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spinning hard drives of the pre-helium-filled generation are not in fact totally sealed.

if you disassemble one you will find the tiny air filter module which covers a hole in the casing for equalizing pressure with the outside air.

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I wouldn't be surprised if the fact that argon is heavier caused the failure. Argon gets into the drives, assisted by the larger pressure outside of the drive at the time of the release, and it wouldn't come out within a reasonable time even when the pressure came back to normal, since there's not much capability for venting gasses out of the hard drive. And since argon is significantly heavier, it causes larger air drag on the mechanical parts of the drive, eventually making the head driving coils too weak to operate at the needed speeds.

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