Thread

1. realityfactchex · 1790739426 · focus · HN ↗

   In 2013 Backblaze saw ~14% avg failure rate at 3 years 3 months. Drive useful life: 4 years, roughly.

   In 2021, Backblaze saw ~14% failure rate at 7 years 9 months. Drive useful life: about 6 years.

   That gave us what was a stable-seeming, old "replace drives at 5 years, or you're getting risky" rule of thumb (unless you prefer to replace on failure, of course).

   In 2025, Backblaze saw ~5% failure rate at 10 years 3 months. Drive useful life: ~10 years, roughly!

   Thanks for all the HDD improvements, industry!

   1. mzhaase · 1790757173 · focus · HN ↗

      I remember back in the late nineties / early 2000s drive failures really were pretty common. During my childhood I think I had three. I've never had a catastrophic failure since then, really came a long way.

      1. mrlonglong · 1790772373 · focus · HN ↗

         I once screamed at a 2.1GB Seagate hard disk and it died.

         Pretty crap.

         1. someonebaggy · 1790779570 · focus · HN ↗

            cue the youtube video of the guy yelling at his JBOD array and watching the latency spike

            1. OptionOfT · 1790781019 · focus · HN ↗

               Absolute gem: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=tDacjrSCeq4" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=tDacjrSCeq4

               1. gandreani · 1790782446 · focus · HN ↗

                  Wow I didn&#x27;t realize it was Brendan Gregg doing the screaming. What a legend!

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