HARD DISK failed verification for recording

[Steam Radio]

This particular Maxtor drive that failed verifcation is only 30GB in capacity and the HDR verification tells me I can only use it for "backup or archive". it seems to work and show up as a regular harddrive perfectly fine on a laptop in a usb caddy but the HDR doesn't like it for recording (not a fast enough reading speed for the HDR to write to during recording apparently) so I'm wondering if I could just use it for the HDR or SDR operating system only, actually I have an SDR which I am rebuilding at the moment and I was going to use it in that and I was just mulling over my options with what I have to hand for now.
My question is can it be used for the operating system or should I just get a replacement?.

[arjepsen]

Replacements are getting difficult to find.
I'd suggest moving to the Compact Flash card solution.
You can get a cf-ide adapter that lets you change the card (while the machine is off).
Thus you don't really need the second drive - you can have several CF cards with the operating system on them (the os takes very little space), and then you take the card to your pc for doing backups.

[Steam Radio]

So you're saying its perfectly possible to use a CF card as the internal drive with the operating system on and also using it record to as well?
so say using a 32GB card will take very little space for the operating system but give you roughly 5 hours of recording time, is that correct?
Meaning theres no need for two drives, just the one?

[arjepsen]

in short - yes.
The OS doesn't take up that much space, so you could have a small handfull of CF cards WITH the OS installed on, and just switch when needed.
There also exists an updated bios chip, that allows you to use a 128gb card/harddrive, so you would have even more space/time availble on one card.

[Steam Radio]

Good to know thanks again Arjepsen.
The small stumbling block will be accessing the card at the rear once my recorder is installed in its rack so getting around the back may be problematic so maybe I will also try the blanking plate where the media tray slots in with the CF card slot in the middle like this one , what do you think ?