how long will the hard drive last?

Below was taken from here: http://www.teksale.com/laptops/laptopparts/listings/Toshiba_mk4006gah_embedded_40gb.htm

MK4006GAH
HDD1564
1.8-inch HDD 40.0 GB 8mm

Toshiba introduces a 40GB 1.8-inch embedded HDD, the MK4006GAH. Enabling some of today's most exciting, small form factor mobile devices, the new mini-drives offer manufacturers significant storage for consumer, commercial and PC applications - such as music players, handheld PCs, PDAs, wearable computers and laptops. Toshiba is committed to grow with developers and users to provide smart computing solutions, backed by Toshiba-renowned quality and technology leadership.
Also for use in iPod 4G & iPod Photo.

** Note for iPod users: These drives will work in 4th Generation iPod and iPod Photo ONLY. These are not fully compatible with earlier generation iPods. The MK4006GAH is only compatible with 4G & Photo models that use 8mm drive. 5mm microdrives also available.

Key Features:

- 40.0 Gigabytes
- Lightweight, only 62 grams
- Low Power Consumption
- 15ms Average Seek Time
- 100MB/s Ultra DMA Transfer Rate
- 300,000 MTTF Hours= 12,500 days= 34.24 years

Baciscally the doucmentation (http://www.teksale.com/downloads/hdd1564.pdf) says that you can get about 5 years or 20,000 power on hours whichever comes first.

Here (http://sdd.toshiba.com/main.aspx?Path=81820000000700000001000065980000151 6/818200000b0c000000010000659c000026bd/8182000000e6000000010000659c0000279e/8182000000e9000000010000659c00000370/818200000c24000000010000659c00002b41/818200000c28000000010000659c00002b4a) are the specs for the 80Gb in my 5.5gen iPod, they seem to be the same as the 4gen hard drive.

With a hard drive in a portable device, the longevity will mostly depend on how you take care of it. The hard drive in my 1993 laptop is still working fine. Some people tend to be rather rough with iPods, dropping them & tossing them onto tables and such, and that would affect the hard drive more than anything.

What I do when I charge it so it doesn't wear out the harddrive (a lot of my friends didn't do this) is when I have to charge it I eject it in iTunes and leave it plugged in.

The best thing you can do is purchase an AC adapter for the iPod when charging it, that way the hard drive never spins up (unless it has been 24 hours since you last used your iPod).

However, people worry about this too much. The iPod's hard drive will definitely last long enough (at least 20-30 years) if taken care of. This means no heavy running (or dropping or throwing the iPod), exposure to moisture, exposure to extreme humidity, exposure to extreme heat, or exposure to extreme cold. If you use your iPod in a non-stupid manner (yes, I said that for a reason) then the hard drive will last long enough. You will end up upgrading to a newer model before the hard drive ever runs down (unless it is a defective hard drive or mistreated).

Pretty interesting. It goes against the common conceptions (or misconceptions) but still. I think more experiments need to be conducted in order to get concrete results but it is still a interesting read.

Either way, the life of the iPod's hard drive will last long enough.

The hard drive is not spinning just because the do not disconnect message is on, you see the little rotating icon on the upper left hand corner of the screen when transferring? Thats when the drive is active.

Actually, I think the hard drive can actually last very, very long. It depends on how you use it. It is just the battery that deteriorates over a period of time, and the worst thing is, there's nothing you can do about it.