Don't worry, I'm most likely only here to post this one (somewhatO.T.) message.

[John Corliss]

People who are really into freeware tend to archive their downloads, and
take pride in having a nice collection that they can share with family
and friends. Most such people depend greatly on their hard drive(s) to
be (a) reliable and safe media for storing those files.

Well, if you have a Maxtor hard drive and tend to not back up your
stuff, you might want to think about doing so on either CD, DVD or on a
backup hard drive made by another manufacturer. Here is why:

I'd grown very concerned when Bill O'Brien (of Computer Shopper's "Hard
Edge" fame) at:

http://www.realtechnews.com/

had spoken out against Maxtor, citing the multiple failures he'd
experienced with drives from that manufacturer. Not only that, but
readers of Bill's blog have flooded him with tales of similar woe.

Seems that my concern was very warranted since after less than two years
of usage, my Maxtor Diamondmax Plus ATA 100/60 GB hard drive has totally
failed. Initially the drive started making a clacking noise at startup
and when accessing data. Then the hard drive light remained on, the
master file table got corrupted and finally the drive crapped out
entirely - dead as a doornail.

Luckily I lost no data since, besides backing up to CDR, I always run
two hard drives and use the slave as a backup clone of the master. I'd
just updated the clone too. The bad news is that the hard drive I'm
totally relying on at this point is an IBM Deskstar ATA/100 60 GB, which
it seems from a lot that I've read, is similarly unreliable. Not only
that, but it's at the end of the apparent lifespan attributed to it by
several of the negative reviews it's received.

During a phone conversation with my computer company's head of technical
support (both company and person will remain unnamed), he told me his
observations had led to the conclusion that Maxtor hard drives are
*very* unreliable and that Seagate drives are the way to go. He also
warned me that his experience has shown that the IBM Deskstar which came
with my computer will be about as reliable as my Maxtor turned out to be.

Note that I don't hold my computer company responsible for this problem
since hard drive life spans only become apparent after several years
have passed since a particular model's introduction. Not only that, but
the person referred to above was right out front about all this.

And yeah, I could send the Maxtor back to the company and get a "free"
replacement but because the drive still holds personal data that can be
recovered, that's not going to happen. It's probably a safe assumption
that Maxtor is very aware such concerns by its customers and depends on
this to alleviate their responsibility.

Not only that, but the three year warranty that I obtained with the
drive no longer exists on their new drives which only come with a meager
one year warranty. So basically, what Maxtor seems to be saying is that
you should expect your hard drive to fail after only a year of use and
that you should be expected to replace it at least that often. What
total bullshit and Maxtor will go the way of the dodo, I'm sure.

I have a Seagate on order and am hoping that the IBM "Deathstar" will
hold out until it arrives. In the mean time though, I'm religiously
backing up to CD.

Hey, believe what you want though.... it's your data. Still, you've been
warned.

 

[dadiOH]

Well, if you have a Maxtor hard drive and tend to not back up your
stuff, you might want to think about doing so on either CD, DVD or on
a backup hard drive made by another manufacturer. Here is why:

I'd grown very concerned when Bill O'Brien (of Computer Shopper's
"Hard Edge" fame) at:

http://www.realtechnews.com/

had spoken out against Maxtor, citing the multiple failures he'd
experienced with drives from that manufacturer. Not only that, but
readers of Bill's blog have flooded him with tales of similar woe.

Seems that my concern was very warranted since after less than two
years of usage, my Maxtor Diamondmax Plus ATA 100/60 GB hard drive
has totally failed. Initially the drive started making a clacking
noise at startup and when accessing data. Then the hard drive light
remained on, the master file table got corrupted and finally the
drive crapped out entirely - dead as a doornail.

I'm sure you could find as many Western Digital/Seagate/IBM/Whoever hard
drive stories. In my case, a WD (not C crapped out totally about a
week after its 1 year warranty expired. My original Maxtor C: lasted
better than five years.
---------------------------

Not only that, but the three year warranty that I obtained with the
drive no longer exists on their new drives which only come with a
meager one year warranty.

The warranty period is a function of from whom you buy the drive, not
the manufacturer.

Resellers can buy whatever warranty period they wish when they buy the
drives; it is a part of the price they pay for the drives. Naturally,
the longer the period the more failures there will be which means they
will be paying more for drives with a 3 year guarantee than for drives
with a 1 year guarantee. Exact same drives.

