Is My External HDD Dead

[Sandy B]

I have a Seagate Backup Plus 6TB external HDD attached to my T4 via a rear USB. A few days ago I noticed that it would not spin down and consequently unplugged the power for a few hours and after powering up rebooted the T4. It appeared to spin down after playing about 5 minutes of recordings, and thought great all is back to normal as the indicator light went off. However tonight I discovered that it completely dead. I checked the power supply and that appears to be OK and pulled it apart and attached a caddy cable to the HDD, however again no response and could not detect any vibration due to spinning. The HDD itself is a Seagate Barracuda (green label). I am assuming that its refusal to spin down has caused the problem.

My question is does anybody have any idea if this is completely terminal, and is it worth trying to repair or repairable. The HDD contains the usual video recordings of TV programs and movies accumulated over the years and it is a pity to lose them.


Hoping somebody has some bright idea.

[Paul_oz53]

Sorry, I can't help with a miracle cure. All I can do is empathise.

I had a 1.5 TB Seagate external drive which died but in my case the HDD survived. A short while later a second 2 TB Seagate died but this time it was the HDD. The end result is that the 1.5 TB drive is still working in the 2TB case, 3 years later.

YouTube videos suggest that the recovery services rely on swapping out the control electronics with a donor board as the path to data recovery but at a price. Unlikely to be viable in your case.

[Sandy B]

Sorry, I can't help with a miracle cure. All I can do is empathise

I have also come to the same conclusion. I spoke to Mark Warkus earlier and he also advised the same, also that it would be very expensive to recover the data and would not be worth it for some videos. He also advised that he is no longer in the repair business so it's a double dose of dad luck.

I had a 1.5 TB Seagate external drive which died but in my case the HDD survived. A short while later a second 2 TB Seagate died but this time it was the HDD. The end result is that the 1.5 TB drive is still working in the 2TB case, 3 years later.

I went to Office Works and bought an identical unit as a replacement. I note that your HDD are also Seagate units, and I am starting to have second thoughts now about the quality of Seagate HDD. Are we just unlucky or is there a long term issue with Seagate HDDs.

Thanks for your interest.

[Paul_oz53]

... I am starting to have second thoughts now about the quality of Seagate HDD. Are we just unlucky or is there a long term issue with Seagate HDDs.

I share your concern. All my externals and newer HDDs are Western Digital which seem to be more reliable.

Over the years I've had failures of other brands including WD but Seagate HDDs have given me trouble disproportionately. My 1.5 TB Seagate shakes terribly when running. It's the backup to a backup lest it too succumbs.

PS Sad to learn Warkus has hung up the hot air gun. May he have a long and happy time in the next phase of his life.

[MrQuade]

You'll want to look at some of the guys who run the big data farms and grab their stats.
Even then, the failure rates vary from period to period, and there never seems to be a clear "best" manufacturer......just different quality in different production runs.

Take this sample from Backblaze that came up in a quick and dirty Google search:
https://www.backblaze.com/blog/hard-dri ... s-q2-2019/

[raymondjpg]

...and there never seems to be a clear "best" manufacturer...

From what I've seen there usually is, but never WD or Seagate.

Just to add my 2c worth, even though the only spinner I have had crash was a 300 GB Seagate many years ago, I'm still wary of the brand. I have also had one 2 TB 3.5" WD decay progressively with weak sectors, but that was among a number of WD HDD over many years, and I'd still go for WD over Seagate if there was a clear choice. Unfortunately sometimes there isn't, and I recently resorted to Seagate for 2.5" 4 TB disks because there is currently no WD equivalent. I don't use them for anything I wouldn't be able to recover from backups.

[MrQuade]

From what I've seen there usually is, but never WD or Seagate.

So Toshiba then? There are only 3 manufacturers of Harddisks left now.

[raymondjpg]

From what I've seen there usually is, but never WD or Seagate.

So Toshiba then? There are only 3 manufacturers of Harddisks left now.

I'm probably thinking historically, over the years, when I've seen a number of tables where, to my recollection, I've not seen WD or Seagate stand out as the best of the bunch. Generally I've seen my choice, as a run of the mill consumer, as being between WD or Seagate, probably for reasons of cost and availability. As of now, I'd be tempted to go with 4 TB SSDs in the 2.5" format, if they were about half the price they are currently.

[stevebow]

Each manufacturer releases a dud every now and then, which in the mind of many then tarnishes the entire brand for a period of time.

[gibster]

I've used HGST Helium filled NAS drives for many years now and have never had an issue with them. I realize they are currently owned by WD. So I've now got a couple of WD Red 12TB NAS drives that are in raid 1 mounted in a Silverstone TS231U-C external enclosure on which my movie/tv series collection resides.

I'm currently running a 3TB HGST in an external Orico USB 3.0 enclosure on my V2. I had initially hooked up an old Seagate external drive to it that kept giving me issues with the V2 locking up and rebooting. Once it was replaced with the HGST in it's new enclosure all the issues stopped. Now runs like a champ unless we have a power failure and I forget to turn the external drive back on LOL

Gib

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