Basically its not the fault of linux. Its due to the crazy hard drive manufacturers that design hard drives to suit the need of windows.
Here is the explanation of what is happening.
Harddisk's head loads and unloads a number of times. If the hard disk is idle, then it parks. What happens in windows is that the idle time is very less. So, the harddisk manufacturers set the harddisk according to the disk access pattern of windows. What happens in Linux and also in Mac is that the disk access pattern is different. The disk is accessed much less often. So, The hard drive head Loads/unloads much more than it does in windows. Tipically a hard disk has a load/unload cycle life expectancy of around 60000(not sure if its 60K or 600K). This gives the life at around 4years of 12hr use daily.
Now since, in linux (and also mac) the load/unload cycle is very high, the life expectancy reduces to around 8 months. (read it in a real life case cenario in a blog. The guy had to replace 3 hard drives).
Whose Fault is it?
It is not linux's fault. Less disk access is better. The manufacturers are the ones that need to be blamed here. They are the ones who set the default setting to suit windows.
Whats the fix ?
As posted by hitboxx, the code does not let the head park and is up all the time. This works but you will have to look at the temperature of your hard drives more closely. The thread in the ubuntu forums has detailed info on the fix (see my first post).
Why am I angry ?
I have been using linux since redhat9. I found out about this bug YESTERDAY!!!. I think things like this should be more publicised. It should be made a sticky everywhere in the linux forums. I f***ed up my thinkpad's hard drive a year ago. KDE started showing some s.m.a.r.t failure errors. I quickly removed kde, installed windows and sold the laptop to a less tech savy guy.
Now, i had been using ubuntu8.04 on my new hp for the past 4 months and yeasterday while randomly checking bugs in launchpad, i found it. This laptop has already got a load cycle of 18K and its been just around 4-5 months i have bought.
So, I just wanted you guys to know that there is a problem that exists and people are losing hard drives . Now, i have linux only in my desktop. Until some list of blacklisted drives and the drives that have no problem are compiled, i have no choice but to stay away from linux in my lappy. I could use the 255/254 fix but its a dirty one and its USE AT YOUR OWN RISK kind of fix.
So, if any guys here runnig linux on laptops please check my first post of this thread, goto the ubuntu forums link i provided and find out if your harddrive suffers. Ignorance is not Bliss.
No, it does not produce bad sectors or kills all drives. check if yours is infected.
I have Arch linux installed on my desktop and its doing very well. No worries. Its just that I advise you to check if you are the unlucky one with the faulty hard drive.
Anyways i better remove Linux until there is any fix.)