While many factors come into play when deciding whether to opt for a hard disk drive (HDD) or a solid-state drive (SSD), lifespan is something that is crucial for many users.
It is important to note that accurate figures for the lifespans of HDDs and SSDs are not 100% certain and depend on them being kept in the optimum conditions – which many users don’t adhere to. The vague estimates that manufacturers give when it comes to the lifespan of their drives do not consider variations in temperature, humidity, and the devices’ handling, all of which can have an adverse effect on lifespan. Nonetheless, there are a few simple facts that can be looked at.
Hard disk drives (HDDs) are electromechanical devices – they contain moving parts. These moving parts – which include the read/write heads, the actuator arm and the spindle motor – mean that HDDs are particularly susceptible to physical damage from shocks, knocks or bumps. While many modern hard disk drives now contain active hard drive protection (AHDP) technology which aims to prevent physical damage by preparing the disk prior to impact, there is still a chance of internal components becoming damaged. While solid-state drives (SSDs) contain no moving parts, their utilisation of NAND flash chips to store data on brings with it a plethora of new problems that HDDs don’t face.
Many people assume that if you left an HDD or SSD in the optimum conditions and didn’t touch it, the data would remain the next time you powered it up. This isn’t true. As the magnetic domains on platters inside an HDD change polarity, there will be an increased number of bit errors, causing media degradation. SSDs don’t store data magnetically – they store data as electrical charges to the NAND flash chips. These electrical charges leak at a faster rate than changes in magnetic polarity that HDDs face.
When it comes to storage, keeping HDDs and SSDs in the optimum conditions is paramount. Factors like temperature and humidity can have adverse effects on both HDDs and SSDs. Storing your drive in an environment with high humidity can lead to the oxidisation of internal components, whether it’s a hard disk drive or a solid-state drive. With SSDs, higher temperatures can accelerate the rate of media degradation, so this is something to bear in mind.
When SSDs first emerged, their lifespan was a common drawback that put many users off adopting the then-new technology. However, improvements in NAND flash technology mean that SSDs are pretty much standard in laptops now, and are comparable with HDDs when it comes to data retention. There has been some concern about the amount of data that can be written to an SSD before it will fail, but modern SSDs can withstand a vast amount of data being written to them.
