Subject: Re: IDE bad sector remapping vs. write-cache
To: None <current-users@NetBSD.org>
From: Greg A. Woods <woods@weird.com>
List: current-users
Date: 08/18/2003 13:13:56
[ On Sunday, August 17, 2003 at 22:01:01 (-0500), Frederick Bruckman wrote: ]
> Subject: Re: IDE bad sector remapping vs. write-cache
>
> I had a WD 80gb that would silently write erroneous data whenever it
> got hot. After significant activity, archives or large files that I'd
> just copied to it would fail their checksums, and fail the comparison
> with the originals. I never detected any errors after the data was
> (finally) correctly written. I now avoid that brand like the plague.

While WD could no doubt have tried harder to make their disks "fail
safe", the real issue is likely with the chassis and environment you
have the disk installed in.

Older Seagate Cheetah's, for example, required relatively enormous
amounts of air flow to maintain proper heat dissipation in an average
office or home environment (on the order of 120CFM air-flow across each
drive, IIRC).

WD should probably have published much more detailed cooling
requirements in their manuals as well, though that would only allow you
to point the finger more accurately at the system integrator.

-- 
						Greg A. Woods

+1 416 218-0098                  VE3TCP            RoboHack <woods@robohack.ca>
Planix, Inc. <woods@planix.com>          Secrets of the Weird <woods@weird.com>