Early 2008 Mac Pro-What type of HD? Smart failing?

markw10markw10
Posted:
in Current Mac Hardware edited January 2014


I have an early 2008 Mac Pro and have two hard drives in it.  The main system drive is a 2TB Western Digital drive I installed about a year ago.  The 2nd drive is a 1TB Seagate drive which is the original drive that came with the Mac Pro.

When looking at Disk Utility a few days ago I realized the drive is showing up in Red and it's saying that SMART is failing.  I've never had this happen before and like having a warning. 





First Question:

When SMART shows up as failing can it be a false alarm or is it likely a definite sign of impending hard drive failure?  When this happens, does the drive frequently fail quickly or does it take awhile?  The fortunate thing is I back this drive up frequently to Time Machine.



Second Question:

What SATA speed does the Mac Pro handle?  I see many hard drives that are 3.0GB/s and some that are 6.0GB/s. Does the Mac Pro handle the faster 6.0GB/s?  If not, would they still work but just not at the additional speed?

I may consider upgrading to a 1.5TB or 2TB but figured I'll go with a Western Digital or Seagate drive.  I see cache ranging from 16MB to 64MB and speeds at 5400RPM and 7200RPM.  Between these two which is more important, large cache size or RPM's? 



Thank you for your help.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 2
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member


    Get SATA III. It only does II, but you'll have that future-proofing.

  • Reply 2 of 2
    markw10markw10 Posts: 356member


    Thanks for the advice.  I'll hit Newegg and other places and start doing some research.

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