Hi all,

is there a known issue with 7200.12s becoming extremely slow after short time (<=0,5 years)?
I got several here, 160, 250, 320 and 500GB, which have transfer rates of 1.5MB/s or less and access times of >30ms.
They read error-free and without clicking or spinning, just slow.
It seems to happen mainly to OEM drives (HP)

can be many things... Uniformly slow in all areas or only on some ? Suddenly ?

Those I know from became slow suddenly. The last one I checked had a 1.5MB/s rate in the first 2/3 of its capacity, then a narrow peak up to 30MB/s and then back to 1.5MB/s. The peak was just wide enough to be recognized as real measurement.
As all of them mirrored with errors so far, I don't care that much. Its a pity that the OEMs don't exchange the built out HDD, but fortunately they're cheap these days.