Even in Europe cars are a necessity in a lot of cases. I live in a pretty small village and the only store is 2 towns over and on a pretty steep hill. It would be possible on a motorcycle(I saw normal ebikes struggle to get up) if you’re alone and don’t need anything from the store.

It is true, do some research please before making such statements. Drives can and do die while on the shelf, that is partially because of something called bit rot but could also be because of the place where it was stored.

The chances of a perfect “as new” drive dying while on the shelf are low but are still there

Old ltt video with more info
https://youtu.be/Ie9qomn3_3U?si=8D4ejsx2OqqaRW-P

Not really, he says that he only 10gb left of his 300gb.

Like the other guy said I also think that he’s just running low on space. Secondly not using the drive will keep it good for longer but it will still bit rot(if he plans to keep the drives for very long)