Please excuse the Linux/Windows crosspost, this is a question about HD
hardware relevant to both OSs!

I have a Dell Precision M6300 that is slowing down really badly, and I
suspect, but have yet to prove, that the HD is failing.

It seems to be getting increasingly difficult to obtain non-shingled
replacement laptop drives. Samsung have sold out to Seagate, and
seemingly now most or all Seagate and Western Digital laptop drives are
SMR ...

Apparently the only non-shingled laptop drives currently made by Seagate
are Exos E, and v. expensive:

https://www.seagate.com/gb/en/products/cmr-smr-list/
https://www.ebuyer.com/store/Storage/cat/Hard-Drive---Internal?a00489=2.5%22&q=exos

Up-to-date information on WD drives seems irresponsibly hard to come by.
After the public backlash around 2020, lists were published then of
which WD drives were SMR ...

https://blog.westerndigital.com/wd-red-nas-drives/

.... but that was 3 years ago and I've not found anything more up to date
and official from the WD site. Also, most independent lists are quite
old, dating from the time the scandal first broke, and/or are compiled
by NAS sites for desktop drives.

Of course, one could buy an older model drive very cheaply, but, even
when they have good ratings, at least some of the stock, even when new
- as in genuinely unused - have been on the shelf for so long that
they are already beyond manufacturer warranty, but, far too frequently,
are suspected items previously returned as faulty being resold, or just
plain second-hand/used and 'refurbished', whatever that may mean for an
item that has 'no user serviceable parts inside':

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Western-Digital-AV-GP-Intellipower-Internal-disk-disc-storage-gigabyte/product-reviews/B002P3KO7O/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_viewpnt_rgt?ie=UTF8&reviewerType=all_reviews&filterByStar=critical&pageNumber=1

Of course, that is a deliberately biased sample by looking at the
critical reviews, but I find them a useful measure of "What's the worst
that can happen?!"

Can anyone point to a UK source of reliable, genuinely new, moderately
priced non-shingled laptop drives from about 500GB to 1.5TB?

Of course, I could skip the shingles problem by going for an SSD, but
have not really explored this up til now. Experience and thoughts on
that would be welcome too.

TIA.

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

In uk.comp.os.linux Java Jive <java@evij.com.invalid> wrote:
> Can anyone point to a UK source of reliable, genuinely new, moderately
> priced non-shingled laptop drives from about 500GB to 1.5TB?
>
> Of course, I could skip the shingles problem by going for an SSD, but
> have not really explored this up til now. Experience and thoughts on
> that would be welcome too.

TBH there's little point in 2.5" HDD in that size range these days. The
cheapest and nastiest SSDs will perform better than any HDD. Frex:

512GB £23
https://www.ebuyer.com/1535248-patriot-p210-512gb-2-5-sata-iii-ssd-p210s512g25

1TB £40
https://www.ebuyer.com/1535247-patriot-p210-1tb-2-5-sata-iii-ssd-p210s1tb25

2TB £84
https://www.ebuyer.com/1535246-patriot-p210-2tb-2-5-sata-iii-ssd-p210s2tb25

Now I'd not be queuing up to buy those specific drives (I'd research and
likely spend a little more to get something better) but even these will be
night and day better than HDD.

Theo

Java Jive wrote:

> I could skip the shingles problem by going for an SSD, but have not
> really explored this up til now.

I wouldn't fit anything other than an SSD to a laptop, seriously.

On 4/6/23 17:02, Java Jive wrote:
> Please excuse the Linux/Windows crosspost, this is a question about HD
> hardware relevant to both OSs!
>
> I have a Dell Precision M6300 that is slowing down really badly, and I
> suspect, but have yet to prove, that the HD is failing.
>
> Can anyone point to a UK source of reliable, genuinely new, moderately
> priced non-shingled laptop drives from about 500GB to 1.5TB?

I would recommend a SSD, no point in going for a HDD unless you need it
for large scale storage 2TB+

Here is my suggestion:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-MZ-76E1T0B-EU-Solid-State/dp/B078WST5RK/

If you want to save some bucks, then go with the 500G, but try to avoid
250G SSD, they tend to be slower. I don't recommend QVO as it wears out
faster.

--
//Aho

On Thu, 6 Apr 2023 16:57:42 +0100, Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk>
wrote:

>Java Jive wrote:
>
>> I could skip the shingles problem by going for an SSD, but have not
>> really explored this up til now.
>
>I wouldn't fit anything other than an SSD to a laptop, seriously.

+1

On 06/04/2023 17:11, J.O. Aho wrote:
>
> I don't recommend QVO as it wears out faster.

How fast? 5 years, 4 years, 3 years or just 6 months?

For most people if a hard disk lasts for 5 years then they have done
very well indeed. I have a HDD that has lasted for nearly 10 years but I
am not a 24/7 user of the machine. I switch on the machine once in the
evening, check the email in my private account, browse the web to see
what is in the news and that's all about it. It is then time to go to
bed after dinner to wake up in the morning to go to work.

Do you have a link where it says QVO is no better than EVO or is it just
your anecdotal experience of using different versions over the years.

Thank you for the info anyway.

On 06.04.23 19:53, Jim Kelly wrote:
> On 06/04/2023 17:11, J.O. Aho wrote:
>>
>> I don't recommend QVO as it wears out faster.
>
> How fast? 5 years, 4 years, 3 years or just 6 months?
>
> For most people if a hard disk lasts for 5 years then they have done
> very well indeed. I have a HDD that has lasted for nearly 10 years but I
> am not a 24/7 user of the machine. I switch on the machine once in the
> evening, check the email in my private account, browse the web to see
> what is in the news and that's all about it. It is then time to go to
> bed after dinner to wake up in the morning to go to work.
>
> Do you have a link where it says QVO is no better than EVO or is it just
> your anecdotal experience of using different versions over the years.
>
> Thank you for the info anyway.
>
>
>
>
My HD is from 2004, or about 19 years.
80 GB , 25 GB used by XP PRO.
Never had any trouble.
All err info on HD reports OK.
Most data is on drive D.

