Heat Kills your Data!

For several different reasons, storage is a very important part of a computer.  These days, computers do far more than they ever have in the past.  From businesses to family photo’s, storage is the ideal way to keep documents on your computer.  The most popular method of storage is the hard disk drive, which we all count on for keeping our data safe.

Even though the hard drive stores data, it isn’t perfect by any means.  Hard drive failure is very common with all computers, with no real way to prevent it.  Although there are several different reasons why a hard drive can fail, the most common is overheating.  Viruses and crashes are common as well, along with theft and accidental deletion.

With the older style and mechanics of hard drives, the RPM speed was low, meaning that the drives wouldn’t overheat.  The hard drives we use now days, have speeds between 7,200 and 10,000 RPM, meaning that they can get quite hot when they start working.  Computers of this day and age come with fans to cool everything down, with most hard drives including temperature sensors as well, so you can keep track of just how hot your hard drive becomes.

With hard drives today, overheating is a very common problem.  The faster hard drives come with speeds of 10,000 RPM, which can make the temperature soar above 70 degrees F, really heating things up inside the drive.  The mechanics on the inside are built to withstand the heat, although if things become too hot, you’ll encounter problems.  If a drive becomes too hot and ends up losing the data, it may be next to impossible to retrieve the information – no matter how good your data recovery specialists may be.

One area that suffers from the drive overheating is the platters, which are magnetic media.  Platters are what carry the data throughout the hard drive.  Platters are constructed from optical glass, aluminum, or ceramic and normally coated with a layer of magnetic material.  Once the hard drive begins to heat up, the platters will start to expand, which changes their size.  When this happens, the magnetic surface on the platters will get destroyed, which results in a loss of data.  If the physical area of the platters are damaged, it will result in unreadable sectors.

Other areas of the hard drive that can be damaged due to overheating are the read and write heads, head actuator, and the controller chip.  Hard drives are very sophisticated pieces of hardware, and can’t handle overheating.  The read and write heads are a common example, as they can easily render the drive useless if they become damaged.  If they get too hot, they don’t make any contact with media, which pretty much stops the flow of transfer from information to the computer.

To prevent your hard drive from overheating, you should always make sure that it is cooled properly and well ventilated.  You can always get additional fans and coolers, which will improve both ventilation and the flow of air in your computer.  You can buy fans and coolers at very affordable prices, which makes them an ideal investment for keeping your hard drive or hard drives cool.

You can also get software that monitors the temperature of your hard drive as well.  Whether it’s software, or additional fans, you should always ensure that your hard drives are kept cool.  By keeping them cool, you’ll greatly reduce the amount of crashes.  You’ll also increase the stability of your hard drive as well, which will make your entire computer perform much better.

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The diagnostics that are associated with computers can help to identify any problem or failure that computers show when they are having problems.  Diagnostics are used to test out the computer system, which includes both the BIOS and memory, software, and even the hardware that is attached to the computer.

The most common types of problems will occur when your computer is down to very low resources, which can either be a low amount of RAM, or a low disk space.  These conditions are very common, and generally result in your computer running very slow.  This can easily be fixed, all you have to do is defrag your hard drive, and get rid of some programs and files that you no longer use or need.

Almost all types of computer diagnostic software can find and fix just about any problem that you are having.  It normally starts off with a BIOS examination, and goes on from there.  PC diagnostics
software can determine a lot from the BIOS, from the common settings to those that have a major impact on both boot up and performance.

No matter what you do, you should never modify or tamper with the BIOS settings, as it can lead to serious problems.  If you do plan to modify or mess with your BIOS, you should always create a backup first, just in case something goes wrong.  The BIOS settings can be very tricky, although they are responsible for a lot to do with your computer.  If you have never been in the BIOS before, you really shouldn’t be modifying anything inside of it.

Depending on the diagnostics program that you are using, there will be several different features available.  Right now, two of the most popular are Norton Systemworks and PC Doctor.  Both of these programs offer full diagnostics software, good for fixing just about any software related computer program you can imagine.

Once you run the program, you’ll be able to select the diagnostic test that you are planning to run.  Some offer you a full system scan, which will scan your entire computer and then display any problems that you having.  After displaying any problems, the software will normally give you an option to go ahead and fix it.  As long as the problem is nothing serious, the diagnostic software can generally fix it.

The more complicated problems, such as hardware failures or hard drive crashes, are a totally different story.  They will require a technician who is very experienced, that can rebuild the hardware.  Diagnostic software can report hardware problems to you, although most of the time it is unable to fix it.

There are other computer diagnostic software that you run after starting the computer or rebooting, that will check everything from BIOS.  These types are great, although the types such as Norton and PC Doctor are by far superior.  They offer far more features, including defragment, cache cleaner, and the option to delete your temporary Internet files.  These features are great to have, especially if you aren’t the technical type.

For more reasons than one, computer diagnostic software is the ideal way to find and prevent problems with your computer.  Norton Systemworks offers you Ghost as well, which is the perfect way to back up your data.  You can back up certain files, or just go ahead and back up your entire hard drive.  Systemworks and Ghost are very easy to use, even if you are completely new to computers.  For everything they offer you – computer diagnostic programs are the ideal way to prevent problems before they happen.

