Is my new 500 GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 HDD affected?

Hello!

I recently bought a new 500 GB SATA Seagate Barracuda 7200.11
ST3500320AS before Christmas 2008 and started using it on the 27th (work
time: 17 days). I am worried if I need to upgrade its firmware or return
the drive after reading about high failure rates online. However, those
were 1 TB and not the smaller sizes. I was wondering if my model was
affected.

I used Hard Drive Inspector program, in updated Windows XP Pro. SP3, to
get details about my two Seagate HDDs (don't think the older 320 GB
model is affected, but you never know):

Hard disk drive # 1
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
General info
Interface : SATA - fixed
Manufacturer : SEAGATE
Model : 320620AS
Serial number : QF0XE9M
Firmware : 3.AAE
Logical geometry info
Cylinders : 16383
Heads : 16
Sectors per track : 63
Physical geometry info
Cylinders : 38913
Tracks per cylinder : 255
Sectors per track : 63
Bytes per sector : 512
Capacity available in LBA Mode : 625,142,448 sectors (305,245 MB)
Buffer size : 16384 KB
Logical drives : C:\; E:\; F:\;
Total free space : 273,656 MB
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Device features
Max block size in R/W operations : 16 sectors
IORDY support : supported
Serial ATA capabilities
SATA Specification Compliance : Yes
SATA Gen-1 signaling speed (1.5Gbps) : supported
SATA Gen-2 signaling speed : not supported
SATA Native Command Queuing : supported
Serial ATA features
Receipt of host-initiated interface power management request : not
supported
Device initiating interface power management : supported
DMA Setup Auto-Activate optimization : not supported
Non-zero buffer offsets in DMA Setup FIS : not supported
Transfer Modes
Supported PIO modes : 0 - 4
Supported Multiword DMA modes : 0 - 2
Supported Ultra DMA modes : 0 - 6
Interface version : ATA/ATA-7
Current transfer mode : SATA 1 (150 MB/s)
Power-on time : 11,472 hours (478 days)?
Min transfer time in Multiword DMA mode : 120 ns
Recommended tr. time in MW DMA mode : 120 ns
Min tr. time in PIO mode without IORDY : 120 ns
Min tr. time in PIO mode with IORDY : 120 ns
Drive features
Temperature sensor detected
Security command set support : supported
Power management support : supported
Write cache support : supported
Read look ahead support : supported
Host protected area support : supported
Microcode downloading support : supported
Enhanced power management support : not supported
Automatic acoustic management support : not supported
Security features
Security mode support : supported
Security mode usage : No
Security locking support : not supported
Security freezing support : supported
Security counter support : not supported
Enchanced security erase mode support : not supported
Security level : high
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Device S.M.A.R.T. status
SMART interface : SCSI-miniport; Physical Drive
Monitoring started at : 6/22/2007 8:41 AM
Last checked at : 1/17/2009 2:45 PM
Death time : not defined
# Attribute Value Thresh Raw
T.E.C. date Flags
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 Raw Read Error Rate 119 6
224,573,904 - LC OC PR ER
3 Spin Up Time 95 0
0 - LC OC
4 Start/Stop Count 100 20
519 - OC EC SP
5 Reallocated Sector Count 100 36
0 - LC OC EC SP
7 Seek Error Rate 82 30
171,148,196 - LC OC PR ER
9 Power-On Hours 87 0
11,472 - OC EC SP
10 Spin Retry Count 100 97
0 - LC OC EC
12 Device Power Cycle Count 100 20
567 - OC EC SP
187 (Unknown Attribute)_187 100 0 0
- OC EC SP
189 (Unknown Attribute)_189 100 0 0
- OC ER EC SP
190 Temperatu 64 45 622,329,892
- OC SP
194 Temperatu 36 0 81,604,378,660
- OC SP
195 Hardware ECC Covered 70 0 128,291,465
- OC ER EC
197 Current Pending Sector Count 100 0 0
- OC EC
198 Offline Scan Uncorrectable Count 100 0 0
- EC
199 UltraDMA CRC Error Rate 200 0 0
- OC PR ER EC SP
200 Write Error Rate 100 0 0
-
202 Data Address Mark Errors 100 0 0
- OC EC SP
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LC-life critical OC-online collection PR-performance related
ER-error rate EC-event count SP-self preserving