On 4/6/23 19:53, Jim Kelly wrote:
> On 06/04/2023 17:11, J.O. Aho wrote:
>>
>> I don't recommend QVO as it wears out faster.
>
> How fast? 5 years, 4 years, 3 years or just 6 months?

Time depends on how much you write to the disk, this includes the
resizing of the paging file that windows does quite frequently in the
background. You can look at the product warranty for the 1T evo 600 TBW
(Max 5 years) vs 1T qvo 360 TBW (Max 3 years), that already hints that
Samsung expects the qvo to have shorter lifespan than the evo, sure this
number don't mean that all qvo will just last 3 years + 1 day or 360TB + 1B.

> For most people if a hard disk lasts for 5 years then they have done
> very well indeed. I have a HDD that has lasted for nearly 10 years but I
> am not a 24/7 user of the machine. I switch on the machine once in the
> evening, check the email in my private account, browse the web to see
> what is in the news and that's all about it. It is then time to go to
> bed after dinner to wake up in the morning to go to work.

I'm of the 24/7 school, I don't switch harddrives/ssd that often, but
when I do it's more to get more space and I do rather spend a few extra
bucks to get a better HDD/SSD and I tend to look at Backblaze yearly
report to feel safe with my pick.

> Do you have a link where it says QVO is no better than EVO or is it just
> your anecdotal experience of using different versions over the years.

https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/samsung-qvo-vs-evo-guide/

--
//Aho

On 2023-04-06 17:02, Java Jive wrote:
> Please excuse the Linux/Windows crosspost, this is a question about HD
> hardware relevant to both OSs!
>
> I have a Dell Precision M6300 that is slowing down really badly, and I
> suspect, but have yet to prove, that the HD is failing.

At least in Linux, this is easy to check. Assuming the drive is
/dev/sda, do, as root:

smartctl -a /dev/sda

Check these two lines:

ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE
UPDATED WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE

197 Current_Pending_Sector 0x0012 100 100 000 Old_age Always
- 0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable 0x0010 100 100 000 Old_age
Offline - 0

If the last column is not zero, you have a problem. Then look at this
other line:

5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct 0x0033 100 100 010 Pre-fail
Always - 0

If the two "100" are not 100, that's bad, the disk is dying. Replace it.

>
> It seems to be getting increasingly difficult to obtain non-shingled
> replacement laptop drives.  Samsung have sold out to Seagate, and
> seemingly now most or all Seagate and Western Digital laptop drives are
> SMR ...
>
> Apparently the only non-shingled laptop drives currently made by Seagate
> are Exos E, and v. expensive:
>
> https://www.seagate.com/gb/en/products/cmr-smr-list/
> https://www.ebuyer.com/store/Storage/cat/Hard-Drive---Internal?a00489=2.5%22&q=exos
>
> Up-to-date information on WD drives seems irresponsibly hard to come by.
>  After the public backlash around 2020, lists were published then of
> which WD drives were SMR ...
>
> https://blog.westerndigital.com/wd-red-nas-drives/
>
> ... but that was 3 years ago and I've not found anything more up to date
> and official from the WD site.  Also, most independent lists are quite
> old, dating from the time the scandal first broke, and/or are compiled
> by NAS sites for desktop drives.
>
> Of course, one could buy an older model drive very cheaply, but, even
> when they have good ratings, at least some of the stock, even when new
> -  as in genuinely unused  -  have been on the shelf for so long that
> they are already beyond manufacturer warranty, but, far too frequently,
> are suspected items previously returned as faulty being resold, or just
> plain second-hand/used and 'refurbished', whatever that may mean for an
> item that has 'no user serviceable parts inside':
>
> https://www.amazon.co.uk/Western-Digital-AV-GP-Intellipower-Internal-disk-disc-storage-gigabyte/product-reviews/B002P3KO7O/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_viewpnt_rgt?ie=UTF8&reviewerType=all_reviews&filterByStar=critical&pageNumber=1
>
> Of course, that is a deliberately biased sample by looking at the
> critical reviews, but I find them a useful measure of "What's the worst
> that can happen?!"
>
> Can anyone point to a UK source of reliable, genuinely new, moderately
> priced non-shingled laptop drives from about 500GB to 1.5TB?
>
> Of course, I could skip the shingles problem by going for an SSD, but
> have not really explored this up til now.  Experience and thoughts on
> that would be welcome too.
Go for an SSD, don't hesitate. Till 1TB at least the prices are reasonable.

I saw some laptops that had both SSD and rotating rust.

SSDs are actually more robust than traditional disks, they don't mind
vibrations, and are nicer on the battery.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

On Thu, 06 Apr 2023 17:22:03 -0400, Carlos E.R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
> SSDs are actually more robust than traditional disks, they don't mind
> vibrations, and are nicer on the battery.

I did have a problem with one laptop when I tried replacing it's hard drive
with an ssd. Massive overheating during large writes (linux install) forcing
a system shutdown part way through. Put the old hard drive back in and it was
fine.

I ended up adding that ssd drive in my desktop system with a fan.
hddtemp for it shows ...
/dev/sdd: INTEL SSDSC2BW240A4: no sensor

It does get very hot to the touch even with the fan.

Other laptops I've put other ssd drives have been fine.

Regards, Dave Hodgins

On 2023-04-07 00:10, David W. Hodgins wrote:
> On Thu, 06 Apr 2023 17:22:03 -0400, Carlos E.R.
> <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
>> SSDs are actually more robust than traditional disks, they don't mind
>> vibrations, and are nicer on the battery.
>
> I did have a problem with one laptop when I tried replacing it's hard drive
> with an ssd. Massive overheating during large writes (linux install)
> forcing
> a system shutdown part way through. Put the old hard drive back in and
> it was
> fine.
>
> I ended up adding that ssd drive in my desktop system with a fan.
> hddtemp for it shows ...
> /dev/sdd: INTEL SSDSC2BW240A4:  no sensor
>
> It does get very hot to the touch even with the fan.
>
> Other laptops I've put other ssd drives have been fine.
Yes, I suppose there were bad designs while the technology matured.

I replaced with an ssd the hard disk in my first laptop, a bit clunky
item for nowdays, and the thing boots when it wants. Sometimes it boots,
sometimes the computer thinks there is no disk. ctrl-alt-del and try
again. But absolutely no problems once booted.

