The Life and Death of Your Hard Disk
The hard disk in your system is primarily a data center. Being a data center, it becomes one of the most indispensable and important devices in your system. In current parlance, hard disks run parallel with advanced microprocessors in terms of technology and the progress they have made in storage capacity and speed to name a few.

But the impending thought that arises is on its lifespan – How long will it last?
It’s hard to comment on the lifespan of your hard disk: it could be a year, three years, five years, or more, considering the fact that the standard warranty of most of the hard disks is only 12 months.
However, the average life of a hard disk depends on a number of factors such as:
- Brand Type
- Size
- Storage Capacity
- Interface Method
- Usage, etc.
As per research conducted by Backblaze, an online backup service, which researched on 25,000 hard drives from different brands and categories, found that about 80% of the hard disks that were regularly used survived for approximately four years.
This means that about 20% of them did not fail or failed sooner than four years. However, a loaded but dormant hard disk can last for long and keep your data safe and secure for several years into the future, provided the data storage conditions are under optimal range.
Whatever be the reason, the repercussions that you have to face with a hard drive that simply stopped working is severe. The reason being, the moment your hard disk dies down, your data stands at risk. The chances are that this may lead to permanent data loss beyond the scope of recovery.
However, there is a reason to look up. Hard disks do not die suddenly; rather, they show warning signs, which therefore, gives you considerable time to back up your critical data so that you do no lose it permanently. Also, many a times data can be recovered, the conditions being that the data in the hard disk should not be overwritten or corruption in the hard disk is minor.
A hard disk failure usually shows signs and symptoms which are easily identifiable. Notable ones which you may come across at one point or the other are:
- Occurrence of cryptic and other error messages.
- Scrambled and altered ‘folder’ and ‘file’ names.
- Stored ‘files’ and ‘folders’ disappearing.
- Long ‘wait time’ to access folders and files.
- Distorted output while opening files.
- Tickling sound or noise from the hard disk.
- and, Frequent crashing of hard disk during the Windows boot up process.
All of these signs are an excellent indicator of some or the other kind of issue in your hard disk that would ultimately make it stop working. Should you observe any of the above signs or symptoms, back up your data immediately.
Backing up your data regularly is a good habit. Also, you should always go for a reliable hard disk brand as this gives a significant amount of warranty for your device. With this, you will be prepared for the worst-case scenario that could spring anytime.
Next, picture another scenario where you did not back up your data due to which your hard disk stops working, consequently leading to a data loss situation. This requires an immediate solution; and, to do so, you can either purchase a hard drive recovery software or visit a data recovery service center. Sometimes a service center may not be within your vicinity but purchasing a data recovery software is just a click away!
There are several niche products available for you to choose from; however, one that deserves special attention are the data recovery products from Stellar Data Recovery – Stellar Data Recovery Professional for Windows and Stellar Data Recovery Professional for Mac, which are advanced utilities.
Let’s delve upon each.
Stellar Data Recovery Professional for Windows easily recovers all your inaccessible data due to deletion, and formatting of the partition of your hard disk which runs on Windows. The software deftly retrieve partitions and data of all types such as text, images, audio, and videos from your damaged hard disk. Not only is the software capable of recovering raw data, its Technicial version possesses an additional feature of RAID data recovery, therefore, supporting several versions of RAID server. It is compatible with Windows 10, 8, 7, Vista, and XP versions.
Stellar Data Recovery Professional for Mac seamlessly recovers all your lost, deleted, and inaccessible data from your Mac system, be it iMac, MacBook Pro, Mac Mini, MacBook Air, or Mac Pro. Here, you can recover data in the raw form even if you’ve lost your Mac volume, or your filesystems are encrypted. With this utility, you can retrieve data from all file systems, be it HFS, HFS+, FAT, ExFAT or NTFS. Further, you can achieve even Mac recovery from OS X volumes that are not mounted. What’s more! You can recover data from all versions of OS X running on your Mac.
Now that you are aware of the features and benefits of Stellar Data Recovery Professional for Windows and Stellar Data Recovery Professional for Mac, you can use them to recover all your lost data from damaged or corrupt hard disk successfully.
So, the next time your hard drive stops working, help is just a click away!
That’s True! If the hard disk is dead from laptop or PC. That time you feel all data were lost. But I’m happy to read this article data recovery is possible to dead Hard Disk. I recommend stellar phoenix windows data recovery that has many advantages and supporting several versions of Raid server. Thank you!
Hello Andy,
We really appreciate your kind words.
I can’t able to recover my lost data from Stellar file recovery software. Please help
Hello Victoria,
Please share the error in detail, so that we better serve you.
