360 Hard Drive Damage Question... :[ Options

[Hoody Man]

Ok well you guys know how computer hard drives work, if you shut them down directly there is a chance of permanently damaging them. Well yesterday, I set some game demos to download while I was playing vegas, and suddenly it froze, no response or anything. It didn't even say downloading stopped.

I was forced to shut it down via power button, now when I turned it back on, my download which I had seen at about 62% was at 57% now. Is there a chance I damaged my hard drive from this? Because my first one was already defective, I dont need another bad one :[

[RDC]

Nah, you're OK. You just loose some of the downloaded data when you get disconnected or turn the 360 off and it just has to download that part again. It beats having to d/l the whole thing all over again, but still kinda bites. About the worst case really would be that it just corrupted the entire d/l and you'll have to delete it and start over, but if the HDD wants to go, it's gonna go.

This post has been edited by RDC: Jan 6 2007, 07:56 PM

[G0t M4xx 21]

Yeah it won't damage the HDD, you can pull the HDD out of the console while it's on and it doesn't do a thing except stop your download.

About the only thing you can do to permanently damage the HDD is drop it/submerge it/run over it/melt it

[Hoody Man]

Thank you lovers, lol. So its not like a computer hard drive then? Because I remember comp HDs ****ing up when u turn them off directly

[RDC]

The 360s HDD is SATA which are designed to be hot swappable, way older PC HDDs had to "park" the heads or there could be problems. That doesn't meant that it's a good idea or OK for ya to go plugging and unplugging the thing all day long, but the "problem" you asked about is just how the downloading feature works on Live. Sometimes it will crap out and you'll have to start it all over, sometimes it just "takes a step back" and continues. In either case, you're not going to kill it by turning off the 360 when it locks up, if it were to come back on and be dead, then I'd start looking at getting a new 360.