- A mechanical hard drive will always make a little noise, but certain noises can be indicative of failure. A loud clicking noise during drive activity is a sign that the internal mechanics of the drive have been damaged. Failure may not be immediate, but this is a good sign that failure is coming. Rattling sounds suggest an improperly mounted hard drive. Check that all hard drive mounting screws are in place; add hard drive mounting pads if needed.
- Many computer users don't know it, but hard drives generate significant amounts of heat. This issue is compounded when several drives are closely mounted or improperly cooled. Every hard drive is designed to work within a certain temperature range; check your documentation for specifics. If your drive doesn't meet its temperature specification, you can add fans. Some fans are made specifically to be mounted on hard drives. Thermal considerations are an often overlooked aspect to hard drive operation and can lead to premature failure if left unchecked.
- Internal hard drives use a "cyclic redundancy check" and hard drive controller logic to ensure data integrity. But most modern hard drives are also mechanical devices, with spinning metal platters and a read head, much like to a record player. The high spinning speed of the platters--several thousand revolutions per minute--can lead to occasional data corruption. Corrupt data is virtually impossible to recover without professional assistance. Recovery service can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars.
- Due to the fast rotational speeds of internal hard drives, mechanical failure is always a possibility. When a drive fails, you know it immediately, because the computer's motherboard and operating system won't recognize the drive; if the operating system is on the drive, the computer won't boot up at all. This kind of failure is rare and usually only occurs at the end of a drive's projected life. The MTBF, or mean time between failure, of any hard drive may be found by checking the drive's documentation or contacting the manufacturer.
- The latest solid state drives, or SSDs, store data in flash memory kept in arrays of cells. In these drives, cell-wear out is a concern. The cells within flash memory act as a kind of trap for electrons. A certain amount of electrons means the cell is set to 1 or 0. This is how flash technology stores data. This ability to trap electrons is limited, however, and a cell can do it only so many times before it becomes unusable. This phenomenon is known as cell wear-out. Though there is currently no long term solution, cell wear-out can be delayed by wear-leveling logic on the hard drive's controller, which evenly spreads the writing of data among all cells.