If one wants a particular drive and a guarantee for a particular period
of time, one has to find a reseller that has purchased that guarantee.

--
dadiOH
____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06...
....a help file of info about MP3s, recording from
LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that.
Get it at http://mysite.verizon.net/xico

 

[Tramp]

<snip>
|Hey, believe what you want though.... it's your data. Still, you've been
|warned.

Yawn!!! Everybody has some horror story about hardware, software,
whatever. I bet there are people out there that swear by Maxtor. Ya
shoulda went and bought SpinRite http://www.grc.com/sr/spinrite.htm

 

[Vrodok the Troll]

On Wed, 02 Mar 2005 05:29:01 -0800, in alt.comp.freeware, John Corliss
<[email protected]>, by way of Message-id

Hey, believe what you want though.... it's your data. Still, you've been
warned.

What; no mention of Western Digital :::: gagging sound ::: ? Never had a
Maxtor go belly-up here; several WDs' have. Returns? Gotta (*not*!!) love those
repacks ("USED") drives they send back, packing them up all nice & pretty &
posing as "New".

 

[Donnie Russell]

The first Maxtor I bought, a 20 GB, started clicking within the first 6
months. I archive everything onto CD-R's very often, and luckily the
drive still worked long enough for nothing to be lost. I shipped it
back to the company, and they sent me a faster 20 GB drive for free. It
works very well, but after a while I replaced it with a WD Caviar
drive, and put the Maxtor in my old machine. I really like WD; I still
have a 1.2 GB Caviar drive that is about 10 years old and still going
strong.

 

[ms]

John Corliss wrote:


I'm sure you could find as many Western Digital/Seagate/IBM/Whoever hard
drive stories. In my case, a WD (not C crapped out totally about a
week after its 1 year warranty expired. My original Maxtor C: lasted
better than five years.

Maybe newer WD drives are not as well-made as earlier ones?

My old 1996 2.5 GB drive, running daily but accessed seldom in the past 5 years,
still works fine. My old XT had a WD that worked fine, and my current 15 GB WD has
been working fine in daily use since 2000. I've had really good luck with them.

Mike Sa

 

[Cullen Skink]

Note that I don't hold my computer company responsible for this problem
since hard drive life spans only become apparent after several years
have passed since a particular model's introduction. Not only that, but
the person referred to above was right out front about all this.

You wouldn't hold them responsible for the problem itself but they are
responsible for resolving warranty issues. It isn't the consumer's fault
if they buy a product which is later discovered to have an inherent
design fault. However it is often quicker to go direct to the
manufacturer. Assuming the drive isn't years out of warranty of course.

 

[/3iff //ullins]

Subject: Don't worry, I'm most likely...

....a lying troll? yes, john-john, you are.

now go 'retire from usenet' again, fool.

 

[elaich]

...a lying troll? yes, john-john, you are.

now go 'retire from usenet' again, fool.

And of course YOU are just brimming over with helpful suggestions.

 

[elaich]

Well, if you have a Maxtor hard drive and tend to not back up your
stuff, you might want to think about doing so on either CD, DVD or on a
backup hard drive made by another manufacturer.

I bought a Maxtor 30 gig HD 4 years ago. About a month before the three
year warranty was set to expire, I began getting messages that the hard
drive was facing imminent failure. I downloaded their drive scanning
program, ran it, and indeed got a bad report. I sent them the drive
(after getting all my stuff off it) along with the report, and they
replaced it with a new 40 gig HD free of charge.

I don't trust ANY drive. Everything I want to save is backed up on a
second HD as well as CD.

I have read opinions that HDs fail much more rapidly now because Windows
has hibernate and standby enabled as default and most people think that's
a good thing. Like all electronic devices, startup is the most damaging
event. A hard drive should be left running constantly - turning it off
and on continually is the worst thing you can do to it.

 

[BobS]

John,

Perhaps you could be a bit more specific with your reference - I was unable
to locate the article by Bill O'Brien you referenced and after doing a
search of the site - found only one possible pertinent item on Maxtor but
that was about a SATA interface failure.

Your doom and gloom is not warranted and you're about the only person I know
of that can take a minor issue and make a big affair out of it. I have 5
systems here in the office and all have multiple hard drives from various
manufactures and over the years - each manufacturers hard drive has failed -
save the SCSI drives from Seagate which are still turning and burning after
7+ years.

