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

[Need_Help]

This is my HDD which I got as a replacement for my ST3500320AS (SD15) which bricked last year :

Model : ST3500320AS

Serial Number :  5QM3EH7Y

Firmware version : SD81

Recently, I found out that SD81 is also one of the affected firmware versions, so I tried downloading the Drive Detect utility and my HDD is marked in red colour (indicates that I need to update the firmware). However, the online serial checker (which won't work most of the time) showed that 'No action required' for my HDD.

Since I saw from somewhere that the online serial checker is not reliable, I had downloaded the SD1A firmware update utility (via Windows) to update my HDD. Unfortunately, it says 'Model matched, firmware not matched' and the update wasn't carried out.

So, do I need to update my HDD? Which 'utility' shall I trust? I had already lost almost 500GB data last year, and I do not wish the same thing to repeat this year with this exact same HDD model and faulty firmware.

Thanks for your reply and have a nice day.

[Cantbecanit]

You'd better call support directly on that one mate, afaik the 500 drives were updated to SD1a and MX1 for Maxtor ones, anything other than the 15 fw's is supposed to be ok, for safety sake, either back it up elsewhere or simply don't use it for now until support can confirm whats what, hth.

[Need_Help]

Thanks for your reply. Since the technical support is only available on working days, I must wait another day before I can contact them.

Right now, I am not able to update my HDD's firmware because the firmware update utility refused to update my HDD, so if my HDD is one of the affected ones, how do I update the firmware?

Thanks.

[Cantbecanit]

Thats generally a fail safe that a drive can only accept the correct FW, I think you will find your drive is fine, it's more than likely one set of numbers like the serial is chucking it up as vunerable, and the other is saying it isn't, call support to confirm it, at least if you have an e.mail from them saying don't worry and it does shutdown you have some proof you called for advice.

[fzabkar]

The Windows version of the updater compares your model number and firmware version against a configuration file. This file contains an update matrix that must match your drive, otherwise the update is aborted.

Here is the configuration file:

http://www.users.on.net/~fzabkar/MS-SD1A.TXT

The FreeDOS (CD ISO) version of the updater works slightly differently. It only checks your drive's model number and family (Moose). It will most likely work for you. I can't advise whether going from SD81 to SD1A is OK, though.

[Need_Help]

Thanks for the replies. Actually I saw from somewhere that the SD1A firmware made their HDD slower / unstable, is that true? Or those are actually the older versions of the SD1A firmware, and the current version works flawlessly?

Thanks.

[fzabkar]

The first bug fix release was itself afflicted with a bug. AIUI, the updater applied the wrong firmware module to the wrong models, bricking them in the process.

I am not aware of any problems with the current release. FWIW, Wikipedia claims that "the SD2B firmware update for Brinks silently removes the DCO ATA feature from the disks while SD1A for Moose adds two ATA features":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seagate_Barracuda

If you would like to find out which features are added (or removed), run SeaTools for Windows before and after the upgrade. The drive's Identify Device data will be saved in a 512-byte *.ATA file, where the asterisk represents the drive's serial number. Be sure to save (or rename) the first ATA file before running SeaTools a second time, as it may be overwritten. If you can then upload the before and after ATA files to a file sharing service, one of us will be able to analyse them for you.

Message Edited by fzabkar on 28-02-2010 05:32 PM

[Need_Help]

Today I have received the reply :

Thank you for contacting Seagate Technical support
 
Please be informed that your replacement drive with serial number 5QM3EH7Y is not affected with the firmware issue

 So I guess the best way to determine whether the drive is affected is to check at the serial number, not the firmware version? I hope the statement given by their technician is 100% reliable and the drive is really not affected by this firmware issue, since other than the serial number, everything on my HDD indicates that I shall update the firmware.

Thanks for all the replies given in this thread and have a nice day.

[Need_Help]

Very, very unfortunately, my drive had failed 2 weeks ago. The serial number checker indicates that it is not affected, but the reality is, it still has the firmware problem (the infamous BSY error). However, I have managed to recover the data using the popular method (can be found easily using Google).

Now I am facing another problem, which is, the firmware cannot be updated. This implicates that my HDD will fail at anytime in the future with the BSY problem. My ST3500320AS with SD81 firmware cannot be updated with the latest firmware just because of the inaccurate serial checker and firmware u. I am really disappointed that the technicians (through online chat) who insisted that my drive was not affected by the firmware problem when I contacted them 2 weeks ago just because of the result of the serial checker.

For anyone using HDD with the affected firmware versions (regardless of the result of serial checker), I strongly advise you to backup your data in another HDD. I have lost my confidence with Seagate products after facing this problem twice.

[fzabkar]

Did you use the Windows EXE, or the CD ISO version of the updater?