Hard disk drive # 2
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
General info
Interface : SATA - fixed
Manufacturer : SEAGATE
Model : 500320AS
Serial number : QM8QPS1
Firmware : SD15
Logical geometry info
Cylinders : 16383
Heads : 16
Sectors per track : 63
Physical geometry info
Cylinders : 60801
Tracks per cylinder : 255
Sectors per track : 63
Bytes per sector : 512
Capacity available in LBA Mode : 976,773,168 sectors (476,940 MB)
Buffer size : 0 KB
Logical drives : D:\; G:\; H:\; I:\;
Total free space : 264,546 MB
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Device features
Max block size in R/W operations : 16 sectors
IORDY support : supported
Serial ATA capabilities
SATA Specification Compliance : Yes
SATA Gen-1 signaling speed (1.5Gbps) : supported
SATA Gen-2 signaling speed : not supported
SATA Native Command Queuing : supported
Serial ATA features
Receipt of host-initiated interface power management request : not
supported
Device initiating interface power management : not supported
DMA Setup Auto-Activate optimization : not supported
Non-zero buffer offsets in DMA Setup FIS : not supported
Transfer Modes
Supported PIO modes : 0 - 4
Supported Multiword DMA modes : 0 - 2
Supported Ultra DMA modes : 0 - 6
Interface version : ATA/ATA-8
Current transfer mode : SATA 1 (150 MB/s)
Power-on time : 408 hours (17 days)?
Min transfer time in Multiword DMA mode : 120 ns
Recommended tr. time in MW DMA mode : 120 ns
Min tr. time in PIO mode without IORDY : 120 ns
Min tr. time in PIO mode with IORDY : 120 ns
Drive features
Temperature sensor detected
Security command set support : supported
Power management support : supported
Write cache support : supported
Read look ahead support : supported
Host protected area support : supported
Microcode downloading support : supported
Enhanced power management support : not supported
Automatic acoustic management support : not supported
Security features
Security erase time : 104 min
Security mode support : supported
Security mode usage : No
Security locking support : not supported
Security freezing support : supported
Security counter support : not supported
Enchanced security erase mode support : supported
Security level : high
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Device S.M.A.R.T. status
SMART interface : SCSI-miniport; Physical Drive
Monitoring started at : 1/17/2009 2:45 PM
Last checked at : 1/17/2009 2:45 PM
Death time : not defined
# Attribute Value Thresh Raw
T.E.C. date Flags
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 Raw Read Error Rate 114 6
230,848,784 - LC OC PR ER
3 Spin Up Time 94 0
0 - LC OC
4 Start/Stop Count 100 20
22 - OC EC SP
5 Reallocated Sector Count 100 36
0 - LC OC EC SP
7 Seek Error Rate 60 30
8,592,185,153 - LC OC PR ER
9 Power-On Hours 100 0
408 - OC EC SP
10 Spin Retry Count 100 97
0 - LC OC EC
12 Device Power Cycle Count 100 20
22 - OC EC SP
184 (Unknown Attribute)_184 100 99 0
- OC EC SP
187 (Unknown Attribute)_187 100 0 0
- OC EC SP
188 (Unknown Attribute)_188 100 0 0
- OC EC SP
189 (Unknown Attribute)_189 100 0 0
- OC ER EC SP
190 Temperatu 70 45 521,469,982
- OC SP
194 Temperatu 30 0 81,604,378,654
- OC SP
195 Hardware ECC Covered 41 0 230,848,784
- OC ER EC
197 Current Pending Sector Count 100 0 0
- OC EC
198 Offline Scan Uncorrectable Count 100 0 0
- EC
199 UltraDMA CRC Error Rate 200 0 0
- OC PR ER EC SP
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LC-life critical OC-online collection PR-performance related
ER-error rate EC-event count SP-self preserving

Did Seagate say which models were affected (couldn't find details) and
do I need to upgrade (firmware)/replace it? I'd rather not run into this
"brick" failure before it occurs.

Thank you in advance.
--
"It doesn't matter what your D&D manual says, you did not get 5
experience points for killing the giant ant in your kitchen." --BBspot's
Geek Horoscopes (7/30/2004)
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Words (Lira's VMX) (ID: 203234)

Previously Ant wrote:
Hello!

I recently bought a new 500 GB SATA Seagate Barracuda 7200.11
ST3500320AS before Christmas 2008 and started using it on the 27th (work
time: 17 days). I am worried if I need to upgrade its firmware or return
the drive after reading about high failure rates online. However, those
were 1 TB and not the smaller sizes. I was wondering if my model was
affected.

I used Hard Drive Inspector program, in updated Windows XP Pro. SP3, to
get details about my two Seagate HDDs (don't think the older 320 GB
model is affected, but you never know):

I think it is currently not quite clear which models are affected,
I saw at least one announcement that all 7200.11 sizes can be affected.
Best monitor the seagate support pages and do not trust the
drive for the next few weeks.