IBM hard drives are now owned by Hitachi but if you registered your new hard
drive with IBM you would have received a notice from them about the
deficiency you noted. Hitachi took over the line and replaced the drives
even though they were out of warranty. I had two Deskstar drives replaced
that were just over 4 years old.

I've also had several Maxtor's bite the dust and were immediately replaced,
same with a WD, some Quantum's and Seagate standard drives. I think every
manufacturer has their fair share of failures when they push the envelope to
get better performance, increased capacity at lower cost.

Tell me you didn't make your purchase decision based on cost....

Your long time backup strategy of using CD's is somewhat flawed. CD's have
been tested and failed after sitting in ideal storage conditions for under
two years. The newer (more expensive DVD) technologies are addressing long
term storage but for now, removable hard drives appear to be the most
economical, long-term solution for small businesses and home systems.
Certainly CD's are fine for the short term and so are other means.

Someone else already addressed the warranty periods. Few home users look at
anything except price and capacity and that is what drives the market. You
want high-quality, fast-performance and 3 year warranties - then expect to
pay for that. As consumers, we demand cheaper and better and damned if most
of the manufacturers don't step up to the plate and deliver (or they go out
of business) but once in awhile they do strike out and build a real bummer.
That doesn't make them bad.

I've never had a problem in dealing with any drive manufacturer and as I've
stated, some even replaced drives that were out of warranty because there
was a known defect. As for one year warranties - what else at these price
points do you purchase that has a longer warranty?

As for not wanting to send the failed drive back to Maxtor because your data
is still on it is certainly understandable. But if you keep it, there is no
obligation on Maxtor's part to give you a new drive based on your word
alone. Can you imagine how many people would be wanting to trade-up and
load up their systems for free by claiming a hard drive failure? C'mon
John, use your head. You bitched loud and clear about it - what solution do
you have that would be fair to you and to Maxtor? I'd really like to hear
that....

Besides, you stated that the drive was making sounds long before it totally
failed and that you backed things up. Plenty of time to call Maxtor, do the
diags, get the diagnostic failure codes for them, get an RMA number and wipe
the drive. Again - you want to blame everyone else for your own failings.
Well, you didn't lose any data but you now own a useless chunk of metal -
that was your decision, not Maxtor's. They offered the replacement drive -
right? So what else can they do to make it right? Do you know of any other
company that has a better way?

And John, you haven't warned anybody about anything except your as-usual
whining is back on-line. Take a longer break this time - the last one
wasn't quite long enough.

Oh, I forgot - you have me in your kill-file, so you can't see this post.

Bob S.

 

[robert]

On Wed, 02 Mar 2005 05:29:01 -0800, in alt.comp.freeware, John Corliss
<[email protected]>, by way of Message-id


What; no mention of Western Digital :::: gagging sound ::: ? Never had a
Maxtor go belly-up here; several WDs' have. Returns? Gotta (*not*!!) love those
repacks ("USED") drives they send back, packing them up all nice & pretty &
posing as "New".

WD's sata raptor line is pretty reliable.

 

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=BBQ=AB?=]

Seems that my concern was very warranted since after less than two
years of usage, my Maxtor Diamondmax Plus ATA 100/60 GB hard drive
has totally failed. Initially the drive started making a clacking
noise at startup and when accessing data.

That's typical. Anyone who hears that should backup all crucial data
immediately, and only after that worry about diagnosis. For those
who've never experienced it, it's pretty much the same noise the heads
make when they park as the computer is shut down or goes into a lower
power state.

During a phone conversation with my computer company's head of
technical support (both company and person will remain unnamed),
he told me his observations had led to the conclusion that Maxtor
hard drives are *very* unreliable and that Seagate drives are the
way to go.

These things go in waves; any HDD manufacturer can hit a bad run, and
I believe all the major ones have at one time or another. Asking about
what company has a recent good track record is a good thing to do
before buying a new HDD, and comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage is a good
place to ask.

And yeah, I could send the Maxtor back to the company and get a
"free" replacement but because the drive still holds personal data
that can be recovered, that's not going to happen. It's probably a
safe assumption that Maxtor is very aware such concerns by its
customers and depends on this to alleviate their responsibility.

