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Thread: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

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    Featured Member Hatshepsut's Avatar
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    Default Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    A year ago, I bought a Seagate FreeAgent Desktop USB 2.0 external hard drive. The connections are completely wonky and will disconnect and reconnect spontaneously. This fucking sucks. The only way I can make it stay for a couple minutes is if 1) I make sure that no movement whatsoever will disturb the drive or the cables, even air currents and 2) I wedged a couple Post-it Note stacks under the external drive's USB connection in order to keep it steady. This enclosure has to go.

    My drive has a 5 year warranty, and I can get it replaced. However, I'd have to back up the data on the drive (I'd have to buy another drive to put it on), send it in, and get the same freaking drive that might give me the exact same problems. Honestly, I should have bought a Western Digital MyBook instead. However, I'm leaning towards buying a separate USB enclosure, cracking open the Seagate FreeAgent enclosure, and transplanting. However, this would lost my 5 year warranty on the drive itself. Any advice?
    Quote Originally Posted by twisterinAZ View Post
    The big dick is dangerous. It makes you overlook certain character flaws and bad behavior .

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    God/dess Mastridonicus's Avatar
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    Default Re: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    Seagate's are great drives in my experience, though if it's one of the upright drives with the base, the initial series of those drives did have issues. The western digitals are currently being struck with actually having failing drives.

    I'd contact seagate and see if they'll still support your warranty if you open the drive. I know I can have a tech break open a seagate drive to get data and still be under warranty but we have a reseller account with them and do a lot of volume.

    your best solution, is to call them for an advanced RMA replacement. They'll send you the drive first. When you get it, a tech may aid you through transplanting the drive in which case you'd be covered under warranty. OR you can just copy your data back slowly before sending them your bad one.
    People are not ruled by their memories.

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    Featured Member Hatshepsut's Avatar
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    Default Re: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    Wow, Mast. Thanks. I guess that it is better to have a good drive and a bad enclosure than vice versa. I'm going to contact both Fry's Electronics and Seagate tomorrow.

    If it's any help, I bought it at Fry's Electronics, I still have the receipt, and I registered the product with Seagate. This sucks, as I've had such great luck with Seagate drives in the past.
    Quote Originally Posted by twisterinAZ View Post
    The big dick is dangerous. It makes you overlook certain character flaws and bad behavior .

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    God/dess Mastridonicus's Avatar
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    Default Re: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Hatshepsut View Post
    Wow, Mast. Thanks. I guess that it is better to have a good drive and a bad enclosure than vice versa. I'm going to contact both Fry's Electronics and Seagate tomorrow.

    If it's any help, I bought it at Fry's Electronics, I still have the receipt, and I registered the product with Seagate. This sucks, as I've had such great luck with Seagate drives in the past.
    Well if Fry's Electronics are a Seagate Reseller and they do enough volume they should be able to do a quick swap of your data to another drive or just swap drives with no problem. Just make sure they give you a work ticket!
    People are not ruled by their memories.

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    Featured Member Hatshepsut's Avatar
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    Default Re: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    Another thing: I've had it with these cheapass pre-enclosed hard drives. You're right, the upright ones do suck ass. Would it be better to just to buy the hard drive and the enclosure separately, or would that cause problems with two warranties? For example, if something happened to the hard drive that was the fault of the enclosure shorting out, would the hard drive company not support the drive?

    Thanks again Mast.
    Quote Originally Posted by twisterinAZ View Post
    The big dick is dangerous. It makes you overlook certain character flaws and bad behavior .

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    God/dess Mastridonicus's Avatar
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    Default Re: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Hatshepsut View Post
    Another thing: I've had it with these cheapass pre-enclosed hard drives. You're right, the upright ones do suck ass. Would it be better to just to buy the hard drive and the enclosure separately, or would that cause problems with two warranties? For example, if something happened to the hard drive that was the fault of the enclosure shorting out, would the hard drive company not support the drive?

    Thanks again Mast.
    Well the seagate drive will ALWAYS have a 5 year warranty on it, the enclosures generally only carry a one year. So I'd do that if you want to.

    Seagate is a great company, but they did really did a shit job with this enclosures. And they also had a bad run of 160 gig Sata's (if yours is a 160 gig external, just get it replaced) but they make good drives. Their old grey external cases where incredible. I miss them.

    Anyways, answering your question, just make sure you get an enclosure with good shock absorbers. Don't be cheap with the enclosure and you'll be happy. Things to take your enclosure from 2 years to 5-7 years use:

    1 - Make sure it's SATA2 capable
    2 - Make sure the universal power adapter can be purchased at a place like target. (some enclosures come with a power adapter that costs more than the enclosure to replace or is proprietary)
    3 - Make sure there are shock absorbers
    4 - read reviews!
    People are not ruled by their memories.

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    Featured Member Hatshepsut's Avatar
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    Default Re: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    ^Mine is 500. Any horror stories about those?
    Quote Originally Posted by twisterinAZ View Post
    The big dick is dangerous. It makes you overlook certain character flaws and bad behavior .

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    God/dess Mastridonicus's Avatar
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    Default Re: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Hatshepsut View Post
    ^Mine is 500. Any horror stories about those?
    Nope. Tho they're very awkward in shape, I typically include two with every server I sell for off site rotational backups.
    People are not ruled by their memories.

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    Featured Member Hatshepsut's Avatar
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    Default Re: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    Okay, I called Seagate. Fry's will only take care of stuff up to 30 days. Seagate is sending me a refurbished replacement. I'll pull the data and send back the faulty one. Jesus, they're trying to charge me to pull the data.
    Quote Originally Posted by twisterinAZ View Post
    The big dick is dangerous. It makes you overlook certain character flaws and bad behavior .

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    Featured Member Hatshepsut's Avatar
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    Default Re: Put my Seagate FreeAgent in a new enclosure or get it replaced?

    Update:

    I have officially had it with the Seagate FreeAgent enclosure. It constantly overheated, causing several Delayed Write Failed error messages even though it was just reading. After having way too many problems with the drive (device constantly not recognizing, refusing to safely remove hardware, etc) and reading about numerous others with the same problem, I decided to forget about the 5-year warranty. I cracked open the cheap shitty plastic enclosure and re-enclosed it with this. Now I don't have problems with it overheating (or at least I don't think so, it doesn't feel too hot to the touch). However, some of my data was corrupted. My mp3 players won't read some files, and I can't even delete some files because they're considered unreadable. I'm going to transfer the data to another drive, reformat the transplanted Seagate, and see if it's still usable. However, I'm trying to remove the corrupt files before I transfer. How can I check for corrupt files? Is there any way to repair it?


    Also, should I get an external enclosure with a fan? Fans seem pointless in a lot of cases, as there's often no intake and they make a lot of ambient noise. This forum thread has mixed messages about fan vs. no fan. I also hear that SATA drives generate less heat, and that Western Digital is now making quieter drives that generate less heat.

    Thanks!
    Quote Originally Posted by twisterinAZ View Post
    The big dick is dangerous. It makes you overlook certain character flaws and bad behavior .

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