I thought that maybe there is a faulty contact, maybe I should open the
laptop and reseat the cables. I have been postponing that for years and
years. Some day. Or maybe not. :-)

--
Cheers, Carlos.

On Thu, 6 Apr 2023 23:22:03 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:

> On 2023-04-06 17:02, Java Jive wrote:
>> Please excuse the Linux/Windows crosspost, this is a question about HD
>> hardware relevant to both OSs!
>>
>> I have a Dell Precision M6300 that is slowing down really badly, and I
>> suspect, but have yet to prove, that the HD is failing.
>
> At least in Linux, this is easy to check. Assuming the drive is
> /dev/sda, do, as root:
>
> smartctl -a /dev/sda
>
> Check these two lines:
>
> ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE UPDATED
> WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
>
I like to keep an eye on disk ages and potential problems, so I have a
weekly cronjob that runs smartctl and emails me the report it produces.

I've found that spinning rust tends to fail after an accumulated running
time of around 50,000 hours +/-5,000

I usually fit 500GB WD Blue drives, which don't use shingling or other
similar tech. I've had no problems with either 2.5" or 3.5" drives for a
long time now.

I'm also happy with the Sanyo 120GB SSD I've fitted in a Lenovo R61i when
its original Fujitsu hard disk died.

This machine's disk access hardware can't handle disks bigger than 200GB,
and by the time its original 160 GB HDD died you couldn't buy any HDDs
smaller than 320GB, so fitting a 120GB SSD was the obvious answer. It
certainly goes like the clappers with this installed. It also produces
weekly smartctl reports: the most notable difference, apart from a general
speedup compared with spinning rust, is that the active hours per week
figure is a lot lower than for spinning rust, probably because an SSD is
instant on/instant off while an HDD will include spinup, spindown and
idle_but_spunup time in its accumulated active runtime.

So far, that's my only experience with an SSD, but my ancient Dual Athlon
house server recently died horribly and is being replaced by a new box
containing a 1TB WD SSD, so I'll be interested to see how this storage
works out. I'll keep the weekly smartctl reports comming on its
accumulated running time. .

--

Martin | martin at
Gregorie | gregorie dot org

On 06/04/2023 16:02, Java Jive wrote:
>
> Please excuse the Linux/Windows crosspost, this is a question about HD
> hardware relevant to both OSs!

Thanks for all the replies, all of which I've read and noted.

> I have a Dell Precision M6300 that is slowing down really badly, and I
> suspect, but have yet to prove, that the HD is failing.

This afternoon I got around to testing the HD with CrystalMark, which
gives it a Health Status of Good, though I wonder at what the columns
actually mean, in particular:

ID Attribute Name Current Worst Threshold Raw Values
05 Reallocated Sectors Count 100 100 50 All zeros
0A Spin Retry Count 253 100 30 All zeros

The full log is appended.

So next I ran MemTest on it - the PC has 4GB RAM and the CPU is an
Intel Core2 Duo running at 2.60GHz, and the test took about 3 hours 55
minutes to do a pass, which definitely seems very slow to me, but no
memory errors either.

However, I did notice that the two sticks were different makes, so may
not have been well matched, but, if that was an issue, why it had only
recently become so, I couldn't fathom. Nevertheless, as I still had 4GB
from P1 (see below) which I upgraded to 8GB, I swapped that in so that
the RAM modules are now guaranteed to be properly matched, but it's made
no difference.

> Of course, I could skip the shingles problem by going for an SSD, but
> have not really explored this up til now.  Experience and thoughts on
> that would be welcome too.

Yes, the general opinion does seem to be that this is the way to go.

The first thing though, now that CrystalMark has spoken somewhat
unexpectedly, is to find out WTF is actually making the PC so slow. An
obvious thing to look for is malware, but I don't it's likely to be
that, as it's *MUCH* slower than 2 other Dell Precision M6300s at even
beginning to load the GRUB menu or OS, which is why I felt certain that
the HD was most likely to be responsible. In the table below, the
problem PC is P2, and while it displays the Dell POST screen for about
the same time as the other two, there is then a long and variable pause
before it displays the GRUB menu, and thereafter the WinXP boot is also
slower (both GRUB menus timeout after 3s).

PC Time to: GRUB/OS Load Win Logon
P1 8GB @ 2.8GHz - Dual-boot Ubuntu 18 & W7: 0:12 0:24 later
P2 4GB @ 2.6GHz - Dual-boot Ubuntu 18 & XP: 0:31-1:00+ 0:19+ later
P3 4GB @ 2.2GHz - XP: 0:08 0:06 later

I've compared the setup options between P1 & P2, and they are the same
in all the things they can be, in particular both are set to Minimal
POST checks.

Anyone got any comments to make about this?

Appendix - CrystalMark log:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskInfo 8.17.14 (C) 2008-2022 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World:
https://crystalmark.info/
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

OS : Windows XP Professional SP3 [5.1 Build 2600] (x86)
Date : 2023/04/06 23:14:12

-- Controller Map ----------------------------------------------------------
- Ricoh SD/MMC Host Controller [ATA]
- Ricoh Memory Stick Controller [ATA]
- Ricoh xD-Picture Card Controller [ATA]
+ Intel(R) ICH8M Ultra ATA Storage Controllers - 2850 [ATA]
- Primary IDE Channel (0)
+ Intel(R) ICH8M 3 port Serial ATA Storage Controller - 2828 [ATA]
+ Primary IDE Channel (0)
- TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V

-- Disk List ---------------------------------------------------------------
(01) TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V : 500.1 GB [0/1/0, pd1]

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
(01) TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Model : TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V
Firmware : AX0G1Q
Serial Number : 43PDW013T
Disk Size : 500.1 GB (8.4/137.4/500.1/500.1)
Buffer Size : 16384 KB
Queue Depth : 32
# of Sectors : 976773168
Rotation Rate : 5400 RPM
Interface : Serial ATA
Major Version : ATA8-ACS
Minor Version : ----
Transfer Mode : SATA/300 | SATA/300
Power On Hours : 19576 hours
Power On Count : 63735 count
Temperature : 34 C (93 F)
Health Status : Good
Features : S.M.A.R.T., APM, NCQ, GPL
APM Level : 00FEh [OFF]
AAM Level : ----
Drive Letter : C: D:

