Prevent possible Seagate hard drive crashes!

[DixieAmerican]

I did the upgrade to my Seagate 320G, after putting in my serial number and getting the proper download.  Everything worked fine----For about two to three weeks, and then when I powered up, the drive made a very loud whirring sound, and then a giant crash that you could hear throughout the house.  Now it tells me I have no hard drive installed.  I did a back-up right after I did the patch.  I go no error notices during backup.  When I reviewed the 5-disc backup, disc 3 says there is no data.  So I have 1, 2, 4 and 5.  I also bought a new 500G (not Seagate) and have my factory discs.  I don't know what will happen when I try to backup with the discs. 

[RasterBlaster]

I'm sorry to hear about your HD crash. Your recovery discs should work with the new hard drive.

[madeforkill]

i just experienced this crash; obviously i did NOT know anything about it and when i contacted the assistance they sent me a new hd without telling me anything about this well known bug.

now that i installed the new one, i come here to find out what happened and read all about this...so are you telling me that there is NOTHING i can do to recover the 400 GB of data in the old hd???? i'd rather throw the whole pc out of the window

[RasterBlaster]

madeforkill,

I feel for you... the misery you went through is the reason why I started this post. I know HP sent me an email (if you registered your product), HP sent me at least two message through their HP Update software, and I found a support document and an red alert on my PC's support page. But if you didn't hear about - then it really sucks... all hard drive crashes suck.

This "problem" can happen with PCs (not just HP) that came with the Seagate drives (250, 500 and 750). So... if you know of anyone that has one of these drives, please tell them to update the firmware! You might want to start preaching to folks about backing up data regularly too... hard drives have spinning mechanical parts - they WILL fail over time. It's just a matter of when.

[agoodfriend]

I have an ST3750630AS at Firmware revision HP24 and am running Vista 64.  I have tried several times to run the SP40966 firmware update to prevent hardware crashes.  Each time it run, I get through the license, bootable CD creation and restart.  When it restarts, I get the blinking white curser in the upper left hand corner for a while, and then the computer starts.  No messages, no errors and more importantly, no firmware update!

Can anyone help?

Thank you

[mopat]

I had the crash, firmware failure, and was able to recover all data intact. It was a bit scary but you can do it since HP is unwilling to provide the customer support required.

Here is a link www.msfn.org/board/solution-seagate-7200-11-hdds-t128807.htm

You will need another computer and a cell phone cable, small torx screwdriver, read the posts at the link. it is a lot to fathom at first, but can be accomplished in 20 minutes.

I will never buy another HP, still cannot believe they are selling these drives with faulty firmware.

I joined the class action suit, HP tech support is a JOKE!

[mopat]

When you click the link, then you have to go to "HARDWARE HANGOUT' then the first post "Solution to the Seagate 7200" best of luck.

Basically you use the cell phone cable to communicate with the harddrive, a paper card to fool it out of the busy state, the other computer operating in a terminal mode to send and receive commands, I used the crappy HP computer's power for the harddrive.

[Twinsal]

It will not be a surprise if i tell everybody that my HDD seagate 7200.1.1 ST3500620AS, 500 Gb crashed early September (HP iq506 touchsmart purchased in october 2008).

It was simple not recognized anymore in the BIOS (basically BIOHD 2 error). I went through the online technical support to try to find a solution.

The diagnostic of the technical support was a hardware failure. HP shipped  me a new hardrive. I must confess that i was a bit suspicious about this statement since my HDD was still spinning fine. So, i went on the HP website, typing a research request on my product and then found out that my problem was related to a firmware issue. 

Pushing ahead my investigation, I realized that it was a widespread problem of which HP was perfectly aware. Several conclusions can be drawn form this misadventure.

1- I suspect that the technical support was perfectly aware of my problem and delibarately lied to me

2-Failure of HP to warn his customers. I did register my product online and received regularly e-mails about commercials. My computer was doing regularly updates from HP website. HP has to understand that people doesn't spend his time on HP websites.

3- The after selling policy is absolutly  disgusting. No offer of recovery data has been made. Moreover, it is only a matter of unbricking a locked HDD here...not a big deal for HP I think. Of course, if you don't send back the crashed HDD, HP will charge you $280. 

Having personal and work-related data on this HDD (unfortunately not all backed-up) and knowing they can easily be recoverable, i am quite reluctant to send the HDD back.

I took my decision. I will keep the crashed HDD, will pay the fees and will try to unbrick my crashed HDD.

I have to say that i am most displeased about the way HP deals with that kind of matters. Enjoy the 280$ i am going to give you because I don't think that i will buy a HP product ever again. 

[mopat]

Great post Twinsal, well written!

You can recover your personal data, it is a little nerve wracking but doable, don't give up.

Do NOT send your personal data to HP, they cannot protect it, they cannot assure you it will not be used for nefarious reasons.

This whole thing is a ploy to steal personal identities.

Do not pay for the HD replacement, let HP sue you, then countersue for fraud.

Selling a product known to be defective is illegal.

Join the class action suit.

You can buy a Western Digital internal 500 meg HD for $96.99

http://allyourbaseonline.com/store/product_info.php?cPath=1_22&products_id=460

Why pay an inflated price, so HP generates revenue to be used to steal your identity.

[M-14]

I did install the updated firmware, with a little trouble. My hard drvie has worked well so far. Is there a class action lawsuit growing on this hd issue?? If not it should be created to protect the people that are having hd crashes to resolve the losses that they have incured.