I've unusual disk failures at the dates listed below (3 failures in ~6months). My first two disks lasted several years. Typical usage is data access to music collection, and on average once a week I copy some files to/from the RAID, leave on 24x7 because power on/off feature hasn't worked very well in the past. Specs listed below includes dates of disk failures. Is this common for RAID1? Is there anything I can do to prolong my HDD lifespan?
Netgear ReadyNAS Duo v1 Raidiator v4.1.12, RAID1 Configuration
Disk 1 Disk 2 11/25/13 OK 01/06/14 OK OK 04/01/14
Disk Manufacturer/Model: Seagate ST1500DL003 (1500GB) Settings: Tell me what you're interested in and I'll post here as soon as I power up again.
Re: Performance Settings and Frequent HDD Failures
Disks of course can fail at any time. Since the load on both disks is identical, they often do fail in rapid succession. However, one of your disk 1s failed after about 6 weeks. That suggests to me that the disk was simply defective.
Personally I think the question of whether power down (or spindown) extends the life of the drive is open. Spin-up puts more stress on the drive than keeping it spinning. So it seems to me that frequent spin-ups might create more wear then keeping them running. My personal approach is to use the drive spin-down feature on the duo, but set the spin-down time fairly long (say an hour or two). Then the drives won't always be spinning down/up.
