hard drive how long works ?

Lady Fitzgerald · 06 Jan 2014

mjf said:

...At the end of the day if you have an OS partition system image and backup your other data you're covered.

Absolutely. And the more backups you have (up to a point), the better since the media (HDD, SSD, flash drive, tape, optical disk, cloud, clay tablets) the backup is on also can fail.

LMiller7 · 06 Jan 2014

Regarding SSD failures.
I did electronics service for some 30 years and my experience was that failure of electronic components was almost always without warning, at least none that was noticed. And when there was a warning it was usually very short. Warning of failure of mechanical devices was more common, but you could never count on that either. What I have read of SSD failures is that there is rarely any warning of failure. I wouldn't expect any.

Whether it be an SSD or conventional drive, make your backups while the drive is working well. Wait for some danger signs and it may be too late. And professional recovery of SSD data is very expensive, considerably higher than for conventional drives. This is due more to the different nature of the device than a lack of experience with the new technology.