Already 2 internal Hard Drives have crashed - WHY???????

Question

I got my MacBook in early June 2006 and just super. Then on 12 April 2007, the Fujitsu 120 gb internal HD crashed-- just like that. OK with SuperDuper! I only lost 3 days of data-- i.e. 15+ years saved.
I installed a 160 gb Hitachi SATA 5400 HD and today, 1 Aug-- that's less than 4 months later-- Kaputt! Gone, more noise than an ice cream maker --
WHAT IS GOING ON? I don't travel with the MacBook alot-- it sits on a nice elevated rest-- is connected to power and an external Monitor. I back up each night via SuperDuper! (and thank goodness!!!!!)-- but after 18 years of computers-- all Macs--- with really never a problem-- maybe once on a 60 gb 3.5" - but then this all of a sudden ?!?!
I can't live like this-- wondering not "if" but "when" my internal HD will just WHAM not work?
I'm starting a new job and will be traveling lots-- can't bring my 2 La Cie external 250 gb HDs with me everywhere! (But you can bet I'll get an external La Cie 160 gb FW and carry that with me!)
This is a bit sad-- unless I'm doing something (I rarely shut down, put MacBook into sleep-- have it wake for backup and then back to bed...)
Any ideas, suggestions, comfort or whatever appreciated. And Apple wants EUR 250 for a replacement-- that's $350 or so-- I just am not sure where to turn here.
Regards, Steve Wednesday 1 August 2007

Answer 1

Your problem is that you put your computer into sleep very often. Apple has introduced a feature called safe sleep. This helps the computer to retain information if the battery runs out or you swap the battery for another, probably fully charged one but the more times you put the computer to sleep the more times it writes intensively to the hard drive and the Sudden motion sensor cannot park the head of the drive in this case, hence the chances of damage to the drive are much greater. You can deactivate safe sleep by putting the following command into terminal:
sudo pmset -a hibernatemode 0
That will disable safe sleep completely.