacity everytime you format the hard disk drive.
• If you format the hard drive more than xxxx times, the hard disk platters lose their magnetic propeties due to repeated reorientation.