Thinkpads Forum

Recently I thought of something which might become an issue after a while for those laptops/thinkpads using SATA HDDs. There are rumors about how many times (10+ times, maybe?) one can replug a HDD onto a SATA cable before the cable worn out (I don't exactly know how to describe, but you sort of know the idea). Does this kind of phenomena also happen to laptop with SATA interface? I was wondering if we change the HDD too many times then the SATA interface on our beloved laptops/thinkpads will become unusable, and that implies a change of mother board, I would say. Am I worried too much here?

Yes you are.

You may be referring to the statement "SATA power connectors and data connectors have been criticized for their fragility and poor robustness", under the Cables and Connectors section in this Wikipedia article here.

In a laptop, the drive is held in a tight fitting space, you slide it in horizontally, and relatively little change of forcing the connector at a "non-orthogonal angle".

That writeup does make an interesting statement. If the connector breaks on the drive, it could no easy access to the drive and effectively complete loss all data.