Seagate, Maxtor and Western Digital

[gojlt2]

I just replaced 1 Maxtor and 2 Seagate hard drives with Western
Digital. All are internal 3.5inch, 7200RPM, 8MB cache.

The replacements were made based on SMART data on the drives read by
www.grc.com SpinRite application. The Seagates and Maxtor
(manufactured by Seagate) all reported massive Seek Errors, ECC
Errors, Write Errors, and others that I don't recall. One of the
Seagate drives was only 1 month old. I contacted Seagate on the new
one, and was told to send it in for warranty replacement. I received a
refurbished drive that had more errors than the one I sent them. YIKES
- no more of this. The Seagate and Maxtor drives were all under
warranty, and I chucked them.

I now have 4 Western Digital drives. Not one is reporting any SMART
errors; the oldest one is a 40MB and has over 30,000 hours reported by
SMART data.

Is this a fluke? Does Seagate make defective drives? Does Western
Digital report SMART data correctly? I am a bit suspicious since none
of the WD drives show any SMART errors.

 

[Rod Speed]

I just replaced 1 Maxtor and 2 Seagate hard drives with Western
Digital. All are internal 3.5inch, 7200RPM, 8MB cache.

The replacements were made based on SMART data on the drives read by
www.grc.com SpinRite application. The Seagates and Maxtor
(manufactured by Seagate) all reported massive Seek Errors, ECC
Errors, Write Errors, and others that I don't recall. One of the
Seagate drives was only 1 month old. I contacted Seagate on the new
one, and was told to send it in for warranty replacement. I received a
refurbished drive that had more errors than the one I sent them. YIKES
- no more of this. The Seagate and Maxtor drives were all under
warranty, and I chucked them.

I now have 4 Western Digital drives. Not one is reporting any SMART
errors; the oldest one is a 40MB and has over 30,000 hours reported by
SMART data.

Is this a fluke?
Nope.

Does Seagate make defective drives?

Certainly some of them do die, just like with any manufacturer.

Does Western Digital report SMART data correctly?
Yes.

I am a bit suspicious since none of the WD drives show any SMART errors.

Post the SMART reports that Everest produces.
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=4181

 

[Arno Wagner]

I just replaced 1 Maxtor and 2 Seagate hard drives with Western
Digital. All are internal 3.5inch, 7200RPM, 8MB cache.

The replacements were made based on SMART data on the drives read by
www.grc.com SpinRite application. The Seagates and Maxtor
(manufactured by Seagate) all reported massive Seek Errors, ECC
Errors, Write Errors, and others that I don't recall. One of the
Seagate drives was only 1 month old. I contacted Seagate on the new
one, and was told to send it in for warranty replacement. I received a
refurbished drive that had more errors than the one I sent them. YIKES
- no more of this. The Seagate and Maxtor drives were all under
warranty, and I chucked them.

I now have 4 Western Digital drives. Not one is reporting any SMART
errors; the oldest one is a 40MB and has over 30,000 hours reported by
SMART data.

Is this a fluke? Does Seagate make defective drives? Does Western
Digital report SMART data correctly? I am a bit suspicious since none
of the WD drives show any SMART errors.

Seagate has turned out some really bad drives lately. They used to be
dependable, but no more. Maxtor is owned by Seagate.

With seek errors, you can have external sources, such as a bad PSU,
though. I would be surprised to see seek errors in three different
drives at the same time without an external reason.

The ECC errors (ECC recoverd) are normal. Drives do not to
a precision seek on reading and often need to apply ECC
or re-read. ECC is faster these days. Write errors are
troubling, but can be the result of seeking problems.

Arno

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

Arno Wagner wrote in news:[email protected]

Seagate has turned out some really bad drives lately. They used to be
dependable, but no more.

Maxtor is owned by Seagate.

Aha, that must be it.

With seek errors, you can have external sources, such as a bad PSU,
though. I would be surprised to see seek errors in three different
drives at the same time without an external reason.

The ECC errors (ECC recoverd) are normal. Drives do not to
a precision seek on reading and often need to apply ECC

or re-read.

Utter nonsense.

ECC is faster these days.

No. Really? Who would have thought, eh.

Write errors are troubling, but can be the result of seeking problems.

Clueless, as always.

 

[Franc Zabkar]

I just replaced 1 Maxtor and 2 Seagate hard drives with Western
Digital. All are internal 3.5inch, 7200RPM, 8MB cache.

