What's the lifespan like on the HDD inside the FreeAgent? I
496139
Like most external USB drives, I'd not rely on it for long-term backups over one year. Augment it with a cloud product that is acceptable for the type of data being backed up (i.e. personal, confidential, commercial, etc.). In my experience, none of the disks used in these devices are high-grade, and in commercial applications, we'll go to a NAS with RAID.
496140
Had it only for 8 months and it runs smoothly. It's my manual back up HD so I only turn it on when I needed to. It gets hot, ventilation is really poor I had to glue those little plastic things so it would get a bit of air flow.
1183720
9-11 years if you write 50 Gigabytes of data to it everyday :)Don't worry about reading data from it, flash devices (like an SSD) have basically an infinite number of read cycles. Hope this helped!
1882758
Thanks for responding to my review. The warranty is 12 Months. Most of the manufacturers are moving to that length.UPDATE: I reread the warranty (very small print). It says that the drive itself is warranted for 2 years, while the "other parts" were warranted for 1 year. What this means is pretty confusing; the warranty statement was obviously not meant for this particular unit - it is a generic statement. I would stick with 1 year as definite, but possibly two years.
1564767
Without much hard drive activity...around 2 hours. With activity, maybe 1 hour 20 mins.
1261985
I have had this for about 4 and never had an issue years i think and never had an issue with single game. I would say i have played a good 30 games on that hard drive with no issue.
832065
If you want to use the drive for automated back-up is has to be plugged in, of course. Any wear items wear faster with constant use, but if the point of the drive is to easily and conveniently back-up your data, so what? I have drives in servers that have been running practically non-stop for years. I've also had brand new drives that lasted only a few months with intermittent use. The bottom line is that drives are commodities and storage is getting cheaper every day. Your data and your time are what is valuable. Connect the drive, configure the automated back-up and forget about it. If the drive fails, pitch it and get another one. If you want to use the drive for automated back-up is has to be plugged in, of course. Any wear items wear faster with constant use, but if the point of the drive is to easily and conveniently back-up your data, so what? I have drives in servers that have been running practically non-stop for years. I've also had brand new drives that lasted only a few months with intermittent use. The bottom line is that drives are commodities and storage is getting cheaper every day. Your data and your time are what is valuable. Connect the drive, configure the automated back-up and forget about it. If... » Read More If you want to use the drive for automated back-up is has to be plugged in, of course. Any wear items wear faster with constant use, but if the point of the drive is to easily and conveniently back-up your data, so what? I have drives in servers that have been running practically non-stop for years. I've also had brand new drives that lasted only a few months with intermittent use. The bottom line is that drives are commodities and storage is getting cheaper every day. Your data and your time are what is valuable. Connect the drive, configure the automated back-up and forget about it. If the drive fails, pitch it and get another one. « Show Less
2093693
Manufacturer's warranty on new WD Red WD20EFRX Hard Drives are currently 3 years. (Source: http://support.wdc.com/warranty/policy.asp)
1667133
I've looked into that and without the original sales receipt it would be reckoned from the date burned into the ROM. You would have 5 years from that date. I found this out by having a drive without a receipt and needing service. WD is so much better than Seagate. I've only had one that I needed service and almost all Seagate drives died within a couple of months for the warranty expiring. 5 years is forever in terms of drives. I got the 2GB version and on a 6Gb channel it's almost as fast as a USB3 flash drive. maybe faster. In short-it screams!
1268994
I don't know, but I am no longer buying any more WD hard drives. All the ones that have crashed and burned are, guess who? I have other brands that have lasted 8 years. Even the so called white lables that are generic from WD crashed within one year. No more WD.
926434
Although I don't own this particular drive, I am here as I am looking to buy this one also to add to my two other Seagate 500gb Freeagents that I already have that have been working flawlessly for me for over 12 months now. I honestly think that your experience was most likely caused by a faulty unit. Without knowing your computer configuration (windows, mac or linux) it's hard to say if any extra steps would need to be taken to set it up, but for a windows or linux based pc it should be simply plug and play in my experience. As you see on this site, there is only one bad review of the product. If you think about how many of these must get sold every year, one bad review is pretty good as almost everybody will take the time to complain, but very few will come back to write a positive review as a working product is what most people expect. So I guess the short answer from me is yes, I would give this drive a second chance, but then again, i may be biased by my great experience. I hope that this is of some help to you..
1947010
I just finished installing this 1TB and it worked like a charm... 828GB free out of 931GB. I'll update this if any thing changes...
1080261
WD says the component design life of a WD drive is 5 yrs. Does that mean after 5 yrs the hard drive is not going to work?What's the use of keeping 2 copies or more if they are going to die after 5 yrs, or am I misunderstanding what WD is saying about their hard drive design life?
2028219
I have two of these drives and have had them for a minimum of 18 months. I have never had any problems with them. They work fine. They came with an AC power adapter as well as a USB cable.
1183718
9-11 years if you write 50 Gigabytes of data to it everyday :) Don't worry about reading data from it, flash devices (like an SSD) have basically an infinite number of read cycles. Hope this helped!
504267
I can't tell you exactly because I have not ever gone to the end. But I am taping a 3 hour session and a 2 hour session together and have no problems. I am then storing on the 2nd drive (a have a 16 GB micro SD installed, not included) and it has held about 20 3 hour session and still has tons of storage. (That's 60 hours with a lot to spare).
1415110
I just bought it its virus free as far as i can see harddrive is pretty much clean . im not a big computer guy but its pretty fast .
2192892
That's a tough one to answer. My drive just crashed a few months after getting it but there's a few reasons why. One reason? Faulty hardware. Another reason? You over worked it or let it get corrupted / broke your OS but that's an easy fix. There are more complex ones like ram causing it to bottleneck and use your hard drive to take the slack. Imagine always running a light bulb non stop for a long time. It's all relative to the amount you use the product. I'd say one of this caliber should last a few years at least, but not always. It's a solid drive, just don't push it too hard, as these things CAN break.