I figured out why Hard drives Break even just sitting on the shelf

I have not been on this forum in years so if this is the wrong place to post this
please move it for me to the correct area -

I figured out what makes hard drives break and how to keep them from breaking -

In side the drive there is a small package of gel (beeds ) that swells over time from being in contact with the air-

the gel pack swells up and presses against the drive disks and stops them from spinning -

this is why a drive will go bad even while just sitting on shelf once bag has been opened and not being used -

and is why a new drive is sealed in a Vacuum / nitrogen filled bag -

Once the drive is removed from the bag and hits the air the Clock has Started Ticking -

Remember how early drives had a warning
printed on them Do Not to block the small vent hole - this is why-

some drives the vent hole was Obvious
on others the vent hole was Hidden and the vent hole went straight into the gel pack on several of the drives I took apart-
on the real early drives the gel pack was placed away from the vent hole -

I think the gel pack likely reacts to moisture in the air - a friend of mine lives in a real dry climate and one of his drives
lasted 10 years


-- Planned/ Designed obsolescence -

the drives I took apart are older drives -

on different drives the gel pack is in different places -

on one seagate the gel pack is under the disk stack - and hard see and to get at -

Seagate disks were very hard to turn but once I dissabled the drive disk stack it was clear that the gel pack was rubbing
against the disks to keep them from turning

on newer Hitachi desk star the gel pack is mounted on the left side of the disks-
Easy to grab with tweezers and remove- ( I removed one on a working desk star -drive spins up fine )
gel pack swells and rubs on side of disks -

on early desk stars the gel pack was hooked to a small moving bracket that looked a lot like drum brakes in a old car
and worked the same way -
gel expands and pushes on brake shoe device and it rubs against the disks --

this is why disks go bad just sitting there --

I think once the disk is stopped it disables motor and may not work again -
Probably has a motor Overload circuit that finally kills the drive -

The screws in all of the drives I took apart use a Torx T8 screw driver to remove -

Dive in and look for yourself -Jay-

Well, no, that's not quite it. Drives do not come in vacum airless bags, they're only static proof. The inside of a drive is air tight, no air allowed in or out, because the tiniest piece of dust would distroy it. The most common reason for drives to go back is a corrupted directory that is not repairable. Since we've no way of 100% verifying if the drive died due to bad directory or physical damage, we chuck them. The read/write heads float, literally, on the bed of air created by the spinning platters. It really doesn't take much to physically crash a head into a platter. Today's drives are not nearly as prone to that as older ones. Also, the motor spinning the dirve, moving the heads back and forth can wear. The mechanics of the read/write heads and their swinging arm can wear. The controller card can go bad. There are dozens and dozens of causes of a drive going bad. But something drying out inside is not very likely. Sitting on a shelf, the physical elemnts don't get regularly lubricated while standing still (self lubricants only work when a machine is in use). And the electrical charges on the platters are so tiny, they actually decay over time when not being regularly recharged during use.