Also, hope you are running software on some other PC machine other than your main computer/laptop.
Need suggestions for data recovery after formatting. Due to some technical issues, I need to format my system. Please suggest the possible solution.
Thanks in advance
Hello Tim,
You can try our software, it will successfully recover all your deleted information.
It’s best to opt for reliable and trustworthy software, in the case of data loss situations. Stellar data recovery is one of the few reputed names in this domain.
Hello Alexa,
Each and every software is developed for the best solution and full recovery.
Yes, Jason you are right. The life and death of a hard drive will not be judged by anyone. So, practicing of taking a backup should be included in our routine. Thanks for sharing a lovely blog with us.
With so much over-dependence on electronic storage devices, we are habitual to keep every single information on them, whether they are audio, video, official data, login credentials etc. Last year, I spend huge amount of money in recovering few personal files. It is very important to keep the backup, which I learned at that time. We can never predict, when our hard disk will stop functioning.
Agree with the words of Kevin. Any compromise with backups may leads to heavy loss of data and eventually lots of dollar in recovering it back. Regular practice of backup is a nice habit. In the situation of data lost, if you forget to take backup, take help of reliable and efficient Stellar products.
We should all make a habit of taking real time backups of our important data on secondary storage devices. No matter how longer or shorter the hard drive run, the backups makes us worries free all the time. Also, it’s best to check our hard drive from time to time and any minor failure if rectified timely will increase the life of any storage media.
The life and death of a hard disk are pros and cons for us. The longer the hard drive is fine; it will be good for us. Somehow, if the hard drive shows the negative results, then we must have to think of the next step to save our data. Heaps of backup are one of the safest parts to secure your data for a longer time.
Great content of writing. The life and death cannot be judged by anyone of anything whether it is living or a non-living thing. One thing, which we have to do, is the proper care. We can take the backup of your data as a precaution of losing it due to hard drive crash or failure.
It’s great to see that you have conceptualized about the life and death of a hard disk. The statement is very true- ‘Safety is better than cure’. This signifies that if we take care of our hard drive and keep the backup of our data on time, then we don’t need to worry in future. We will not need to run for highly
expensive data recovery services.
Thanks for the blog!
Very well said, Jeff. The life of any living or a non-living thing is not fixed. No one can judge, or we can say decide that for how long the thing will survive whether it is a living thing or a non – living thing. In the case of hard drives, again no one can guess the age of a hard disk that for how long it will stay. Therefore, it is better to have a backup at the initial stage to avoid the problem of data loss.
The life of any electronic device is not fixed, to avoid yourself from data loss, it was always recommended to take timely backups. If by chance your data is lost, don’t try to recover by yourself always take the advice of any expert or use data recovery software.
Agree with the views of all the people above. Any mishappening to our hard drive data may happen at any time in future, which can be saved with the help of taking real time backups. As disk drive is the major data storage center of our computer, both its life and health should be properly taken care in regular interval of time.
I agree with the words of Mr. Kevin that you had written a well-formulated content. No can know or control the life of anyone whether it is a human being or a hard drive. So, what we can do is to take multiple backups of valuable data to save it for the future, which can be lost from any of the storage media.
The very first thing which comes in our mind is – ‘For how long a hard drive will stay live with us’. There are various companies which day to day manufactures hard drives. The best thing about all these companies are that they show something creative in their work. But, what if, your hard drive got logically damaged? For this, it is always suggested to take a multiple backup of your valuable data and keep them at different places. Else, you have to rush either for a data recovery center or have to use a data recovery software to recover your data.
Appreciating content. I must say, that apart from the core technical writing, you can write the other content very well. Thanks for sharing the content with us.
I am impressed with the words of Mr. Richard that the life and death are the two things which can’t be ignored by anyone. This thing is not even judged by people. I must follow the rule of ‘Taking a backup of valuable data and keeping them at different places.’ Thanks for sharing a beautiful post with us.
The life and death are two main fundamentals which can’t be ignored either by a living or a non- living thing. Like us, we all have a certain age limit of our life; similarly, if we are considering the age of hard drive (a non-living thing), it also has a certain threshold age limit, which when crossed, the hard drive becomes dead. So, it’s always recommended to have a backup of valuable data in multiple copies and place them at different places; so that, if any one of the backup data destroys due to any reason, you may get the data from another option. Thanks for sharing an informative post with us.
Very impressive topic and content. How beautifully you have explained the importance of a hard disk in your blog. Appreciating! Thanks for the blog post.
Very well formulated content!!! Impressed with the concept of expressing the life and death of a hard drive. The software PRO, which you have discussed in this blog is impressive as I have used this software a few months back. Thanks for sharing the post with us.