-- S.M.A.R.T. --------------------------------------------------------------
ID Cur Wor Thr RawValues(6) Attribute Name
01 100 100 _50 000000000000 Read Error Rate
02 100 100 _50 000000000000 Throughput Performance
03 100 100 __1 000000000435 Spin-Up Time
04 100 100 __0 0000000101FA Start/Stop Count
05 100 100 _50 000000000000 Reallocated Sectors Count
07 100 100 _50 000000000000 Seek Error Rate
08 100 100 _50 000000000000 Seek Time Performance
09 _52 _52 __0 000000004C78 Power-On Hours
0A 253 100 _30 000000000000 Spin Retry Count
0C 100 100 __0 00000000F8F7 Power Cycle Count
BF 100 100 __0 00000000003A G-Sense Error Rate
C0 __1 __1 __0 00000000EB0F Power-off Retract Count
C1 _94 _94 __0 00000001022B Load/Unload Cycle Count
C2 100 100 __0 003300070022 Temperature
C4 100 100 __0 000000000000 Reallocation Event Count
C5 100 100 __0 000000000000 Current Pending Sector Count
C6 100 100 __0 000000000000 Uncorrectable Sector Count
C7 200 200 __0 000000000000 UltraDMA CRC Error Count
DC 100 100 __0 000000000000 Disk Shift
DE _52 _52 __0 000000004B85 Loaded Hours
DF 100 100 __0 000000000000 Load/Unload Retry Count
E0 100 100 __0 000000000000 Load Friction
E2 100 100 __0 0000000000B6 Load 'In'-time
F0 100 100 __1 000000000000 Head Flying Hours

-- IDENTIFY_DEVICE ---------------------------------------------------------
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
000: 0040 3FFF C837 0010 0000 0000 003F 0000 0000 0000
010: 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2034 3350 4457 3031 3354
020: 0000 8000 0000 4158 3047 3151 2020 544F 5348 4942
030: 4120 4D51 3031 4142 4430 3530 5620 2020 2020 2020
040: 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 8010 0000 2F00
050: 4000 0200 0000 0007 3FFF 0010 003F FC10 00FB 0110
060: FFFF 0FFF 0007 0007 0003 0078 0078 0078 0078 0000
070: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 001F 0F06 0004 004C 0040
080: 01F8 0000 746B 7D69 6163 7469 BC41 6163 203F 0038
090: 0038 00FE FFFE 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000
100: 6030 3A38 0000 0000 0000 0000 6003 0000 5000 0394
110: B4A8 6F9A 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 401C
120: 401C 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0029 0000
130: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000
140: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000
150: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000
160: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0003 0000
170: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000
180: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000
190: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000
200: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 003D 0000 0000 4000
210: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 1518 0000 0000
220: 0000 0000 101F 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000
230: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0001 0080 0000 0000 0000 0000
240: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000
250: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 E1A5

-- SMART_READ_DATA ---------------------------------------------------------
+0 +1 +2 +3 +4 +5 +6 +7 +8 +9 +A +B +C +D +E +F
000: 10 00 01 0B 00 64 64 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 05
010: 00 64 64 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 03 27 00 64 64 35
020: 04 00 00 00 00 00 04 32 00 64 64 FA 01 01 00 00
030: 00 00 05 33 00 64 64 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 07 0B
040: 00 64 64 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 08 05 00 64 64 00
050: 00 00 00 00 00 00 09 32 00 34 34 78 4C 00 00 00
060: 00 00 0A 33 00 FD 64 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0C 32
070: 00 64 64 F7 F8 00 00 00 00 00 BF 32 00 64 64 3A
080: 00 00 00 00 00 00 C0 32 00 01 01 0F EB 00 00 00
090: 00 00 C1 32 00 5E 5E 2B 02 01 00 00 00 00 C2 22
0A0: 00 64 64 22 00 07 00 33 00 00 C4 32 00 64 64 00
0B0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 C5 32 00 64 64 00 00 00 00 00
0C0: 00 00 C6 30 00 64 64 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 C7 32
0D0: 00 C8 C8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 DC 02 00 64 64 00
0E0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 DE 32 00 34 34 85 4B 00 00 00
0F0: 00 00 DF 32 00 64 64 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 E0 22
100: 00 64 64 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 E2 26 00 64 64 B6
110: 00 00 00 00 00 00 F0 01 00 64 64 00 00 00 00 00
120: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
130: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
140: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
150: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
160: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 82 00 78 00 00 5B
170: 03 00 01 00 02 78 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
180: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
190: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1A0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1B0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1C0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1D0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1E0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1F0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 52

On 2023-04-07 01:02, Martin Gregorie wrote:
> On Thu, 6 Apr 2023 23:22:03 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
>
>> On 2023-04-06 17:02, Java Jive wrote:
>>> Please excuse the Linux/Windows crosspost, this is a question about HD
>>> hardware relevant to both OSs!
>>>
>>> I have a Dell Precision M6300 that is slowing down really badly, and I
>>> suspect, but have yet to prove, that the HD is failing.
>>
>> At least in Linux, this is easy to check. Assuming the drive is
>> /dev/sda, do, as root:
>>
>> smartctl -a /dev/sda
>>
>> Check these two lines:
>>
>> ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE UPDATED
>> WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
>>
> I like to keep an eye on disk ages and potential problems, so I have a
> weekly cronjob that runs smartctl and emails me the report it produces.

You could simply run the daemon, smartd.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

On 07/04/2023 00:17, Java Jive wrote:
>
> PC                                 Time to:  GRUB/OS Load  Win Logon
> P1 8GB @ 2.8GHz - Dual-boot Ubuntu 18 & W7:  0:12          0:24 later
> P2 4GB @ 2.6GHz - Dual-boot Ubuntu 18 & XP:  0:31-1:00+    0:19+ later
> P3 4GB @ 2.2GHz - XP:                        0:08          0:06 later

Perhaps I should have explained that these are times for each PC to get
to the logon screen from a state of hibernation, in other words, from
no power being consumed through reloading the previous state to
displaying the logon screen.