The replacements were made based on SMART data on the drives read by
www.grc.com SpinRite application. The Seagates and Maxtor
(manufactured by Seagate) all reported massive Seek Errors, ECC
Errors, Write Errors, and others that I don't recall. One of the
Seagate drives was only 1 month old. I contacted Seagate on the new
one, and was told to send it in for warranty replacement. I received a
refurbished drive that had more errors than the one I sent them. YIKES
- no more of this. The Seagate and Maxtor drives were all under
warranty, and I chucked them.

I now have 4 Western Digital drives. Not one is reporting any SMART
errors; the oldest one is a 40MB and has over 30,000 hours reported by
SMART data.

Is this a fluke? Does Seagate make defective drives? Does Western
Digital report SMART data correctly? I am a bit suspicious since none
of the WD drives show any SMART errors.

Seagate drives appear to report big numbers for these parameters.

Here are some examples.

Good 120GB Seagate HD:
http://www.users.on.net/~fzabkar/SmartUDM/120GB.RPT

13GB Seagate HD with bad sectors:
http://www.users.on.net/~fzabkar/SmartUDM/13GB.RPT

Good 6GB Fujitsu HD:
http://www.users.on.net/~fzabkar/SmartUDM/6GB.RPT

See this old post of mine where I attempted to make sense of my
Seagate SMART data.

Seagate SMART, Raw Read Error Rate, Seek Error Rate
http://tinyurl.com/38nxmj

My testing suggests that the Seek Error Rate number is actually a
count, not a rate, and it appears to count seeks rather than seek
errors. Hence it comes as no surprise to me that your refurbished
drive has larger values for these parameters.

- Franc Zabkar

 

[Odie Ferrous]

I just replaced 1 Maxtor and 2 Seagate hard drives with Western
Digital. All are internal 3.5inch, 7200RPM, 8MB cache.

The replacements were made based on SMART data on the drives read by
www.grc.com SpinRite application. The Seagates and Maxtor
(manufactured by Seagate) all reported massive Seek Errors, ECC
Errors, Write Errors, and others that I don't recall. One of the
Seagate drives was only 1 month old. I contacted Seagate on the new
one, and was told to send it in for warranty replacement. I received a
refurbished drive that had more errors than the one I sent them. YIKES
- no more of this. The Seagate and Maxtor drives were all under
warranty, and I chucked them.

I now have 4 Western Digital drives. Not one is reporting any SMART
errors; the oldest one is a 40MB and has over 30,000 hours reported by
SMART data.

Is this a fluke? Does Seagate make defective drives? Does Western
Digital report SMART data correctly? I am a bit suspicious since none
of the WD drives show any SMART errors.

I am currently de-engineering some Seagate drives, with the assistance
of a highly-qualified CNC engineer.

Seagate drives (at least their higher-capacity drives manufactured
within the past year) are displaying signs of manufacturing errors,
resulting in catastrophic failures.

Once this aberration has been confirmed, it will be made available to
the world's IT press.

For the time being, I no longer recommend Seagate drives; I am
receiving more of these for recovery than all other drives put
together. Only two years ago, I recommended nothing but Seagate.

The problem seems to stem from the construction (mal-construction) of
their fluid bearings.

I have been in touch with the European / Middle East CEO of Seagate who
is taking his time to respond to my requests for information.

Watch this space.


Duncan

 

[Arno Wagner]

I am currently de-engineering some Seagate drives, with the assistance
of a highly-qualified CNC engineer.

Seagate drives (at least their higher-capacity drives manufactured
within the past year) are displaying signs of manufacturing errors,
resulting in catastrophic failures.

No surprise from my own (smaller, but independent) observations.

Once this aberration has been confirmed, it will be made available to
the world's IT press.

Cool. Please post a link here when the results become available.

For the time being, I no longer recommend Seagate drives; I am
receiving more of these for recovery than all other drives put
together. Only two years ago, I recommended nothing but Seagate.

The problem seems to stem from the construction (mal-construction) of
their fluid bearings.

I have been in touch with the European / Middle East CEO of Seagate who
is taking his time to respond to my requests for information.

Watch this space.

Will do.

Arno

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

Arno Wagner wrote in news:[email protected]
That's what you think.

No surprise from my own (smaller, but independent) observations.

Thats why you still buy them, eh babblebot.
To make your (smaller, but *independent*) observations.
So babblebot, how come you didn't strike us down with this earth shat-
tering news.

Cool.

Cool? Come on babblebot, a bit more enthusiasm, please.

Please post a link here when the results become available.

You won't be needing that since it will be news so blindingly hot
that it will burn the skin of your face babblebot. Literally.

Will do.

Yes please. And don't forget to hold your breath while doing it.