Check the warranty of your new hard disk

People in the automotive industry have been saying that today's cars are far more reliable than those made 20 years ago. To a large extent, we can accept that, although we can still find models that give owners a migraine not long after they drive off the dealership lot.

Similarly, every time we talk about computers, it is not easy to say that computer components are also becoming more reliable as time goes on. Some component products have markedly improved, while others have not.

A survey by the Australian Consumers' Association, as reported by The Age last month, found that one in four PCs needed repair work last year. A lawn mower, the article said, was on the average more trouble-free than a PC. It does quote a Gartner analyst, Andy Woo, as saying that the most prevalent culprit for PC downtime was the software.

Still, hardware failure is not uncommon. Basically, every time you buy a new computer, you are taking a chance. If you are lucky, you will get a desktop or notebook computer that does not give you much of a headache. Until the inevitable arrives, of course. If you are not so lucky, you may get a keyboard with the G and H keys stuck, for example.

One of the components that normally comes to the end of its life quite early is the hard disk. This should come as no surprise. The hard disk is the component that works the hardest of all. It has to keep spinning even while you doze in front of the monitor.

If your memory capacity is too small for the application you are running, the hard disk has to work even harder to accommodate the overflow from the RAM. Each time you search for that important file and you have forgotten its name, you rev up the hard disk. And when our power company PLN thinks it is time to give your computer a jolt, it is your hard disk that will suffer the most.

So during the entire life of a PC or a notebook, you may have to replace your hard disk at least once. Of course, it would not be necessary if you are one of those lucky enough to have the financial power to buy the latest PC or notebook every few months or so just for the fun of keeping up to date.

But if you are like the rest of us, you will have to buy a new hard disk. The good news is that taking out the old hard disk and installing a new one is easy. The hardware system, especially the BIOS, has the intelligence to detect and identify the hard disk so you will not have to input the parameters manually as in the past. The most important thing to do would be to note which cable goes where.

The bad news is, starting this month, the three most popular hard diskmakers, Maxtor, Seagate and Western Digital, have cut their warranty period from three years to only one! These three hard disk suppliers, according to CNET News.com, control 85 percent of the hard disk market.

One of the companies said that a bad hard disk would generally fail within the first 90 days of use. Well, I had three Fujitsu hard disks that failed within one month after their two-year warranty period expired. Incidentally, Fujitsu has abandoned the consumer segments and now concentrates on making hard disks for servers and notebooks, which will bring the company a better profit margin.

The three companies unanimously said that the cut in the warranty period was necessary because of the razor thin margin in the hard disk segment. Also, as IBM said at its web site, quite a few of the hard disks that were returned as defective turned out to be OK when tested. This certainly makes it difficult for them to keep offering a three-year warranty with only a 12 percent margin out of the US$70 price tag on a typical hard disk.

Well, if life were perfect and PLN was kind enough to make sure that our electronic equipment would not be damaged by sudden interruptions of electricity, brownouts, surges or spikes, the cut in the warranty period would not be any cause for concern. But with our electricity the way it is, you should buy a hard disk with the longest warranty that you can still find. So far, IBM has not joined the club by slashing its warranty time.

Unfortunately, because of their higher prices, IBM's hard disks are not easy to find on the market. The stores in local computer shopping centers do not usually keep them in stock, so you may have to order them.

If it is no longer possible for you to buy a hard disk with a longer warranty period, then you have more reason than ever to buy a CD-RW drive. (Zatni Arbi)