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

On 2023-04-07 01:17, Java Jive wrote:
> On 06/04/2023 16:02, Java Jive wrote:

....

> -- Disk List
> ---------------------------------------------------------------
>  (01) TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V : 500.1 GB [0/1/0, pd1]
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>  (01) TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>            Model : TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V
>         Firmware : AX0G1Q
>    Serial Number : 43PDW013T
>        Disk Size : 500.1 GB (8.4/137.4/500.1/500.1)
>      Buffer Size : 16384 KB
>      Queue Depth : 32
>     # of Sectors : 976773168
>    Rotation Rate : 5400 RPM
>        Interface : Serial ATA
>    Major Version : ATA8-ACS
>    Minor Version : ----
>    Transfer Mode : SATA/300 | SATA/300
>   Power On Hours : 19576 hours
>   Power On Count : 63735 count
>      Temperature : 34 C (93 F)
>    Health Status : Good
>         Features : S.M.A.R.T., APM, NCQ, GPL
>        APM Level : 00FEh [OFF]
>        AAM Level : ----
>     Drive Letter : C: D:
>
> -- S.M.A.R.T.
> --------------------------------------------------------------
> ID Cur Wor Thr RawValues(6) Attribute Name
> 01 100 100 _50 000000000000 Read Error Rate
> 02 100 100 _50 000000000000 Throughput Performance
> 03 100 100 __1 000000000435 Spin-Up Time
> 04 100 100 __0 0000000101FA Start/Stop Count
> 05 100 100 _50 000000000000 Reallocated Sectors Count
> 07 100 100 _50 000000000000 Seek Error Rate
> 08 100 100 _50 000000000000 Seek Time Performance
> 09 _52 _52 __0 000000004C78 Power-On Hours
> 0A 253 100 _30 000000000000 Spin Retry Count
> 0C 100 100 __0 00000000F8F7 Power Cycle Count
> BF 100 100 __0 00000000003A G-Sense Error Rate
> C0 __1 __1 __0 00000000EB0F Power-off Retract Count
> C1 _94 _94 __0 00000001022B Load/Unload Cycle Count
> C2 100 100 __0 003300070022 Temperature
> C4 100 100 __0 000000000000 Reallocation Event Count
> C5 100 100 __0 000000000000 Current Pending Sector Count
> C6 100 100 __0 000000000000 Uncorrectable Sector Count
> C7 200 200 __0 000000000000 UltraDMA CRC Error Count
> DC 100 100 __0 000000000000 Disk Shift
> DE _52 _52 __0 000000004B85 Loaded Hours
> DF 100 100 __0 000000000000 Load/Unload Retry Count
> E0 100 100 __0 000000000000 Load Friction
> E2 100 100 __0 0000000000B6 Load 'In'-time
> F0 100 100 __1 000000000000 Head Flying Hours

I don't see anything wrong in this disk.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

On Thu, 6 Apr 2023 23:22:03 +0200
"Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:

> On 2023-04-06 17:02, Java Jive wrote:
> > Please excuse the Linux/Windows crosspost, this is a question about
> > HD hardware relevant to both OSs!
> >
> > I have a Dell Precision M6300 that is slowing down really badly,
> > and I suspect, but have yet to prove, that the HD is failing.
>
> At least in Linux, this is easy to check. Assuming the drive is
> /dev/sda, do, as root:
>
> smartctl -a /dev/sda
>
> Check these two lines:
>
> ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE
> UPDATED WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
>
>
> 197 Current_Pending_Sector 0x0012 100 100 000 Old_age
> Always
> - 0
> 198 Offline_Uncorrectable 0x0010 100 100 000 Old_age
> Offline - 0
>
>
> If the last column is not zero, you have a problem. Then look at this
> other line:
>
> 5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct 0x0033 100 100 010 Pre-fail
> Always - 0
>
> If the two "100" are not 100, that's bad, the disk is dying. Replace
> it.
>
> >
> > It seems to be getting increasingly difficult to obtain
> > non-shingled replacement laptop drives.  Samsung have sold out to
> > Seagate, and seemingly now most or all Seagate and Western Digital
> > laptop drives are SMR ...
> >
> > Apparently the only non-shingled laptop drives currently made by
> > Seagate are Exos E, and v. expensive:
> >
> > https://www.seagate.com/gb/en/products/cmr-smr-list/
> > https://www.ebuyer.com/store/Storage/cat/Hard-Drive---Internal?a00489=2.5%22&q=exos
> >
> > Up-to-date information on WD drives seems irresponsibly hard to
> > come by. After the public backlash around 2020, lists were
> > published then of which WD drives were SMR ...
> >
> > https://blog.westerndigital.com/wd-red-nas-drives/
> >
> > ... but that was 3 years ago and I've not found anything more up to
> > date and official from the WD site.  Also, most independent lists
> > are quite old, dating from the time the scandal first broke, and/or
> > are compiled by NAS sites for desktop drives.
> >
> > Of course, one could buy an older model drive very cheaply, but,
> > even when they have good ratings, at least some of the stock, even
> > when new
> > -  as in genuinely unused  -  have been on the shelf for so long
> > that they are already beyond manufacturer warranty, but, far too
> > frequently, are suspected items previously returned as faulty being
> > resold, or just plain second-hand/used and 'refurbished', whatever
> > that may mean for an item that has 'no user serviceable parts
> > inside':
> >
> > https://www.amazon.co.uk/Western-Digital-AV-GP-Intellipower-Internal-disk-disc-storage-gigabyte/product-reviews/B002P3KO7O/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_viewpnt_rgt?ie=UTF8&reviewerType=all_reviews&filterByStar=critical&pageNumber=1
> >
> > Of course, that is a deliberately biased sample by looking at the
> > critical reviews, but I find them a useful measure of "What's the
> > worst that can happen?!"
> >
> > Can anyone point to a UK source of reliable, genuinely new,
> > moderately priced non-shingled laptop drives from about 500GB to
> > 1.5TB?
> >
> > Of course, I could skip the shingles problem by going for an SSD,
> > but have not really explored this up til now.  Experience and
> > thoughts on that would be welcome too.
> Go for an SSD, don't hesitate. Till 1TB at least the prices are
> reasonable.
>
> I saw some laptops that had both SSD and rotating rust.
>
>
> SSDs are actually more robust than traditional disks, they don't mind
> vibrations, and are nicer on the battery.
>
>
I tried this on my laptop, which has no performance problems that I
know of, and this is the result:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 1
Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE UPDATED WHEN_FAILED
RAW_VALUE
1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate 0x0032 100 100 050 Old_age Always 0
5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct 0x0032 100 100 050 Old_age Always 0

