Safest Hard Disk Free Space


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Good Day.

 

I'm wondering what's the safest free disk space a hard drive can have to operate correctly and avoid a future damage, i'm using 10% for OS and also for storage disk.

 

What are your experiences on this topic?

 

Regards. 

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Every computer device dies. That is the reality.

 

Backup is crucial. Save all your important data to at least 3 drives.

 

I'm sure Budman can go on further with this...

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I think he means, "how much free space does an OS need to continue running without an issue?"

I don't think there is a definite answer. I would be worried if I have less than 10GB of free space on my main HDD, but that's just me.

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Oh, I read that wrong.

 

Just use the full drive, and another disk for storage, easy peasy. Get a 120GB SSD

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Thank you all for your answers, the question goes regarding hard disk life. I know that having a almost full disk causes perfomances issues or file access lags due to the amount of information is stored or apps running in the hard drive.

 

I wonder if having a hard disk working always with a small percentage of free space no matter if its for running os/apps  or just access stored files,  ends in overloading the engine of the disk and increase the posibility to fail due to the high activity of reading/running files.

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mtycharly: sounds like you are living on the past :)     Does not sound nice of me to say that but just use one SSD for your OS ALONE.  As for storage, you can use physical HDD.  You will not need to deal with any lag.  The lag you are refering to is due to the old drive.  And yeah if you have a laptop that use 5400RPM and you partition it for OS and then for storage, yeah it will do that.  So the solution to avoid that is to get ONE SSD for the OS ONLY.  And then another SEPARATE drive for storage.

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I already have an OS disk and a separate storage disk, the question is in general what would be the best amount of free space so a hard drive operates without overload either if its for running an OS or storing data? does a full disk could have more opportunity of failure than a disk with certain % of free space? 

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I think he means, "how much free space does an OS need to continue running without an issue?"

RE the above, it depends on what you're doing. If web browsing, I'd allow at least 2GB. I just Word processing, 500MB.

 

Whatever you do, remember to BACKUP frequently. Then again, I have 25 year old hard disks that are still working perfectly... :)

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I like 10% free space, if only for defragging.

 

And absolutely back up your personal data, especially when it comes to SSD drives.

 

http://open-blog.net/how-to-extend-the-life-if-your-hard-drive/

 

http://www.lc-tech.com/pc/5-ways-extend-the-life-of-your-hard-drive/

 

http://lifehacker.com/5802838/how-to-maximize-the-life-of-your-ssd

 

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I think what you're asking is how full to get a HDD before it starts "hurting" ..

If it were me, I wouldnt go above 80% - take that with a grain of salt - because I dont own anything with more than 50% full (it gives me an excuse to buy a larger drive) :D

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What??  Where did anyone get the idea that running at say 70% capacity of the drive means it last longer than say running at 80% of cap??

 

"I know that having a almost full disk causes perfomances issues or file access lags due to the amount of information is stored or apps running in the hard drive."

 

How do you know this?  Because its just not true - where is your source of this information?

 

So you think that if I have say files stored on my disk that take up 50% of the space that it will be faster to access file X then if I have say 90% of the disk full -- it is now slower to access file X??

 

While its a bad idea to run at 100% just because you have no room to write files ;)  With SSDs there is no difference in running at 40% vs 90% - and on a normal HDD if you want to defrag it you need to have room available, etc.  But just because the disk is at 90% vs 40% is not going to mean it lasts a shorter amount of time..

 

And before someone jumps in that in a HDD the files on the outside of the platter can be read faster than the files on the inside of the platter because the platter is moving faster at the outer edge, etc.  Come ON!!!  you are talking such a small difference in time that is is of no significance when talking day to day usage of a disk.  Yes we all know that if you spin a disk be it a hdd platter or a record or a cd or a tire that the rotational speed on the outside of the disk is faster than the inner part of the disk..

 

So its better to keep your disk with less files on them because they will be on the outer edge of the disk - this is nonsense talk when it comes to actual use of the computer and the files on them, etc.

 

Normally when you disk gets to say the 80% mark you either need to do some clean up, or start looking for bigger disk would be my rule of thumb.  But that has really nothing to do with if your disk is going to last you 3 years or 4 years, etc.

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Hello,

 

My general rule of thumb is to try and leave ~20% free on the boot (+applications) and/or swap file drive(s). 

 

For data storage drives, I typically upgrade them when I get to around 5-10% free disk space by purchasing new drives (or recycling existing ones) that are double the size of what is currently being used (e.g., replacing 1GB drives with 2GB ones, 2GB with 4GB drives and so forth).  In a RAID or RAID-like environment, it might work a little differently, depending upon the existing number of drives being used and their capacity, as well as room in the chassis for additional drives.

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

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