2006-12-19 17:10:22 · 3 answers · asked by samar s 1 in Computers & Internet ➔ Hardware ➔ Laptops & Notebooks
1. defrag occasionally to keep the drive from having to constantly seek to get contiguous data
2. if it is a high performance, large drive (multi-platter), or has a lot of cache you might consider getting a HDD cooler (this is a small fan that fits onto the body of the drive -- heat shortens life
3. backup your harddrive elsewhere - especially non-replaceable data -- nothing lasts forever.
2006-12-19 17:16:19 · answer #1 · answered by MarkW 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Make sure you don't expose it to a lot of vibration/shaking or drops.
If you can, eject your hard disc on windows or on a mac by finding the eject button on a mac, and in the lower right corner, right click the usb logo and eject hard ware. A lot of people on windows say that this doesn't do anything, but i have messed up two external hard drives this way.
If you can, turn off your hard drive before you pull the usb cable so that it turns off on it's own. Try to defragment and possibly partition the drive so that it runs more efficiently.
Maybe converting your hard disc to NTFS may help, especially if you are capturing video using adobe premiere (the disc can only write 4 gigs or about 18 minutes of video before an error on FAT32 format).
Back everything up, for photos, use shutterfly.com to upload for free all your photos.
2006-12-19 17:17:39 · answer #2 · answered by gotham158 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The only thing I can think of is the obvious, keep it cool and keep it clean of dust accumulation. Lots of great hard drive coolers out there.
2006-12-19 17:16:34 · answer #3 · answered by robert257a 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