(multiple similar lines), then finally:
245 Unknown_Attribute 0x0032 100 100 050 Old_age Always 101664

SMART Error Log Version: 1
No Errors Logged

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
Num Test_Description Status Remaining
LifeTime(hours) LBA_of_first_error # 1 Short offline Completed
without error 00% 993 -

Selective Self-tests/Logging not supported
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

... which does not match your '000' requirement for the last of the three
columns.

This is on a Linux system, BTW.
--
Davey

Jim Kelly <invalid@invalid.net> wrote:
> On 06/04/2023 17:11, J.O. Aho wrote:
> >
> > I don't recommend QVO as it wears out faster.
>
> How fast? 5 years, 4 years, 3 years or just 6 months?
>
> For most people if a hard disk lasts for 5 years then they have done
> very well indeed.

In 30 years or more of PC ownership I think I have only had one or two
disk drives fail, they mostly just get pensioned off when disk sizes
are such that the space the old drives have is not worth bothering
with.

For example the 2TB WD 'My Book' backup (two 1TB drives) which I
bought in 2009 and ran continuously until 2020 or thereabouts still
boots and makes its backup available if I need them.

--
Chris Green
·

On 07/04/2023 03:37, Carlos E.R. wrote:
>
> On 2023-04-07 01:17, Java Jive wrote:
>>
>> -- Disk List
>> ---------------------------------------------------------------
>>   (01) TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V : 500.1 GB [0/1/0, pd1]
>>
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>   (01) TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>             Model : TOSHIBA MQ01ABD050V
>>          Firmware : AX0G1Q
>>     Serial Number : 43PDW013T
>>         Disk Size : 500.1 GB (8.4/137.4/500.1/500.1)
>>       Buffer Size : 16384 KB
>>       Queue Depth : 32
>>      # of Sectors : 976773168
>>     Rotation Rate : 5400 RPM
>>         Interface : Serial ATA
>>     Major Version : ATA8-ACS
>>     Minor Version : ----
>>     Transfer Mode : SATA/300 | SATA/300
>>    Power On Hours : 19576 hours
>>    Power On Count : 63735 count
>>       Temperature : 34 C (93 F)
>>     Health Status : Good
>>          Features : S.M.A.R.T., APM, NCQ, GPL
>>         APM Level : 00FEh [OFF]
>>         AAM Level : ----
>>      Drive Letter : C: D:
>>
>> -- S.M.A.R.T.
>> --------------------------------------------------------------
>> ID Cur Wor Thr RawValues(6) Attribute Name
>> 01 100 100 _50 000000000000 Read Error Rate
>> 02 100 100 _50 000000000000 Throughput Performance
>> 03 100 100 __1 000000000435 Spin-Up Time
>> 04 100 100 __0 0000000101FA Start/Stop Count
>> 05 100 100 _50 000000000000 Reallocated Sectors Count
>> 07 100 100 _50 000000000000 Seek Error Rate
>> 08 100 100 _50 000000000000 Seek Time Performance
>> 09 _52 _52 __0 000000004C78 Power-On Hours
>> 0A 253 100 _30 000000000000 Spin Retry Count
>> 0C 100 100 __0 00000000F8F7 Power Cycle Count
>> BF 100 100 __0 00000000003A G-Sense Error Rate
>> C0 __1 __1 __0 00000000EB0F Power-off Retract Count
>> C1 _94 _94 __0 00000001022B Load/Unload Cycle Count
>> C2 100 100 __0 003300070022 Temperature
>> C4 100 100 __0 000000000000 Reallocation Event Count
>> C5 100 100 __0 000000000000 Current Pending Sector Count
>> C6 100 100 __0 000000000000 Uncorrectable Sector Count
>> C7 200 200 __0 000000000000 UltraDMA CRC Error Count
>> DC 100 100 __0 000000000000 Disk Shift
>> DE _52 _52 __0 000000004B85 Loaded Hours
>> DF 100 100 __0 000000000000 Load/Unload Retry Count
>> E0 100 100 __0 000000000000 Load Friction
>> E2 100 100 __0 0000000000B6 Load 'In'-time
>> F0 100 100 __1 000000000000 Head Flying Hours
>
> I don't see anything wrong in this disk.

Yes, yet the difference in time between P1 & P2 to reach the GRUB menu,
and the difference in speed with which it is drawn when it is reached -
P1 is almost instantaneous, while P2 painfully draws first the border
from the bottom up and then fills in the menu - is very, very
noticeable, and, as that is the moment when the HD is first accessed, I
felt sure that it must be the problem, but apparently not.

I now declare the problem officially a mystery!

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

On 4/6/2023 4:51 PM, J.O. Aho wrote:
> On 4/6/23 19:53, Jim Kelly wrote:
>> On 06/04/2023 17:11, J.O. Aho wrote:
>>>
>>> I don't recommend QVO as it wears out faster.
>>
>> How fast? 5 years, 4 years, 3 years or just 6 months?
>
> Time depends on how much you write to the disk, this includes the resizing of the paging file that windows does quite frequently in the background. You can look at the product warranty for the 1T evo 600 TBW (Max 5 years) vs 1T qvo 360 TBW (Max 3 years), that already hints that Samsung expects the qvo to have shorter lifespan than the evo, sure this number don't mean that all qvo will just last 3 years + 1 day or 360TB + 1B.
>

WinXP was like this. And the pagefile happened
to have just dreadful fragmentation, leading users to
be twiddling thumbs while it "un0wound". Just an awful design.

virtual memory
pagefile.sys

Win10/Win11 are like this:

virtual memory
Memory Compressor
pagefile.sys

The first discussions about pagefile and SSDs, happened when Sinovsky
was still around, in the Windows 7 era. Presumably, that's when an
internal project was underway, to modify how it works.

