SATA cables--An unreliable standard?

[DrJohnstrous]

I build our family computers, and perform some heavy lifting with them to do photo and video editing. I gradually migrated to mostly SATA drives as older ones went to hard drive heaven. On at least three types of motherboards, I began having a very high rate of boot failures. How I narrowed down the problem is a months-long story, but it is that the SATA cable connectors are extremely sensitive to the slightest movement on most hard drives. Even creep caused by heat variations can cause the drive to stop working suddenly, which in turn causes physical damage from platter crashes. I've tried several brands/types of cables. It appears that some drives are more vulnerable than others. I finally resorted to having to glue the cables together sandwiched with foam core board and several ounces of hot melt glue, to prevent creeping. Who on Earth approved this standard, and why are they not dangling from gibbets (Metaphorical)? Is there a reliable SATA cable somewhere in the world?

 

[hang-the-9]

You bring up a good pint, the cheaper SATA cables without any type of retention just use friction to keep things together.

The right angle ones and the ones with a metal bracket hold on quite a bit better, like these http://www.linkdelight.com/013671-50cm-SATA-III-3.0-7-pin-Hard-Drivers-Data-Cable.html

 

[ex_bubblehead]

I don't know where you get your cables but I've never encountered such problems in many years of use. All of the cables I use have squeeze-to-release clips on them (both ends) and I've never had one fail as you describe. Properly installed and dressed cables do not move around. The same can be said for hard drives. If they are moving around enough to dislodge cables they are not properly secured.

 

[getochkn]

10 computers in my house, hundreds built over my life, never had a sata cable creep out because of heat. Had 1 motherboard that ate drives and killed them. every sata drive hooked up to the motherboard would die in a week but that was only 1 particular motherboard.

 

[bigpinkdragon286]

It's good that some users haven't had to experience SATA cables going bad, but lower cost cables certainly do have a tendency to fail over time. They generally protrude straight out and have only plastic to support the weight of the cable, unless as ex_bubblehead mentioned, you affix them somehow. The solution is to replace them with better cables. I remember this problem from the first generation of SATA cabling, but once the problem became somewhat apparent, the cable connectors we redesigned slightly to prevent it.

Having a SATA cable disconnect, even during use, is not going to cause a hard disk to crash, but can cause DATA errors. It just disconnects it from the DATA bus. The drives are designed to be hot swappable.

 

[DrJohnstrous]

It's good that some users haven't had to experience SATA cables going bad, but lower cost cables certainly do have a tendency to fail over time. They generally protrude straight out and have only plastic to support the weight of the cable, unless as ex_bubblehead mentioned, you affix them somehow. The solution is to replace them with better cables. I remember this problem from the first generation of SATA cabling, but once the problem became somewhat apparent, the cable connectors we redesigned slightly to prevent it.

Having a SATA cable disconnect, even during use, is not going to cause a hard disk to crash, but can cause DATA errors. It just disconnects it from the DATA bus. The drives are designed to be hot swappable.

Thanks for all the replies--The ones who never had the problem are a bit puzzling--I have had lots of mechanical experience and have built complex scientific machines; I can assure that the problem is not how the drives or motherboard are secured. Must be the generation of boards and drives I've built with.

Can anyone refer me to a source for reliable cables? The one suggested previously is "out of stock," although I intend to try ones from that company, even though they are only around $0.99 apiece. Same prices on eBay where I have tried at least 4 different suppliers. The ones with the metal securing clips have seemed a bit more reliable, but only after having to secure them with gobs of hot melt glue. They still seem very loosely engaged to the SATA tabs, and the movement of even 1 or 2 degrees from perpendicular will produce errors. It seems that it would have been very easy to engineer the tabs just slightly thicker or the spring action of the connector tabs a bit more forceful.

 

[bigpinkdragon286]

Once transitioning to the SATA connectors with metal locking tabs, although still somewhat flimsy seeming, as you've noticed, I haven't had any recurrence of SATA drop-outs in years. You're probably right about it being the particular generation of equipment you were building with.

 

[DrJohnstrous]

Thanks again everyone. I recently swapped motherboards; installed the inexpensive Asus M5A97 R2.0. The SATA on this new board is certainly more reliable than the fancier MSI 790FX-GD70 I had running before. However, it is still not 100% and all the disk errors I have encountered are still traceable to the SATA connections. Fortunately, I'm comfortable with open case computers.
I can totally imagine that there are manufacturers out there whose SATA connections work for some reason. But I think if I were a less savvy consumer whose computers were black boxes, SATA would, by now, have driven me to drink or worse.
Not all of us can simply hop down to the store and buy another motherboard because the designers of a cable simply had to come up with a method of connection that relies on the barest spring pressure on a surface less than the head of a pin.

 

[Hawkeye22]

Monoprice is an excellent place to get cables of all sorts and they come with a limited liftetime warranty.

http://www.monoprice.com/