Re: raid10 hard disk choice

On Fri, 22 May 2009, Robert Schnabel wrote:

> No, the original drives I have work fine.  The problem, as you point out, is
> that Seagate changed the firmware and made it so that you cannot flash it to
> a different version.

The subtle point here is that whether a drive has been out long enough to
have a stable firmware is very much a component of its overall quality and
reliability--regardless of whether the drive works fine in any one system
or not.  The odds of you'll get a RAID compability breaking firmware
change in the first few months a drive is on the market are painfully
high.

You don't have to defend that it was the right decision for you, I was
just uncomfortable with the way you were extrapolating your experience to
provide a larger rule of thumb.  Allocated hot spares and cold spares on
the shelf are both important, but for most people those should be a safety
net on top of making the safest hardware choice, rather than as a way to
allow taking excessive risks in what you buy.

--
* Greg Smith gsmith@gregsmith.com http://www.gregsmith.com Baltimore, MD