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Back it up!

Computer data can be very important to us, especially those of us who make a living on the computer.  Over the last several years, the computer has grown on all of us, making our lives so much easier.  For that very reason, it’s easy to tell that if we lost our computer data, it would completely destroy a majority of us.

Losing data can be an overwhelming thought to say the least.  Computers store data, although machines have been known to fail.  Even though the computer has become a lot more reliable over the years, it is virtually impossible to prevent computers from losing data.

You don’t need to take this lying down through, as you can indeed fight back.  The ideal way to ensure that you never lose your precious data, is to back it up and keep backing it up.  You should back up your computer data at least once a week, with once per day being the recommended way to do it.

In the past, and even some today, the floppy disc is the main method used to back up computer data.  Even though they store a small amount of data, they are easy to access, easy to use, and nearly every computer has one.

Those of you who are looking to take things to the next level should look into backing up your entire hard drive.  Backing up your entire hard drive is something that everyone should do, as it is indeed one of the best and most reliable ways to backup your computer.

When you create a backup of your entire hard drive, it will copy all of your information, so if something happens you’ll always have your data.  Doing a full backup of your hard drive is great, although it can be very time consuming.  To make matters worse, it is recommended that you create  a backup at least once a week.  On the other hand, if what you have on your computer is very important, you’ll find it more than worth the effort and time needed to back things up.

Another way you can back up your data, programs, and files, is to burn them directly to a data CD or DVD.  This way, you can select which files or folders you want to keep.  If you use CD/RW or DVD/RW disks, you can continue to add information to them when you create a backup.  If you don’t use the RW (re-writable) media, then you won’t be able to go back and add more information to the disc.

Burning data directly to discs are the method of backup that most people are using these days, although backing up the entire hard drive is the preferred way of backing up your data.  If you plan to use discs, you’ll need either a CD or DVD burner, which you can get for a great price these days.  The discs are cheap as well, which only makes this method of backing things up that much better.

Whether it’s for your business or for personal reasons, you can’t go wrong backing up your data.  You should always strive to back things up properly, as this will ensure that the data will always be there when you need it.  This way, if you computer happens to crash or you lose everything on your hard drive, you’ll always have your backup files to go back to.  This in itself can save you a lot of time, effort, and quite possibly even money – just for the simple fact that the files are all but a copy away to restore.

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Don't forget your laptop!

If you were to look at past statistics regarding the information that has been lost in regards to laptop computers, you would find yourself amazed.  Even though this information can be astounding, many of us still don’t take the time to back up the information on our laptops.

To put it in simple terms, nothing in the computer industry is fool proof.  Hard drives can crash, the laptop can get stolen, or it can even be dropped and rendered useless.  To ensure that we are never left without our precious data, we should always create a backup of our information.

There is no mistaken the fact that over a million laptops have been stolen over the years in the United States alone.  Anytime a laptop is stolen, chances are that it won’t be recovered.  If the information wasn’t backed up, then the owner will be left with no laptop – but more importantly – no backed up data either.

Just like you can with desktop computers, you can also create a backup of the data on your laptop as well.  You can use online services, back it up remotely, or use several other methods to ensure that you keep all of your data.  Preserving your data is something you should really look into, especially if you have business material on your laptop.

The best way to go about backing up your data and files is to burn them to a data CD.  Data CDs can hold up to 700 MB (Mega Bytes) of data, which means a lot of files.  To back things up this way, all you need is a CD/RW burner in your laptop, which most of the newer ones come with.

The only drawback to laptops is the fact that they don’t offer near as much storage or security measures as a desktop PC.  Desktop computers have a lot more power, and they can also do things (including backups) in a fraction of the time.

The laptop computer was designed for on the go use, which is the main reason why people don’t really think about backing up their data.  When the thought finally does come to mind, it is normally too late to do anything about it.

As mentioned above, the easiest and quickest way to backup your laptop data is to use an online backup service.  Depending on your connection to the Internet, it can take anywhere from several minutes to several hours.  Although it may take you a little bit of time, you’ll have the satisfaction in knowing that your data is there if something should happen.

Whether it’s for your business or personal use, you can’t go wrong backing up your data.  You should always create a backup of your data at least once a month, even more than that if you have a lot of important information that you add to your laptop on a frequent basis.

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I installed this as a second drive in my desktop computer and have been satisfied with the performance. I would rate it as very quiet. If I listen closely I can tell that it is running, but that is about all. The only sound that is really noticeable is when it auto-parks after it has been idle for a while, and when it restarts when I access it. I actually enjoy hearing the “snap-snap” sound that occurs when the two drives auto-park in sequence when the computer goes to sleep — I guess I am just easily entertained!

One caution: this is an OEM package, so don’t forget to order a SATA cable and the appropriate (very short) 6-32 screws to go with it, as there is nothing in the package except the drive itself. I was able to find “retail package” drives locally, which include the SATA cable in the box (don’t know if it includes screws), but they were all the 7000.11 version, not the 12th generation drive like this one. The 7000.12 is supposed to be quite a bit lower in power consumption, and based on the wattage readout on my UPS I can confirm that this drive adds very little load to the power supply.

