Seagate drive failed me

Jul 4th, 2015 4:47 pm

#1

Kaitlyn [OP]: Deal Guru; May 6, 2005; 11515 posts; 1487 upvotes; GVR

Jul 4th, 2015 4:47 pm

I bought a portable drive back in may for my trip in june. Returned at the end of june to plug my drive in and have windows report a problem. It shows space used, but no files are listed when I explore the drive. On the trip itself, didn't have any issues using the drive.

I'm beyond the 30 days of purchase from Staples and I threw out the box/etc (but do have the receipt from online order). right before my trip as I was cleaning up.

Is there anything I can do to return this to Staples? I have absolutely zero confidence in repairing+continuing to use the drive at this point, and I'm not exactly for getting a replacement since this drive failed me the first time I actually needed it.

What can I do?

Jul 4th, 2015 4:56 pm

#2

eldiablo: Deal Expert; Feb 24, 2007; 15094 posts; 2697 upvotes

Jul 4th, 2015 4:56 pm

I presume you would be concerned regarding the stored data on that drive. For attempting to recover the data try their recovery service..

http://www.seagate.com/ca/en/services-s ... s/recover/

As far as returning the drive, you will have to contact Seagate where they will ship you a replacement refurbished drive once they receive your unit. You will need to contact them for an RMA.
Once you receive the refurbished external from Seagate, you can consider selling it on BST or Kijiji in order to recoup some of the money.

Jul 4th, 2015 5:28 pm

#3

RunnerForDeals: Deal Addict; Dec 24, 2006; 3006 posts; 1832 upvotes; Barrie

Jul 4th, 2015 5:28 pm

I got bit by the Seagate bug hard as well. Two of 3TB drives in my NAS went belly up. Lost almost 2TB of data after restoring and recovering. It sucked.

Your best course of action right now is either through Seagate or a Credit Card Warranty plan if your credit card has one.

+1

Jul 4th, 2015 5:34 pm

#4

ROYinTO: Deal Fanatic; Dec 12, 2009; 5551 posts; 3047 upvotes; Toronto

Jul 4th, 2015 5:34 pm

Seagate Recovery Services will do the Seagate RMA for you if you use their services.

I didn't have a great experience with them although they did recover the files I needed. They wait for the RMA drive to arrive to restore to. If you don't have a drive that qualifies for an RMA replacement, they will simply give you your data on a drive or USB stick. Go figure.

What types of files did you lose? That makes a big difference in what they charge.

Jul 4th, 2015 5:35 pm

#5

ROYinTO: Deal Fanatic; Dec 12, 2009; 5551 posts; 3047 upvotes; Toronto

Jul 4th, 2015 5:35 pm

RunnerForDeals wrote: ↑I got bit by the Seagate bug hard as well. Two of 3TB drives in my NAS went belly up.

Thanks for the reminder. Note to self, backup NAS.

Jul 4th, 2015 5:51 pm

#6

grumps312: Sr. Member; Dec 25, 2010; 766 posts; 113 upvotes; Toronto

Jul 4th, 2015 5:51 pm

I had a Seagate that failed me too. Think I'm going to switch to WD from now on.

Selling cheap textbooks & books. Price is negotiable!

+1

Jul 4th, 2015 5:54 pm

#7

Kaitlyn [OP]: Deal Guru; May 6, 2005; 11515 posts; 1487 upvotes; GVR

Jul 4th, 2015 5:54 pm

RunnerForDeals wrote: ↑I got bit by the Seagate bug hard as well. Two of 3TB drives in my NAS went belly up. Lost almost 2TB of data after restoring and recovering. It sucked.

Your best course of action right now is either through Seagate or a Credit Card Warranty plan if your credit card has one.

Interesting note about the CC - anything I can do through my CC that would be quicker/easier/get me my refund? Technically it would still very much be under the MFR warranty...

Jul 4th, 2015 6:02 pm

#8

eldiablo: Deal Expert; Feb 24, 2007; 15094 posts; 2697 upvotes

Jul 4th, 2015 6:02 pm

Kaitlyn wrote: ↑Interesting note about the CC - anything I can do through my CC that would be quicker/easier/get me my refund? Technically it would still very much be under the MFR warranty...

Unfortunately, no. It's all between you and the manufacturer/Seagate. If you had used your Gold/Platinum CC, it would possibly double your warranty (if only new unit at the time of purchase) but any quality issues (past the 15 days from Staples) is in the hands of Seagate returns/warranty department.

Jul 4th, 2015 8:42 pm

#9

death_hawk: Deal Expert; Aug 22, 2006; 29362 posts; 14857 upvotes

Jul 4th, 2015 8:42 pm

jackrabbit000 wrote: ↑Seagate's HD's are crap. I always buy Western Digital and not once have I ever had a problem.

grumps312 wrote: ↑I had a Seagate that failed me too. Think I'm going to switch to WD from now on.

I'm staring at 3 dead WDs right now.
ALL hard drives will fail.

Jul 4th, 2015 9:37 pm

#10

LEXX911: Deal Addict; Jul 27, 2009; 2392 posts; 461 upvotes

Jul 4th, 2015 9:37 pm

What exactly is your problem? During your trip how did you access your portable HDD? Through your laptop? How did you access your portable HDD when your got home? Through the same laptop? Have you try opening up the portable HDD and if you have a desktop computer have you try connecting it to one of your sata to see if you have the same problem? Is your portable HDD have file encryption?

