FWIW, I've used something like 8 Segates over the last 10 years and never had one completely fail. Yes blocks and sectors occationally go bad, but never anything resulting in an unusable drive.

Bad blocks are a fact of life for drives, that's why formatting software and most basic disk recovery tools are able to map around bad spots. 1 problem of this type with a drive in 2 years of use is not necessarily a good reason to replace it or to swear off the brand ;)

Glad to hear that you got the Data back.

Kool Gl with that then Taco,

And Dolby it seems that you is right with the "luck of the draw" by what others have said here.. But I still think its not realy down to the manufacturer.. as we all know there is stuff that is not 100% go's out of the back doors and gets passed on cheap to resellers... I think that is maybe where the "luck of the draw" is you finding a reputible company or local store even that dont have any of that stuff lol ... I know for a fact there is 3 places here within 20 miles of each other that have that crap :(

I just use my website to backup my sources, just zip them all up and upload them.

Of course, with my games that does take some space, and not sure how much you got... But it's quicker/easier to setup then a scourceforge project.