I had an issue earlier this year with my 120GB IBM/Hitachi. It didn't have bad cluster or any sort of failiar, it was simply refusing to use anything except PIO Mode 4 in Windows.
Wiped the drive and reformatted it, been good as gold since.
Right now I only have Hitachi and Western Digital. Although I trust WD to an extent, I've not has as much good experience as I have with IBM/Hitachi.
Fujitsu and Seagate I now avoid like the plague unless I really need space, cheap and fast. The number of those that have died on me is just ridiculous. On the whole I don't think it's Hard Disks that are getting worse, I think it's because computers are now letting us run them basically 24|7 now.
I mean I generally only turn off my computer once a month, if that. It's always going. Yet 2-3 years ago, it would be turned off each night when I went to sleep. Not sure what has changed my mind on letting my computer run longer, maybe it's because Windows XP doesn't inadvertently crash during the middle of the night for no reason. But whatever the reason I'm not the only one who's started to do this trend of just leaving my computer on until I have to change hardware.
Hard Disks are constantly running really, sure with the new power systems they'll shut down after a while to conserve themselves, but this is still atleast 9-10hours a day of useage. It's also bad for them to be constantly powered up and down.
Well as I said, provided you know which ones to avoid like the plague you should be alright. This said if your having this much trouble it might be time to think about a new Mobo.
