A really long time (at least by residential standards). Close to 24/7 for many years.
If a single HDD failing is traumatic then you're doing something wrong. At absolute minimum you should be in raid1. Backups should amount to snapshots that can be restored in a single step.
> If a single HDD failing is traumatic then you're doing something wrong. At absolute minimum you should be in raid1. Backups should amount to snapshots that can be restored in a single step.
I wasn't storing anything important on it anyway, mostly movies ripped from Blu-rays. So its failure wasn't traumatic. However I expected it to last at least three years, but it died after exactly 365 days of use. The seller refused to send a replacement, and legally speaking, they were in the right.
idk, it was such a traumatic experience for me that I decided to pass on recertified HDDs.