[Leica] Hard drives

[lrzeitlin at aol.com]

Hard drives have a limited life span. Compared to floppy discs they 
hold a phenomenal amount of information but because they contain moving 
parts they wear out. For me drives last about two years of reasonably 
hard use. I have had about five drive failures in assorted equipment in 
the last ten years. Surprisingly constant use does not appreciably 
alter the failure rate. The lubricants dry up in a stored drive almost 
as fast as they do in a spinning one. According to my friends in the 
computer industry, solid state storage is the way to go, The other day 
I bought a 120 GB high speed thumb drive for about $50 at a computer 
store. If Edward Snowdon could store years of CIA and diplomatic 
messages on a cheap thumb drive I guess it is good enough for my 
pictures.
Larry Z