Arno

On 1/17/2009 6:19 PM PT, Arno Wagner typed:

I recently bought a new 500 GB SATA Seagate Barracuda 7200.11
ST3500320AS before Christmas 2008 and started using it on the 27th (work
time: 17 days). I am worried if I need to upgrade its firmware or return
the drive after reading about high failure rates online. However, those
were 1 TB and not the smaller sizes. I was wondering if my model was
affected.

I used Hard Drive Inspector program, in updated Windows XP Pro. SP3, to
get details about my two Seagate HDDs (don't think the older 320 GB
model is affected, but you never know):

I think it is currently not quite clear which models are affected,
I saw at least one announcement that all 7200.11 sizes can be affected.

Where did you see that?


Best monitor the seagate support pages and do not trust the
drive for the next few weeks.

Dang it, I am using it as a primary production drive on my home PC. I do
have Ghost (.gho and .ghs) backups before copying all my datas over.

Earlier today, I e-mailed to see what they say
about my Seagate HDDs just in case.
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Here is the info.:

http://techreport.com/discussions.x/16246

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In message Arno Wagner
was claimed to have wrote:

Previously Ant wrote:
Hello!

I recently bought a new 500 GB SATA Seagate Barracuda 7200.11
ST3500320AS before Christmas 2008 and started using it on the 27th (work
time: 17 days). I am worried if I need to upgrade its firmware or return
the drive after reading about high failure rates online. However, those
were 1 TB and not the smaller sizes. I was wondering if my model was
affected.

I used Hard Drive Inspector program, in updated Windows XP Pro. SP3, to
get details about my two Seagate HDDs (don't think the older 320 GB
model is affected, but you never know):

I think it is currently not quite clear which models are affected,
I saw at least one announcement that all 7200.11 sizes can be affected.
Best monitor the seagate support pages and do not trust the
drive for the next few weeks.

If by "currently not quite clear which models are affected" you meant
"the list of models affected is on Seagate's KB" then you're correct.

http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/cr...p?DocId=207931

If you don't have one of the listed model numbers then you're safe, but
if you do, then what isn't clear is which firmware revisions are
affected, at this time you need to contact Seagate with your brand,
model, serial and firmware version to find out if you need to update.

There are more then just 1TB drives on the list.

I recently bought a new 500 GB SATA Seagate Barracuda 7200.11
ST3500320AS before Christmas 2008 and started using it on the 27th (work
time: 17 days). I am worried if I need to upgrade its firmware or return
the drive after reading about high failure rates online. However, those
were 1 TB and not the smaller sizes. I was wondering if my model was
affected.
I used Hard Drive Inspector program, in updated Windows XP Pro. SP3, to
get details about my two Seagate HDDs (don't think the older 320 GB
model is affected, but you never know):

I think it is currently not quite clear which models are affected,
I saw at least one announcement that all 7200.11 sizes can be affected.
Best monitor the seagate support pages and do not trust the
drive for the next few weeks.

If by "currently not quite clear which models are affected" you meant
"the list of models affected is on Seagate's KB" then you're correct.

http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/cr...p?DocId=207931

If you don't have one of the listed model numbers then you're safe, but
if you do, then what isn't clear is which firmware revisions are
affected, at this time you need to contact Seagate with your brand,
model, serial and firmware version to find out if you need to update.

There are more then just 1TB drives on the list.

Dang it! My new 500 GB is on the list! I have SD15 firmware. Um, where
do I get the later firmware or do I really have to go through Seagate's
technical support?

HDD Inspector is warning me that my new 500 GB HDD's current seek error
rate state is at 43% (current=60, best=100, threshold=30, and worst=57).
Um, is this related to the failures people are having?

Device S.M.A.R.T. status
SMART interface : SCSI-miniport; Physical Drive
Monitoring started at : 1/17/2009 2:45 PM
Last checked at : 1/17/2009 9:48 PM
Death time : not defined
# Attribute Value Thresh Raw
T.E.C. date Flags
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 Raw Read Error Rate 114 6
233,580,137 - LC OC PR ER
3 Spin Up Time 94 0
0 - LC OC
4 Start/Stop Count 100 20
22 - OC EC SP
5 Reallocated Sector Count 100 36
0 - LC OC EC SP
7 Seek Error Rate 60 30
8,592,191,466 - LC OC PR ER
9 Power-On Hours 100 0
415 - OC EC SP
10 Spin Retry Count 100 97
0 - LC OC EC
12 Device Power Cycle Count 100 20
22 - OC EC SP
184 (Unknown Attribute)_184 100 99 0
- OC EC SP
187 (Unknown Attribute)_187 100 0 0
- OC EC SP
188 (Unknown Attribute)_188 100 0 0
- OC EC SP
189 (Unknown Attribute)_189 100 0 0
- OC ER EC SP
190 Temperatu 68 45 555,024,416
- OC SP
194 Temperatu 32 0 81,604,378,656
- OC SP
195 Hardware ECC Covered 41 0 233,580,137
- OC ER EC
197 Current Pending Sector Count 100 0 0
- OC EC
198 Offline Scan Uncorrectable Count 100 0 0
- EC
199 UltraDMA CRC Error Rate 200 0 0
- OC PR ER EC SP
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LC-life critical OC-online collection PR-performance related
ER-error rate EC-event count SP-self preserving


--
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the Wind"
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Ant is currently not listening to any songs on his home computer.