What you should see happen today, is only "transient"
consumption "hits" the pagefile. Most of the time, like
even when starting a single application, there is no
activity on the pagefile at all. If there isn't enough
memory to run an application, it just errors out. It
does not torture you by "paging out one of the other apps".

When the OS is given 1GB of memory, hard faults are pretty
close to zero, and the Memory Compressor hardly runs.
As you reduce memory to the OS, down to the 250-350MB range,
the hard fault rate shoots up, and you can find the Memory
Compressor railed on one core. And this behavior is "in defense"
of the pagefile, trying to avoid wasteful writes to it.

Modern Windows has lots of wasteful activity, that should
not be there, but paging is not it. There are ETL tracing
files, Search Indexer (wasteful!), Windows Defender (writes
while it scans!), Photos (is doing OCR of your photos and
saving the text in an SQLITE database!). It's a rampage of
"userland silliness" today, that is wearing your SSD.
There are as many as four potential services, that are
interested in "scraping for email addresses", but I have not
managed to catch them doing this. For the person who does not
seek to leave incriminating evidence on a computer, these new
OSes are your worst nightmare :-) Even if the info is not
exfiltrated, it just... should not be there.

Paul

On 4/6/2023 6:10 PM, David W. Hodgins wrote:
> On Thu, 06 Apr 2023 17:22:03 -0400, Carlos E.R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
>> SSDs are actually more robust than traditional disks, they don't mind
>> vibrations, and are nicer on the battery.
>
> I did have a problem with one laptop when I tried replacing it's hard drive
> with an ssd. Massive overheating during large writes (linux install) forcing
> a system shutdown part way through. Put the old hard drive back in and it was
> fine.
>
> I ended up adding that ssd drive in my desktop system with a fan.
> hddtemp for it shows ...
> /dev/sdd: INTEL SSDSC2BW240A4:  no sensor
>
> It does get very hot to the touch even with the fan.
>
> Other laptops I've put other ssd drives have been fine.
>
> Regards, Dave Hodgins

https://ssd.userbenchmark.com/SpeedTest/3104/INTEL-SSDSC2BW240A4

Controller: LSI SandForce SF2281. <=== ding! ding! ding!

That's the SandForce data compressor, on writes.
Drive shoots up to 7W consumption spikes, during compression.

There aren't many compression methods, that can compress
in real time at 500MB/sec. And that's what the SandForce was doing.

And I thought only Kingston, used them.

SandForce were more common in the first generation, when there were
more of the smaller manufacturers (like maybe OCZ). But after that,
it was mostly Kingston that seemed to use them.

The other controllers don't do compression, or we'd have tales
of excess consumption for them too.

When you mentioned Intel, at first I thought the drive might
be Optane, but no, it's just Sandforce as root cause.

Paul

On 4/6/2023 7:46 PM, Java Jive wrote:
> On 07/04/2023 00:17, Java Jive wrote:
>>
>> PC                                 Time to:  GRUB/OS Load  Win Logon
>> P1 8GB @ 2.8GHz - Dual-boot Ubuntu 18 & W7:  0:12          0:24 later
>> P2 4GB @ 2.6GHz - Dual-boot Ubuntu 18 & XP:  0:31-1:00+    0:19+ later
>> P3 4GB @ 2.2GHz - XP:                        0:08          0:06 later
>
> Perhaps I should have explained that these are times for each PC to get to the logon screen from a state of hibernation, in other words, from no power being consumed through reloading the previous state to displaying the logon screen.
>

While in Windows, run HDTune benchmark, and look for "bad spots" in the curve.

Even when "Reallocated" is zero, the benchmark curve helps give the user
a "pre-warning" about surface wear on the platter.

In Linux, Gnome-disks has a benchmarking curve, but it isn't as well-developed
as some of the Windows third-party products (Gnome-disks needs to use more samples
and spend more time benching). Gnome-disks also allowed *write* benching at one time,
so be careful to not erase a disk by accident doing that.

SMART Reallocated works best, when defects are uniformly spread across the platter.

If all the spares are exhausted in a narrow swath of disk surface,
then Reallocated remains at zero, yet, the drive is in trouble.

It is for this reason, we bench with HDTune, as a pre-warning of trouble.
Disk health, is a combo of a clean benchmark run, as well as Reallocated is zero.
(The free benchmarker, only does read benches, so is "erasure-safe". It won't
erase a drive when you use it.)

https://www.hdtune.com/files/hdtune_255.exe # ten year old free version

In this example, the band at 53-54% is looking like a bad patch. I have a drive
here, that was used for WinXP, that it had a bad patch from 50% to 60% of
the disk and the performance was that low. Used to take forever to boot.
I replaced the drive, purely from a performance point of view. The SMART
was not really warning about this. But the bench "does not lie" :-) if
there is a localized surface problem, a bench can show you the problem.
(This isn't the absolute best benchmark curve, and sometimes it is
OS interference doing this. On a modern OS, you may need some uptime
to pass, before running your bench.)

https://images.sftcdn.net/images/t_app-cover-l,f_auto/p/315203d6-96d3-11e6-9cd9-00163ed833e7/3484776723/hd-tune-screenshot.jpg

On a hard drive, the outer circumference offers better rates than the
hub does, which is why the benchmark curve gently declines to half-rate.
When you see stairsteps in the bench curve, that is "zoned recording",
and the formatting of the tracks changes from one part of the disk
to another, on purpose. The stair steps then, are normal, and part of
design.

*******

Since you're using WinXP, the alignment of the drive could be wrong.
This may need to be re-aligned, during cloning.

Drive type Issue
512n No problem # This is the best drive type 512 byte external, 512 byte internal
512e Internal align # Most drives are 512 external, 4K internal. WinXP = realign please
SSD Internal align # 63 sector "tracks" do not align to power-of-two NAND storage. Realign it.