It would be silly to expect them to send a replacement without getting
the original back; it works that way for coffee maker warranties as
well. In case you hear the click death coming on in another drive, you
might want to wipe it first then diagnose. If it doesn't need
replacing, you can restore from backup, and if it does, you can rest
easy having already cleaned the drive.

 

[El Gee]

People who are really into freeware tend to archive their downloads,
and take pride in having a nice collection that they can share with
family and friends. Most such people depend greatly on their hard
drive(s) to be (a) reliable and safe media for storing those files.

Well, if you have a Maxtor hard drive and tend to not back up your
stuff, you might want to think about doing so on either CD, DVD or on
a backup hard drive made by another manufacturer. Here is why:

I'd grown very concerned when Bill O'Brien (of Computer Shopper's
"Hard Edge" fame) at:

http://www.realtechnews.com/

had spoken out against Maxtor, citing the multiple failures he'd
experienced with drives from that manufacturer. Not only that, but
readers of Bill's blog have flooded him with tales of similar woe.

Seems that my concern was very warranted since after less than two
years of usage, my Maxtor Diamondmax Plus ATA 100/60 GB hard drive has
totally failed. Initially the drive started making a clacking noise at
startup and when accessing data. Then the hard drive light remained
on, the master file table got corrupted and finally the drive crapped
out entirely - dead as a doornail.

Luckily I lost no data since, besides backing up to CDR, I always run
two hard drives and use the slave as a backup clone of the master. I'd
just updated the clone too. The bad news is that the hard drive I'm
totally relying on at this point is an IBM Deskstar ATA/100 60 GB,
which it seems from a lot that I've read, is similarly unreliable. Not
only that, but it's at the end of the apparent lifespan attributed to
it by several of the negative reviews it's received.

During a phone conversation with my computer company's head of
technical support (both company and person will remain unnamed), he
told me his observations had led to the conclusion that Maxtor hard
drives are *very* unreliable and that Seagate drives are the way to
go. He also warned me that his experience has shown that the IBM
Deskstar which came with my computer will be about as reliable as my
Maxtor turned out to be.

Note that I don't hold my computer company responsible for this
problem since hard drive life spans only become apparent after several
years have passed since a particular model's introduction. Not only
that, but the person referred to above was right out front about all
this.

And yeah, I could send the Maxtor back to the company and get a "free"
replacement but because the drive still holds personal data that can
be recovered, that's not going to happen. It's probably a safe
assumption that Maxtor is very aware such concerns by its customers
and depends on this to alleviate their responsibility.

Not only that, but the three year warranty that I obtained with the
drive no longer exists on their new drives which only come with a
meager one year warranty. So basically, what Maxtor seems to be saying
is that you should expect your hard drive to fail after only a year of
use and that you should be expected to replace it at least that often.
What total bullshit and Maxtor will go the way of the dodo, I'm sure.

I have a Seagate on order and am hoping that the IBM "Deathstar" will
hold out until it arrives. In the mean time though, I'm religiously
backing up to CD.

Hey, believe what you want though.... it's your data. Still, you've
been warned.

I have purchased 3 HD's in my life:

1) 20 gig WD 5400 rpm (still runs although I have removed it...it is
about 5 years old) -- 3 year warranty 2) 80 gig WD 7200 rpm (main OS
HD, about 2 years old) 3 - year warranty 3) 160 gig Seagate 7200 SATA
(less than 1 month old) 5 - year warranty

Before I bought these, I have owned several (10+) used HD's from 1.6
gigs to 10 gigs in size. Most have been Maxtor's (they through them
away at my old shop since they were "too small" to be useful). I have
had 2 fail, both were over 5 years old, one was about 10 years old. I
have heard stories of HD woes from all manufacturers (Hitachi getting
the worse reputation), but have not had any major complaints. The older
onces are loud (I have 3 in my Linux box, Junior has 3 in his WinMe box)
but they run and are not failing.

War stories about HD are line the horror stories we hear about Chevy or
Ford...grossly over exagerated. Failure exists everywhere.

--
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
El Gee <><
Know Christ, Know Peace
No Christ, No Peace

Remove yourhat to reply
Home Page - www.mistergeek.com
Blog - mcwtlg.blogspot.com
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

[Chrissy Cruiser]

|Hey, believe what you want though.... it's your data. Still, you've been
|warned.

Yawn!!! Everybody has some horror story about hardware, software,
whatever. I bet there are people out there that swear by Maxtor.