On Jan 17, 9:24*pm, DevilsPGD wrote:
If by "currently not quite clear which models are affected" you meant
"the list of models affected is on Seagate's KB" then you're correct.

http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/cr...h.jsp?DocId=20....

If you don't have one of the listed model numbers then you're safe, but
if you do, then what isn't clear is which firmware revisions are
affected, at this time you need to contact Seagate with your brand,
model, serial and firmware version to find out if you need to update.

There are more then just 1TB drives on the list.

They should know by the end of next week, after all their systems are
updated. You can call them, and then read off your serial number and
they should be able to let you know what needs to happen.

In message Ant
was claimed to have wrote:

Dang it! My new 500 GB is on the list! I have SD15 firmware. Um, where
do I get the later firmware or do I really have to go through Seagate's
technical support?

Right now, tech support. This article covers why they don't make
firmware available in most cases, although it wouldn't surprise me to
see a tool show up that addresses this specific issue, from identifying
the drives to completing the update.

http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/cr...206091&Hilite=

Previously DevilsPGD wrote:
In message Arno Wagner
was claimed to have wrote:

Previously Ant wrote:
Hello!

I recently bought a new 500 GB SATA Seagate Barracuda 7200.11
ST3500320AS before Christmas 2008 and started using it on the 27th (work
time: 17 days). I am worried if I need to upgrade its firmware or return
the drive after reading about high failure rates online. However, those
were 1 TB and not the smaller sizes. I was wondering if my model was
affected.

I used Hard Drive Inspector program, in updated Windows XP Pro. SP3, to
get details about my two Seagate HDDs (don't think the older 320 GB
model is affected, but you never know):

I think it is currently not quite clear which models are affected,
I saw at least one announcement that all 7200.11 sizes can be affected.
Best monitor the seagate support pages and do not trust the
drive for the next few weeks.

If by "currently not quite clear which models are affected" you meant
"the list of models affected is on Seagate's KB" then you're correct.

http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/cr...p?DocId=207931

If you don't have one of the listed model numbers then you're safe, but
if you do, then what isn't clear is which firmware revisions are
affected, at this time you need to contact Seagate with your brand,
model, serial and firmware version to find out if you need to update.

Yes, that is what I meant. Dod not know that you can ask them with
the exact drive data.

There are more then just 1TB drives on the list.

Looks that way.

Arno

On Sat, 17 Jan 2009 21:57:35 -0800, Ant put finger
to keyboard and composed:

HDD Inspector is warning me that my new 500 GB HDD's current seek error
rate state is at 43% (current=60, best=100, threshold=30, and worst=57).
Um, is this related to the failures people are having?

IME the raw "seek error rate" numbers are difficult to interpret. I
believe you will find that this parameter produces large numbers in
earlier models as well. In fact my Seagate drives appear to function
perfectly well in spite of them. I believe my own testing shows that
the raw seek error rate parameter for my old 13GB Seagate HDD is a
seek count, not an error, and not a rate.

If you try to make sense of your own data, you see that for a total of
415 Power-On Hours you have a Seek Error Rate of 8,592,191,466. If you
juggle these numbers, you arrive at a nonsensical figure of 48
nanoseconds per seek. As for the worst and threshold figures of 60 and
30, AFAICT *every* working Seagate drive reports the same number.

See my search results:
http://groups.google.com/group/comp....4?dmode=source

Device S.M.A.R.T. status

# Attribute Value Thresh Raw
T.E.C. date Flags
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 Raw Read Error Rate 114 6
233,580,137 - LC OC PR ER

7 Seek Error Rate 60 30
8,592,191,466 - LC OC PR ER
9 Power-On Hours 100 0
415 - OC EC SP

Parameter 190 (=68) appears to be equal to "100 degrees C - current
temperature". I'm guessing that the threshold value of 45 actually
reflects a maximum allowable temperature of 55 degC.

190 Temperatu 68 45 555,024,416
- OC SP

Parameter 194 (=32) appears to be the current temperature of the drive
in degrees C.

194 Temperatu 32 0 81,604,378,656
- OC SP

- Franc Zabkar
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