Windows 7 partitions are on 1 megabyte boundaries. This would be good with 512e HDD
or with an SSD.

WinXP partitions are related to CHS and Sectors = 63. Lots of numbers in
the WinXP metadata, are divisible by 63. This is not a good choice,
if the hard drive uses 4K internal sectors, and needs to do fractional
operations when handling clusters which don't align with the disk.

It's possible the original drive is a 512n, just based on "production era".

Linux fdisk should be able to tell you whether a drive is 512n or 512e.

On Western Digital, 512n drives were available on either WD Black or WD Gold.
Most others were 512e.

Summary: If I had to gamble on a hard drive, I would buy the smallest
WD Black I could find (WD5000LPSX 500GB), and hope for the best :-)
Hardly any technical information is available these days, for hard drives.
For that matter, I did not see a lot of *choice* for hard drives
for laptops -- SSD might be your only choice now. The 15mm thick hard
drives won't fit in a laptop. SSD are 7mm, laptop drives are 7mm or 9.5mm.
"Expansion" 2.5" external drives are generally the 15mm type. Too thick.

The stock of hard drives at my computer store, is very low. I can get
1TB 3.5" drives. They have no high capacity hard drives (how are you supposed
to do backups???). I would have to go online, to find more selection.
The retailers are not helping matters.

Paul

On Fri, 07 Apr 2023 07:36:24 -0400, Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> wrote:

> On 4/6/2023 6:10 PM, David W. Hodgins wrote:
>> On Thu, 06 Apr 2023 17:22:03 -0400, Carlos E.R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
>>> SSDs are actually more robust than traditional disks, they don't mind
>>> vibrations, and are nicer on the battery.
>>
>> I did have a problem with one laptop when I tried replacing it's hard drive
>> with an ssd. Massive overheating during large writes (linux install) forcing
>> a system shutdown part way through. Put the old hard drive back in and it was
>> fine.
>>
>> I ended up adding that ssd drive in my desktop system with a fan.
>> hddtemp for it shows ...
>> /dev/sdd: INTEL SSDSC2BW240A4: no sensor
>>
>> It does get very hot to the touch even with the fan.
>>
>> Other laptops I've put other ssd drives have been fine.
>>
>> Regards, Dave Hodgins
>
> https://ssd.userbenchmark.com/SpeedTest/3104/INTEL-SSDSC2BW240A4
>
> Controller: LSI SandForce SF2281. <=== ding! ding! ding!
>
> That's the SandForce data compressor, on writes.
> Drive shoots up to 7W consumption spikes, during compression.
>
> There aren't many compression methods, that can compress
> in real time at 500MB/sec. And that's what the SandForce was doing.
>
> And I thought only Kingston, used them.
>
> SandForce were more common in the first generation, when there were
> more of the smaller manufacturers (like maybe OCZ). But after that,
> it was mostly Kingston that seemed to use them.
>
> The other controllers don't do compression, or we'd have tales
> of excess consumption for them too.
>
> When you mentioned Intel, at first I thought the drive might
> be Optane, but no, it's just Sandforce as root cause.

Thanks. Finally an explanation that makes sense!

My first ssd drive is an OCZ, and it's still working fine after 10 years.

I have four ssd drives in this system.
Model=OCZ-AGILITY4, FwRev=1.5.2, SerialNo=OCZ-N82WMCWEEW3L4H5T
Model=KINGSTON SEDC400S37960G, FwRev=SAFM32.I, SerialNo=50026B727502FD10
Model=INTEL SSDSC2BW240A4, FwRev=DC12, SerialNo=BTDA329505PE2403GN
Model=KINGSTON SEDC400S37960G, FwRev=SAFM32.I, SerialNo=50026B727502FD90

For the OCZ AGILITY smartctl shows ...
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE UPDATED WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate 0x0000 005 000 000 Old_age Offline - 5
3 Spin_Up_Time 0x0000 100 100 000 Old_age Offline - 0
4 Start_Stop_Count 0x0000 100 100 000 Old_age Offline - 0
5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct 0x0000 100 100 000 Old_age Offline - 1
9 Power_On_Hours 0x0000 100 100 000 Old_age Offline - 86564
12 Power_Cycle_Count 0x0000 100 100 000 Old_age Offline - 481
232 Lifetime_Writes 0x0000 100 100 000 Old_age Offline - 90965437028
233 Media_Wearout_Indicator 0x0000 092 000 000 Old_age Offline - 92

I've seen many people complaining about OCZ, but my experience with it has
been great. While I've had several spinning rust drives fail over the years,
I've yet to have an ssd drive fail.

I still have one spinning rust drive in this system, but almost never use it.
I do make multiple levels of backup.

Regards, Dave Hodgins

On Fri, 7 Apr 2023 08:19:48 +0100, Chris Green <cl@isbd.net> wrote:

>Jim Kelly <invalid@invalid.net> wrote:
>> On 06/04/2023 17:11, J.O. Aho wrote:
>> >
>> > I don't recommend QVO as it wears out faster.
>>
>> How fast? 5 years, 4 years, 3 years or just 6 months?
>>
>> For most people if a hard disk lasts for 5 years then they have done
>> very well indeed.
>
>In 30 years or more of PC ownership

37 years for me.

> I think I have only had one or two
>disk drives fail,

Zero failures for me.

>they mostly just get pensioned off when disk sizes
>are such that the space the old drives have is not worth bothering
>with.

Same here.

On 2023-04-07 14:46, Paul wrote:
> On a hard drive, the outer circumference offers better rates than the
> hub does, which is why the benchmark curve gently declines to half-rate.
> When you see stairsteps in the bench curve, that is "zoned recording",
> and the formatting of the tracks changes from one part of the disk
> to another, on purpose. The stair steps then, are normal, and part of
> design.

Once I did a brute force test of a new disk. I made a lot of partitions,
say 50. Then tested speed on each of them (probably using different
filesystems, too). I think I used "hdparm -tT /dev/sdXY", maybe some dd
read/write.

It turned out that the disk was significantly faster at about 1/3 of the
way. The centre was significantly slower.

Of course, the disk might be lying about its geometry.

--
Cheers, Carlos.