Seagate is the world’s largest and oldest manufacturer of computer hard disks. The company has been going from strength to strength with its $1.9 billion acquisition of rival HDD firm Maxtor in 2005 as well as their recent development of the world’s first true 1TB hard disk.
Such an illustrious background, you might think, has much to do with the company’s reputation for producing hard disk drives that are powerful, reliable and fast (Seagate makes faster drives because it produces disks with the highest bit density in the industry). However, a decade ago Seagate drives were not as robust as they are today and failures were much more common. If you happen to keep valuable data on one of those old Seagate drives, it may be time to consider replacing it.
Common Seagate Hard Disk Drives and Problems
Seagate Momentus – quite a new drive on the market for notebooks. Momentus 40GB drives, and 30GB drives, can suffer premature media damage.
Seagate Barracuda – IDE and SATA drives that are very popular due to their speed, large storage ability and quiet operation. If you suspect a malfunction you may need to listen up close to hear the tell-tale clicking noises of a failing drive.
Seagate U series – Older model IDE drives that have a reputation for operating noisily – this doesn’t usually present any problems though.
Seagate Cheetah – SCSI or Fibre Channel high performance drives that operate up to 15,000RPM. We’ve found very few problems with these units.
Seagate Drives – Causes of Failure
Seagate Momentus drives tend to operate at cooler temperatures than other drives, making them less susceptible to failure. However, they can suffer from damage to the first sector of the drive accompanied by bad-blocks over the surface.
We’ve also seen problems with faulty spindles on some Seagate drives. While the spindle is spinning the platters, the oil that lubricates the bearings will leak and cause the spindle to seize. When this happens we employ specialised equipment and techniques to take the platters away from the drive so we can reconstruct the data.
Some of those old Seagate drives that still exhibit problems are the Seagate Elite SCSI drive, Seagate 32140A and Seagate 5XXX series, all of which are apt to suffer severe head crash.
Symptoms That Lead to Data Loss on Seagate Hard Disk Drives
The drive will become noisy (U series drives get very noisy)
The BIOS doesn’t recognise the drive
The BIOS recognises the drive but slow performance accompanied by a regular ticking sound leads to a crash
The BIOS doesn’t recognise the drive even though the drive is spinning, again accompanied by a ticking sound
While some Seagate drives tend to operate loudly, you should beware of any unusual sounds coming from the unit, especially on models that are prone to a severe head crash. If the volume won’t mount or you think that your drive has sustained damage or is about to fail turn it off right away and contact one of our technicians for advice.
Contact Data Detect for hard drive disk recovery.