Third WD1200JB drive died; what to do?

On Wed, 23 Jul 2003 13:27:16 GMT, Matt Garman pondered exceedingly, then took
quill in hand and carefully composed...

| About three months ago, I ordered a Western Digital "Special Edition"
| 120 GB IDE drive (WD1200JB) from Newegg. It died after a very short
| amount of use (this was confirmed by Western Digital's "Data Lifeguard
| Diagnostics" tools available from their website). This first death was
| within the Newegg 30 day exchange policy, so they shipped me a new one
| to replace the dead one.
|
| Well, that one worked until recently. My Newegg warranty was up, so I
| got a replacement directly from Western Digital (the drives have a three
| year warranty). Guess what? They sent me a REFURBISHED drive!
|
| I just put the refurbished drive in last night. It was DOA.
|
| Obviously I'm now pretty frustrated. I'm sure I can go through the
| Western Digital RMA process again, but I'm sure they'll just send me
| another refurbished drive (and who knows how long it will last, or if it
| will work at all). I'm afraid to call them and spend a long time at the
| run-around game (*IF* I can even get through to a person, I'll probably
| have to play the automated phone game for a while).
|
| Anyone have any advice as to what I should do? My faith in these drives
| is pretty much gone, so I'd like to get as much of my money back as
| possible and go with a different brand. I'm tempted to just suck it up
| and spend the money on SCSI.
|
| If there are any thoughts or suggestions, I'm glad to hear them!

I've been using WD drives for years and have had very few problems. When
something has come up, WD has been very cooperative. Why not call them and tell
them exactly what you've said here? I think they will work out something that
will satisfy you.

Larc



§§§ - Please raise temperature of mail to reply by e-mail - §§§

Anyone have any advice as to what I should do? My faith in these
drives
is pretty much gone, so I'd like to get as much of my money back as
possible and go with a different brand. I'm tempted to just suck it
up
and spend the money on SCSI.

If it were me, I'd chalk it down as a loss, swallow your pride and buy
a Maxtor or Seagate instead. I can't see how you would get your money
back on this, having a bad drive. You could write to Western
Digital's corporate headquarters and write a letter to complain, but
I'd only do that after ditching the product.

~ Adrian ~

---
"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity;
an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

Matt

Stop "assuming" and call W.D.


"Iain Robinson" wrote in
message ...
I've just had the 80GB version go on the blink. I went through the RMA
process and got a refurbished drive in return. This I think is standard
practice - I had the same from Maxtor. Is it just me or are drives getting
less reliable? In the last 2 years I've had 2 Maxtor and now 1 WD drive go
down. I went to WD because I thought Maxtor were too unreliable!

Iain


"Matt Garman" wrote in message
...
About three months ago, I ordered a Western Digital "Special Edition"
120 GB IDE drive (WD1200JB) from Newegg. It died after a very short
amount of use (this was confirmed by Western Digital's "Data Lifeguard
Diagnostics" tools available from their website). This first death was
within the Newegg 30 day exchange policy, so they shipped me a new one
to replace the dead one.

Well, that one worked until recently. My Newegg warranty was up, so I
got a replacement directly from Western Digital (the drives have a three
year warranty). Guess what? They sent me a REFURBISHED drive!

I just put the refurbished drive in last night. It was DOA.

Obviously I'm now pretty frustrated. I'm sure I can go through the
Western Digital RMA process again, but I'm sure they'll just send me
another refurbished drive (and who knows how long it will last, or if it
will work at all). I'm afraid to call them and spend a long time at the
run-around game (*IF* I can even get through to a person, I'll probably
have to play the automated phone game for a while).

Anyone have any advice as to what I should do? My faith in these drives
is pretty much gone, so I'd like to get as much of my money back as
possible and go with a different brand. I'm tempted to just suck it up
and spend the money on SCSI.

If there are any thoughts or suggestions, I'm glad to hear them!

Thanks,
Matt

--
Matt Garman, garman at raw-sewage dot net

"Matt Garman" wrote in message
...
About three months ago, I ordered a Western Digital "Special Edition"
120 GB IDE drive (WD1200JB) from Newegg. It died after a very short
amount of use (this was confirmed by Western Digital's "Data Lifeguard
Diagnostics" tools available from their website). This first death was
within the Newegg 30 day exchange policy, so they shipped me a new one
to replace the dead one.

Snip

Grab a Maxtor drive, I wouldn't use anything else. Some Seagate drives
make a lot of noise but are good for holding data. (so my mate tells me)

Matt (UK)

seagates are quieter than WD or maxtor. if you want to try something other
than WD i'd say get them to replace it again then sell off the drive they
send you on ebay or something and buy what you want. Samsung has a really
nice new drive available that's supposed to be even quieter than the
seagates.

"trappeduser" wrote in message
...

"Matt Garman" wrote in message
...
About three months ago, I ordered a Western Digital "Special Edition"
120 GB IDE drive (WD1200JB) from Newegg. It died after a very short
amount of use (this was confirmed by Western Digital's "Data Lifeguard
Diagnostics" tools available from their website). This first death was
within the Newegg 30 day exchange policy, so they shipped me a new one
to replace the dead one.

Snip

Grab a Maxtor drive, I wouldn't use anything else. Some Seagate drives
make a lot of noise but are good for holding data. (so my mate tells me)

Matt (UK)



The latest Segate hard drive are among the quietest on the market,
if not the quietest.

http://www.siliconacoustics.com/quietharddrives.html

http://www.endpcnoise.com/cgi-bin/e/...%20Drives.html

http://fredrik.hubbe.net/silence/hd.html (scroll down)

Craig

actually the barracuda IV was the quietest, their newer drives are louder
but still quieter than WD or maxtor.

www.silentpcreview.com

"Craig" wrote in message
news:6bFTa.2463$5b7.131@lakeread01...

"trappeduser" wrote in message
...

"Matt Garman" wrote in message
...
About three months ago, I ordered a Western Digital "Special Edition"
120 GB IDE drive (WD1200JB) from Newegg. It died after a very short
amount of use (this was confirmed by Western Digital's "Data Lifeguard
Diagnostics" tools available from their website). This first death
was
within the Newegg 30 day exchange policy, so they shipped me a new one
to replace the dead one.

Snip

Grab a Maxtor drive, I wouldn't use anything else. Some Seagate drives
make a lot of noise but are good for holding data. (so my mate tells me)

Matt (UK)



The latest Segate hard drive are among the quietest on the market,
if not the quietest.

http://www.siliconacoustics.com/quietharddrives.html


http://www.endpcnoise.com/cgi-bin/e/...yes/sf=categor
y/se=Quiet%20Hard%20Drives.html

http://fredrik.hubbe.net/silence/hd.html (scroll down)

Craig