I have a dozen, various ages, including two of these he moans about. Not
one has crashed and they are slammed 7/24/36x for two solid years and more.

 

[Sweet Andy Licious]

Just get Spinrite from Steve and you'll be ok. I have a Maxtor 13 gig hard
drive that I got in 1998 and has since been retired and is now doing duty on
a Win 95 box a friend of mine owns.

I have both WD (40 gig) and Max (160 gig) for a couple of years and no
problems with them. I think if someone has trouble with a drive they tend to
blame the manufacturer when maybe they buy them from somewhere else and
resell them with their brand name.

 

[Vic Dura]

had spoken out against Maxtor, citing the multiple failures he'd
experienced with drives from that manufacturer. Not only that, but
readers of Bill's blog have flooded him with tales of similar woe.

I've had several Maxtor drives and never had a problem.

 

[/3iff //ullins]

That's typical.

sure is. cracksmokin' corliss lies all the time...

 

[DaveH]

People who are really into freeware tend to archive their downloads, and
take pride in having a nice collection that they can share with family and
friends. Most such people depend greatly on their hard drive(s) to be (a)
reliable and safe media for storing those files.

Well, if you have a Maxtor hard drive and tend to not back up your stuff,
you might want to think about doing so on either CD, DVD or on a backup
hard drive made by another manufacturer. Here is why:

I'd grown very concerned when Bill O'Brien (of Computer Shopper's "Hard
Edge" fame) at:

http://www.realtechnews.com/

had spoken out against Maxtor, citing the multiple failures he'd
experienced with drives from that manufacturer. Not only that, but readers
of Bill's blog have flooded him with tales of similar woe.

Seems that my concern was very warranted since after less than two years
of usage, my Maxtor Diamondmax Plus ATA 100/60 GB hard drive has totally
failed. Initially the drive started making a clacking noise at startup and
when accessing data. Then the hard drive light remained on, the master
file table got corrupted and finally the drive crapped out entirely - dead
as a doornail.

Luckily I lost no data since, besides backing up to CDR, I always run two
hard drives and use the slave as a backup clone of the master. I'd just
updated the clone too. The bad news is that the hard drive I'm totally
relying on at this point is an IBM Deskstar ATA/100 60 GB, which it seems
from a lot that I've read, is similarly unreliable. Not only that, but
it's at the end of the apparent lifespan attributed to it by several of
the negative reviews it's received.

During a phone conversation with my computer company's head of technical
support (both company and person will remain unnamed), he told me his
observations had led to the conclusion that Maxtor hard drives are *very*
unreliable and that Seagate drives are the way to go. He also warned me
that his experience has shown that the IBM Deskstar which came with my
computer will be about as reliable as my Maxtor turned out to be.

Note that I don't hold my computer company responsible for this problem
since hard drive life spans only become apparent after several years have
passed since a particular model's introduction. Not only that, but the
person referred to above was right out front about all this.

And yeah, I could send the Maxtor back to the company and get a "free"
replacement but because the drive still holds personal data that can be
recovered, that's not going to happen. It's probably a safe assumption
that Maxtor is very aware such concerns by its customers and depends on
this to alleviate their responsibility.

Not only that, but the three year warranty that I obtained with the drive
no longer exists on their new drives which only come with a meager one
year warranty. So basically, what Maxtor seems to be saying is that you
should expect your hard drive to fail after only a year of use and that
you should be expected to replace it at least that often. What total
bullshit and Maxtor will go the way of the dodo, I'm sure.

I have a Seagate on order and am hoping that the IBM "Deathstar" will hold
out until it arrives. In the mean time though, I'm religiously backing up
to CD.

Hey, believe what you want though.... it's your data. Still, you've been
warned.

John,

Your segway into freeware doesn't hold water. Take your agenda to
alt.whocaresaboutyourharddrive.

Dave H.

 

[Gary R. Schmidt]

John Corliss wrote:
[SNIP doom and gloom about (which disk manufacturer was it again???)]

In 25 years, I've had disks fail from _every_ manufacturer, whether
ST506, ESDI, SASI/SCSI, Mass/UniBus, IDE, EIDE, or pigeon-post based.

Every now and then a particular model or batch from a manufacturer turns
out to be a lemon.

This is why you do backups, relying on a disk starting up, or continuing
to run is foolish. They are electro-mechanical devices and they _break_!

Cheers,
Gary B-)