I have a client who picked up one of those Western Digital 175GB HDDs at CompUSA a couple of weeks ago during their 19th anniversary sale. This drive has been giving me headaches today.

When this drive is installed in the system (XP w/SP1, AMD XP2500+ Barton, A7N8X Dlx Mobo, 512MB Corsair RAM, ATI AIW 8500LE 128MB Video) the system starts acting really weird. A few minutes after booting, network connectivity slows to a crawl. Transferring between partitions on the same disk slows down then stops. Overall system performance gets worse and worse with each passing moment until the system just freezes.

Now, I've tried every jumper / drive / ribbon / slave / master / cable select configuration there is to try using the drive. I even tried using the ATA controller card that came with the drive. Doesn't matter if the drive is a master, slave, or whatever. I installed XP on this system using Maxtor 80GB & 120GB drives and everything went flawlessly. Once the WD drive is introduced all operations cease to function within minutes. Installing it into my test system resulted in similar problems. Probably a bad Western Digital drive, right? I called Western Digital and they are sending a new drive and we will RMA the one we have (hats off to them).

So, anyway, here's my question: Has anyone else experienced problems with the Western Digital drives? If yes, were you able to correct the problems and how?

I'm filing this under sh** I didn't need to happen to me today

Alan,

Was there any noise coming from the drive also? The past couple of months, I have worked on a couple of computers that had Western Digital drives, I believe an 80 GB and a 20 GB. In both cases one of the signs that the drive was getting ready to die was extremely slow performance which eventually resulted in a knocking noise coming from the drive.

I was lucky and able to get data off of one, but the other one went fairly fast and refused to boot up in any machine it was attached to, whether as a master or slave.

I think that Western Digital has a utility that can be run on the drive and gives back an error status. Since you are getting yours replaced, I figure you have probably already run it. Let us know if the replacement works any better.

-party-

Thanks for the feedback Fritomonk.

Nah, there wasn't any unusual noise coming from the drive. I didn't run the WD utility which is something I probably should have done to save me from over 2 hours of nonsense. I'll know for next time

I gotta tell ya, WD exhibited no hesitation in replacing the drive. No "return to retailer" or "you didn't install it properly" tactics at all. The CSR said we probably got a bad drive out of the box, which indicates to me that this may happen often.

I've had good luck with hard drives. Guess it was "my time" to get a bad one :lol:

I'm just curious. Was it actually a 175, or was it a 175 box with a 180 in it, and was it the 2MB or the 8MB version in the box? I have never actually seen a WD 175GB drive, but I have seen lots of 175GB boxes with 180s in them.

No trouble to report with those so far.

Nack

I don't have the drive in my possession, but I know it was 2MB cache and it was probably the 180 in a 175 box. CompUSA was selling these for $75 +/- AR during their anniversary sale. Came with an ATA controller card also.

Update to my original post.

Well, the replacement drive arrived today. Installed it into the system as a slave, partitioned, formatted, transferred data and so far no problems. As a goof we took the new drive out and replaced it with the original one. System slowed to a crawl. Put new drive back in and everything is great.

Interesting to note that the replacement drive is a refurbished drive. Called Western Digital and received the standard reply that "the refurb drives are better because they have gone through more testing". Attempts to get a new drive failed. We presented some good arguements, but CSR said there is nothing else they can do.

So, WD was good on sending a replacement drive, but sent a refurb -mad- . The drive works, but that's not the point. No more WD drives for me. Only recourse I feel I have is to not buy their products.

That is pretty standard. I had to RMA a Maxtor drive about a month ago, and got a refurbed drive back from them. That's fine with me, as long as the drive has a decent warranty. I believe in this case, that the warranty was good for the original warranty period plus a year or so.

Yeah, the CSR said it was standard, but this was to replace a new drive that failed out of the box.

It's like, "sorry your brand new drive was bad...here's a used one to replace it".

company we tech for used WDs with the DELL systems here.
We get bad drives out of the box ALL THE TIME.
I never use WD in my own system unless it was an unbelievable deal. I always use Maxtor or Seagate and never had any problems. (lets hope I didnt just jinx myself)

I had similar instance with AMD and a RMA with them.
I sent them a xp1800 T-Bread and they sent me back a Palimino....man was I hot...I decided not to cause any problems until I put chip in and it was running at over 70 Degrees with no load on it...
called them back and pissed an moaned about the wait time for 4 phone calls long distance. The swap on the processor and the fact that it was crap and running WAY to hot to be used.

they sent me xp2100 T-bread in place of my xp1800
so...sometimes it does help to give them ONE more call back!!!

I always use Maxtor, only because they are readily available, relatively inexpensive and pretty reliable.

This client couldn't pass up the deal at CUSA. I'm just glad he didn't buy it on my recommendation. But, in a way I'm glad he bought it for the service I provided. Didn't overcharge him though. I'm actually a good guy

Sorry to hear they sent you a refurb.

I particularly like that note they put in every WD hard drive box that says something like "If this drive fails to work - DO NOT TAKE IT BACK TO THE STORE. Call us, at 1-800-GET-F#$@#@ and we will help you solve your problem or replace it for you if necessary". -mad-

Yeah, right - with a refurb. Next time, head for the nearest CompUSA and let them send it back to WD for a full credit (the store has the juice to MAKE the manufacturers take back their defective stuff for a full credit - none of this refurb stuff). Then call them at that 1800 number, and tell them exactly what you did and why. Maybe that might get their attention. Also be sure to mention that you are a consultant and that you install XXX drives per month.

Don't get me wrong. While I am not a big fan of the policy, I have no serious problem with them replacing dead drives (particularly those that worked longer than 90 days) with refurbs, since you are essentially trading what should be a used working drive, for another used working drive. I can understand why they would do that. But for a drive that was DOA right out of the box with NO mileage on it, they should have taken care of the customer with a new drive (maybe even with a slightly larger new drive or an 8MB cache version, and a profuse apology - DOA out of the box is very BAD).

At least you got a drive that works now, but I bet your client isn't too happy about it, which could hurt your business in the long run (not that you did anything wrong, but it is always better when the customer is totally happy with the whole job). Sounds like WD really let you down, and I think you are right for not buying any more of their products.

Your misfortune can be of help to others, however. The moral of this story is "when your new drive is DOA, do not call the 1800 number, do not RMA the drive, just take it back to the store for a replacement, and don't take no for an answer, since only the store can make the manufacturer eat their own mistake."

Nack

:lol:
I agree with the rest of your post too. Great advice, thanks.

Oh, 2 reasons we couldn't return the drive to CUSA: Past the return date (which sometimes isn't a problem anyway) and the UPC was cut from the box for rebate purposes (which was mailed in the next day). This brings up another good point - test out your equipment before sending in the rebate.

"test out your equipment before sending in the rebate. "



--------------------

YES YES YES!!! HooRay for that!!! OUCH!!!

I feel that is 20% of reason for rebates ( Beside the fact that many never send them in).

It makes returns virtually impossible. We get all excite & cust that box...

Now if we wait to cut the box we may forget... HMMM REBATES...

Ahh but some of the dealz are great if you have the patience.

Got $90.00 in checks last week for stuff i could have lived without!

-party-

one of our brand new Dell computers had a bad WD HD in it.
What a ROYAL p.i.t.a.!!!! We always buy Maxtor (better deals) when we get secondary drives.

-mad-

175 GB.

oooooooh the SIMS d/ls I could put on that.