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A CD can hold over 600 floppies!

With the technical age upon us, computers are far more important now than they have ever been in the past.  A lot is done on the computer these days, from paying bills to earning a living.  Therefore, the data that you have on your computer is very important.

Among the data found on your computer, you may have precious pictures and memories that you wouldn’t dream of losing.  No matter how sophisticated computers get, they will still crash, or encounter other problems that can result in a loss of data.  For that reason, a backup of your data is very important.

While there are several ways that you can go about backing up your data, a CD Rom is by far the easiest and quickly becoming the most popular as well.  Like other backup methods, the CD Rom does have it’s faults, although it has more pros to offer you than cons.

One of the best facts about CD Rom backups are the fact that your disc will be stored on CDs.  The standard CD-R data disc can hold up to 700 MB of data, which is a lot of files.  You can store pictures, documents, software, programs, and virtually anything else that you can think of to a CD – including entire folders that are full of files and data.

If you use CD-RW media, which are also known as re-writable discs, you’ll be able to continue adding data until the disc is full.  You can also re-write over existing data on these discs as well, which makes them ideal for those who constantly update documents that they need to hold onto.

If you are using the standard CD-R data disks, you won’t be able to add more data to them.  Once you have added the information to your disk, that’s it.  This is a great choice if you want to keep the data as is, and know without a shadow of a doubt that it is going to be backed up whenever you need it.

With the prices of CD burners and CDs being so cheap these days, anyone can afford them.  They don’t cost near as much as they did years ago, which is why they are so popular when it comes to backing up your data.  If you own a newer computer, chances are that a CD burner was included with it.  If you have an older computer, you can buy a CD burner and some discs for a little of nothing.

The best thing about backing up data with CDs is the fact that they are more reliable than floppy discs, easier to access than an online backup, and they will last you a lifetime.  If you have important data that needs to be backed up, you can rest assured that a CD-Rom is an excellent way to back up your information.

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The CD-R discs are compact and easy to store. While the discs are still blank, store them in the circular case on the spindle that they came in. After your burn data onto them, I would recommend storing them in slim jewel cases instead of paper sleeves. It’s just better protection for your CD-Rs that have data stored on them. Don’t store these discs, burnt or blank, in rooms that become very hot; this causes damage to any brand of this type of disc and you could lose data over time.

There are two caveats that many other people note about any brand of this product: when you are burning the data onto the blank disc, don’t be surprised if you see that the data is burning at a rate slower than 52x. This can happen if your burner doesn’t have the capacity to burn faster, or it may be a quirk. I am not a professional so I cannot be certain of precisely what causes this phenomenon; but I assure you that the extra minute or two (tops) that you wait to get your CD-R completed is worth the wait. In addition, DON’T write on these using Sharpie ink pens. The ink can seep through the top coating of the CD-R disc and compromise your data. In fact, don’t write directly on these–period. You risk losing your information. Don’t attach labels of any sort, either.

Overall, Verbatim blank CD-R discs store data reliably and I believe that an extra minute to burn the data onto the blank disc is well worth it.

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At some point in time, everyone who owns a computer will experience the trials and tribulations of hard drive failure.  The reasons behind it vary, and could include everything from a human error to damages resulting from flood or water.  Viruses can play a role as well, along with many other factors.  For many years, the need to recover data that has been lost or destroyed has made data recovery such a very valuable asset.

Almost all hard drives can be recovered.  Normally, if the drive is making a ticking or a scratching noise, you can use certain software programs to recover the data.  Sometimes, due to age or bad parts, the aperture arm in the hard drive can fail, or the platters can become damaged and lose the data that they hold.  If you can’t recover the information with software, you’ll need to send the hard drive off and have it either rebuilt or have technicians recover your data.

Data recovery is always an option, from hard drives that are 2 GB in size to the largest of over 300    GB or more of data.  No matter what size hard drive you have, the data can generally be recovered.  Keep in mind that if you’ve had a computer crash, you’ll need to send the hard drive off to have the data recovered by technicians.

One of the key benefits of data recovery is the fact that information can also be retrieved from the recycle bin as well.  Partition recovery, and even information that has been lost somewhere on the disk can be retrieved as well.  Even though it may seem like your data is gone forever – the technicians that specialize in data recovery can retrieve it.

From Windows to Mac, everything can be recovered.  There are different filing structures and formats, including NTFS and FAT32.  These are common Windows filing structures, and hold all of the information for your hard.

Those of you who have multiple hard drives in your computer, can rest assured that RAID configurations can also be recovered.  If a single hard drive on the RAID configuration fails, the RAID setup will absorb the blow and there won’t be a loss of data.  On the other hand, if the entire RAID configuration crashes, it will crash big time.  Whenever this happens, you’ll need to send it off and have technicians restore both the RAID hardware and software.

Anytime your hard drive happens to crash or malfunction, data recovery is there to help you get back your files.  Whether they are personally files or very important files that are need for business – you can put your trust in data recovery and know that you’ll get everything the back the way it was.

Don’t forget to check out our Online Store for great deals on New and Used Hard Drives

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