Jul 4th, 2015 9:38 pm

#11

coolspot: Deal Expert; Oct 6, 2005; 16798 posts; 2464 upvotes

Jul 4th, 2015 9:38 pm

death_hawk wrote: ↑I'm staring at 3 dead WDs right now. ALL hard drives will fail.

I agree - all drives are prone to failure. I just buy whatever is cheapest and make sure I have multiple backups.

Jul 4th, 2015 10:10 pm

#12

Streamrider: Member; Aug 11, 2007; 300 posts; 44 upvotes

Jul 4th, 2015 10:10 pm

grumps312 wrote: ↑I had a Seagate that failed me too. Think I'm going to switch to WD from now on.

... or Toshiba or Hitachi. They are actually the most reliable drives right now. Then WD. Seagate used to be good but they have not been reliable for a while now. They never should have bought Maxtor as Seagate has been bad ever since they bought them. Samsungs were awesome drives too and I thought that Seagate would improve after they bought Samsung a few years back but unfortunately that has not happened.

Jul 4th, 2015 10:59 pm

#13

eldiablo: Deal Expert; Feb 24, 2007; 15094 posts; 2697 upvotes

Jul 4th, 2015 10:59 pm

Streamrider wrote: ↑... or Toshiba or Hitachi. They are actually the most reliable drives right now. Then WD. Seagate used to be good but they have not been reliable for a while now. They never should have bought Maxtor as Seagate has been bad ever since they bought them. Samsungs were awesome drives too and I thought that Seagate would improve after they bought Samsung a few years back but unfortunately that has not happened.

Planned or built-in obsolescence..is the name of the game.

Jul 4th, 2015 11:19 pm

#14

Raptors: Deal Addict; Jun 1, 2007; 1223 posts; 163 upvotes; M4W 1J6

Jul 4th, 2015 11:19 pm

What exactly is this problem that Windows is reporting? You had data stored on the drive or not? Run CHKDSK on it to see if there are any file system errors. I'm gonna guess that this is a PEBKAC problem.

Hard drives are mechanical and do fail (assuming it's not a PEBKAC problem). Staples is unlikely to take it back, so if you have no faith in a replacement drive then throw it out and be done with it.

Jul 4th, 2015 11:45 pm

#15

death_hawk: Deal Expert; Aug 22, 2006; 29362 posts; 14857 upvotes

Jul 4th, 2015 11:45 pm

Streamrider wrote: ↑ Samsungs were awesome drives

SO MANY FAILED F1s.
I'm sitting on what (was worth) $2000 of F1s that gave me nothing but problems. I had something like an 80% failure rate.

Jul 4th, 2015 11:54 pm

#16

Solsearchin1: Deal Fanatic; Nov 24, 2012; 5889 posts; 2135 upvotes; Space

Jul 4th, 2015 11:54 pm

Avoid Seagate, problem solved. WD or Hitachi if you value your time and reliability.

Jul 4th, 2015 11:57 pm

#17

death_hawk: Deal Expert; Aug 22, 2006; 29362 posts; 14857 upvotes

Jul 4th, 2015 11:57 pm

Solsearchin1 wrote: ↑Avoid Seagate, problem solved. WD or Hitachi if you value your time and reliability.

That's funny because I have more failed WDs currently than Seagates.
More failed Seagates than Hitachis but that's mostly just a numbers game. I only have like 8 Hitachis compared to 50+ Seagates and WDs each.

Jul 5th, 2015 12:05 am

#18

golf_guy21: Deal Addict; Nov 26, 2011; 1085 posts; 267 upvotes; ontario

Jul 5th, 2015 12:05 am

my first WD drive I foolishly thought it would work

I had a ton of videos and pictures that I put on the drive and deleted them from my pc
I forget what happened but I owned the drive less than a week and I think the light was just blinking and saying it wanted to reformat
took it back to tiger direct and he said it was gone and exchanged it for another one
haven't had problems with the 2nd one yet - both were the 2tb models

Jul 5th, 2015 12:05 am

#19

eldiablo: Deal Expert; Feb 24, 2007; 15094 posts; 2697 upvotes

Jul 5th, 2015 12:05 am

http://storagemojo.com/2007/02/19/googl ... xperience/

[QUOTE]
Google’s Disk Failure Experience

by Robin Harris on Monday, 19 February, 2007

Google released a fascinating research paper titled Failure Trends in a Large Disk Drive Population (pdf) at this years File and Storage Technologies (FAST ’07) conference. Google collected data on a population of 100,000 disk drives, analyzed it, and wrote it up for our delectation.

In yet another twist of consumer-driven IT, the disks Google studied, PATA and SATA drives, are the same drives you and I would buy for personal use. As an ironic result, we now have better data on drive failures for cheap drives than the enterprise does for its much costlier FC and SCSI “enterprise” disks with their much higher MTBFs.

[/QUOTE]

Jul 5th, 2015 3:05 pm

#20

importpsycho: Deal Addict; Feb 28, 2004; 3807 posts; 756 upvotes; Vancouver

Jul 5th, 2015 3:05 pm

eldiablo wrote: ↑http://storagemojo.com/2007/02/19/googl ... xperience/

Robin Harris on Monday, 19 February, 2007