Hard Drive Woes

[LA_MERC_LaTech]

Ok...so here's the deal...

A couple months ago, I formatted my HD (I do this once a year) and upgraded my motherboard, video card and CPU. It took a number of hours to re-install all my software (20 GB worth), and all was fine and good in Tech land. I went to eat lunch that day, and when I came back, my 40 GB IBM HD had died. I was VERY upset because not only were there 2 partitions on the HD, but the Windows partition had been destroyed as well as my archive directory where I backed all my downloaded software to! Ooooh...I was mad at IBM. This HD was 2 years old.

SO! I had a spare 20 sitting around and I put it in my PC and installed 20 GB worth of data again. What fun. I RMA'ed the dead HD to IBM, and was asured that eventually, I would receive a replacement HD in the mail. I did (3 weeks later) and all was fine and good in Tech land.

SO! This new HD was sitting on my counter top for...oh, a month or so (who wants to shut down their machine when everything is working well?!). The other day (Friday of last week to be exact), I ghosted my 20 GB to the NEW AND IMPROVED 40 GB HD manufactured now by Hitachi (who mistakenly purchased IBM's HD manufacturing line, thinking it was a good business move).

SO! I've been noticing this last weekend and couple days weird things happening in my machine. It actually locked up...3 times! My machine NEVER locks up! Well, I just wrote it off as a fluke...power problems or something. Well, little did I know that it WASN'T power problems, nor was it a fluke.

SO! Last night, I'm playing CS...having a good time killing those terrorists who are trying to blow up this Semi and or Plane. All of a sudden, I hear my HD spin down (as it sounds when it loses power). I was like, "Huh?" It powered back up and I was still playing CS...so, all was kinda ok in Tech land. I run around in circles after saying "My PC is doing some weird things..." And the HD does it again, but this time, it cycles up and down about 4 times REALLY FAST. "Uh oh....that's not good." "I gotta go guys, my PC is freaking out!" And I shut down my PC.

SO! I give it a second to think about how bad it's been, and then I reboot. It makes it into Windows without any problems. All is concerned, but pretening not to be, in Tech land. I take the side off my PC and notice a weird whining sound eminating from my "NEW" HD. "Erm..." So, I decide to push on the bottom of the HD to see if moving it will help (yeah, looking back that seems stupid, but at the time it was a valid solution). It helps....THE COMPUTER LOCK UP! Ok...so, we have issues with the HD now.

SO! Thankfully, I never formatted the 20 from which I ghosted, so I install that back into my machine (breaking the head off one of the screws in the process) and reboot. Ta-Da! No problems. I get online and go to IBM's website to see if I can RMA this drive...BINGO! They don't support that drive even though the origional drive WAS a IBM drive. So, I go to Hitachi. Blah blah blah..."your RMA # is..."

SO! Part of me thinks, "I'm going to get this HD back, and it's going to be a POS also." Afterall...that WAS a NEW HD they sent me to begin with (supposedly).

SO! Now that I've completely bored you with my story (if, indeed, you've read this long!), I'm in the market for a new HD. BESIDES IBM and HITACHI, does anyone have a favorite HD manufacturer that produces QUALITY drives?

I'm gonna put this 40 (when/if I get it back!) on E-Bay and may replace the IBM 80GB I have as well...

LaTech

[LA_MERC_goose]

I'm not the guru of the internals like some however I have a 75 GB WD partitioned three ways and been running for over a year and never had a single problem. I have Win2000 loaded, my games, kids games, wife's school and a massive program for the fire department - which if I lost I would cry because it has every report for every call we have responded to in the last three years and I keyed them all in. I got it at a deal at BestBuy, $125 with a $40 rebate. I like the rebate, I hate waiting.

[LA_MERC_Onji]

My very first HD was a seagate, it came in my Packard Bell (yes i know, i was a n00b then) it was only a 127mb, but it did well. Then after a couple of years, and gaining experience etc, i decided to build my 1st pc. I got a brand new seagate harddrive, and guess what, it wouldnt work! Its motor would come on, but it would never spin up, i RMA'd it back, got another one in, it did the same thing, RMA'd it again, and it did the same thing again! So i said screw this! I called up the place i got all of my parts from and told them about the problems I was having with this drive, and they said they would send me a Western Digital of the same capacity for the same price (i think it was a little more expensive than the seagate at the time) I got it in, installed it, and it was PERFECT, first try! That was the turning point for me, I have been buying western digital drives since and have not had ONE problem to this day.
We use several different brands at work including ibm. I havent personally had any problems with an ibm drive, but i HAVE heard some horror stories from people that have. They are going through the same things you are scott. Their particular drive was a 120gb drive. They have done the rma thing several times with no luck.
If you can get ahold of a live person (good luck with that) tell them about your problems and see if they'll either give you a different model for the same price, or if they can refund your money in anyway. Maybe the model drive you have was a bad batch or something.

Later :)

[LA_MERC_LaTech]

Ok then, pros and cons of SATA HD?

[LA_MERC_Dirge]

I will NEVER buy a WD HDD again, I have had a couple fry out and seen a couple more fry... THEY suck!

I bought a Maxtor 120 GB 7200 RPM 8MB buffer about a year ago, and I haven't had any problems at all (/me knocks on wood)! The Maxtor got good reviews too!

[Redneck]

Scott I must agree with them. I buy Western Digital hard drives and they rock. I really think you should check out the Western Digital 740GD Raptor (http://www.westerndigital.com/en/products/Products.asp?DriveID=65). Yes its only a 74 gig HD and its pretty expensive, $250ish was the lowest price I found on Price Watch from this website CLICK FOR LINK (http://www.monarchcomputer.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=M&Product_Code=150239&Category_Code=SATAHardDrives), but I think you will see that it is THE Hard Drive now. This is a link for a review on it from Toms that has more retailers for it (CLICK FOR LINK (http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20040123/index.html)) Hope this has helped you in some way, its the least I could do for ya since you have helped me for years now with all my stuff.

[LA_MERC_LaTech]

http://storagereview.com/php/benchmark/bench_sort.php

From what I've seen, I am going to have to agree with you guys...Raptor drive HERE I COME!!!

[JUNKY]

I have ahd problems with Seagate, Maxtor, WD, and IBM. I'll probably go with whatever I can get the best deal on :-)

[CajunTech]

I have a SATA WD Raptor drive and it rocks....

I useually buy/recommend Western Digital and Maxtor drives..

I run the 36GB WD SATA drive as my primary and have an 80GB 8MB cache (WD or Maxtor don't remember) as my storage. It's possible to get two drives like that for under $200 total if you hit the right rebates(maybe even a 120GB instead of an 80GB).

[LA_MERC_M@lACHi]

WD Raptor drives are awesome. I highly recommend them.

[LA_MERC_LaTech]

Ok, I just ordered the 74GB Raptor...will let everyone know how that baby is when I get it.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Yeah - I've never really run anything but WD's and that's all I will buy at work!

[CajunTech]

Seagate ownz joo :D

J/K... I did just order a 200GB, 8MB, 7200RPM Seagate drive for $100 tho. Guess I'll be screaming in a couple months when it crashes with all my data on it.

[LA_MERC_T4rg3T]

The game server is running the 36GB Raptor drive :)