Barracuda XT, Barracuda, Barracuda Green, DiamondMax and other desktop SATA and IDE drives

[sekin]

lol you are lucky BIOS , I have more than 15 hdd like this STM3500320AS :/

I solved the first with the rs232 trick and saved my datas on an other hdd (western now) , but i am waiting  for this firmware .....

ALAN could you give us a delay for this firmware?  lol because I need all the day to flash all my hdd lol

[Giorgio]

Hi,

just verified with the serial number checker, and have been reported my drive is NOT affected

1 3QK03CQ9 Drive is not affected. No action required.

My drive is "Model: MAXTOR STM3750330AS, Serial: 3QK03CQ9, Firmware: MX15"...

Does it mean that the serial checker is able to identify faulty drives based on conditions other than model and firmware release (i.e. the equipment used in the production chain...) and the information returned can be trusted?

Thanks,

Giorgio

[Carpo]

I think the checker is faulty because this models STM3500320AS,STM3750330AS and STM31000340AS with mx15 firmware are affected!

But there is no firmware after 8 days of the crappy firmware they released short before!

Carpo

[zitsky66]

YOU ASSUME ANY AND ALL RISK IF THIS VOIDS YOUR WARRANTY OR YOU LOSE DATA.  DO NOT DO THIS IF YOU HAVE CRITICAL DATA ON YOUR HARD DRIVE.  WAIT FOR THE OFFICIAL SEAGATE FIRMWARE UPDATE.

I'm not encouraging anyone to do this.  It will certainly void your warranty, but I'm posting it as an FYI.  I have 3 of these STM drives, and decided to find out if they really are identical to the Seagate ST drives.

The drives I have all have the same part number and similar serial numbers.  Two have date codes of 08377, one with 08376:

S/N 5QJ0XXXX
P/N 9GT158-325
Firmware MX15
Date Code 08377
Site Code: WUXISG
 

Here is what I did to get the SD1A firmware on the drives.  I used the old, bad version of the SD1A iso, then later used the updated version from:  MooseDT-SD1A-3D4D-16-32MB.ISO posted on Seagate's website.

You have to boot from the firmware iso, then do the following:

Press F10 at the readme.txt screen
At the Drive model selection prompt press Z
When you see Press any key to continue,
Then press Ctrl-C
At the message, Terminate batch file press Y

Then, at the command prompt, type the following command:

Using good SD1A from MooseDT-SD1A-3D4D-16-32MB.ISO

fdl462b -f sd1a3d4d.lod -s -x -b -v

Using older, bad SD1A (not recommended)

fdl457 -f sd1amoos.lod -s -x -b -v

 After the firmware update is done, wait a few seconds, then turn off power.

I have done this on three STM drives which were failing when connected to an HP Smart Array P800 RAID controller.  They show up as Seagate ST31000340AS drives after the firmware update.  They are now stable.  I have tested them after the firmware update with Seagate Seatools diagnostic, HP Smart Start diagnostics, and have used them for a Linux install numerous times. 

I also rescued a Seagate ST drive that was bricked by the old SD1A firmware by updating with the newer version.  What's interesting is that the "bad" version of SD1A did not brick the Maxtor STM drives!

This post might be a violation of the forum rules, and might be deleted, so copy this down. 

YOU ASSUME ANY AND ALL RISK IF THIS VOIDS YOUR WARRANTY OR YOU LOSE DATA.  DO NOT DO THIS IF YOU HAVE CRITICAL DATA ON YOUR HARD DRIVE.  WAIT FOR THE OFFICIAL SEAGATE FIRMWARE UPDATE.

Message Edited by zitsky66 on 01-27-2009 12:19 PM

[Xunainers]

Indeed, the Maxtor STM3500320AS and Seagate ST3500320AS are indentical.

If you read at the Maxtor's label, at the right side near the trash simbol you'll see STX "ST3500320AS".

And thanks for the tutorial on how to use Seagate firmware on Maxtor.

I have update 2 drives so far and it works wonders!

Now, i have other 23 to update. And 12 costumers that havent powered down or rebooted their computers for the last 3 weeks fearing they would lose data (they all use STM3500320AS)

I'll come back later, as i am dying on curiosity to see an official seagate reply on this thread explaining why the STM3500320AS is still under validation

[sekin]

lol nice trick to update maxtor with the seagate firmware lollll

i ll try it tomorrow on one of my revived hdd

how it's possible that seagate engineers can't do the same thing ... MORE THAN ONE WEEK FOR A FIRMWARE ... (it's too difficult to rename the seagate firmware to maxtor firmware lol ?? )

only the customers are working on it to solve the problem ???... as we can see there is no solution from seagate to unbrick or update theses defective hdd... but a lot of solutions from the part of members of the forom ...

[zitsky66]

Yes, it's great how everyone is coming together to try to find a solution.  I figured it's about time I did something useful. 

I knew that I'd have to send my drives back to Seagate anyway, either because they failed or because my firmware trick would brick the drives.  So, I had nothing to lose.

[Carpo]

So seagate what do you think now?

Is it normal that the community in this forum is working faster or better than your members you pay for?

You see other people can manage it to get the firmware on the maxtor drive.

But seagate "himselfe" can't get it out for us?!

And Alan what do you think about that?

Is that the right way if you see how it works.

I can't believe it.

Carpo 

[Giorgio]

I think the checker is faulty because this models STM3500320AS,STM3750330AS and STM31000340AS with mx15 firmware are affected!

Carpo, that's my fear. Nevertheless, the drive is functional since 5 monts and the way it is used (on a PC which is sent to stand-by at least 10 times per day) have low probability of having it still working if being part of the <1% affected drives.

The firmware is not there, and the drive is used only to store non critical data and daily backups (weekly backups are then done on a remote disk), but I'd like to hear from a Seagate source if the serial number checker is reliable or not.

Anyone out there?

[Carpo]

Just look here:

http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=207969

I think all these drives with MX15 are affected.

Both of my STM drives are dead with all my data on it.

The drives are about  3 month old.