Momentus XT, Momentus, Momentus Thin, MobileMax, and other notebook drives

[southbayphoto]

I have the stupid beep that has been occuring.  I don't know why it does it, but it just does it randomly.  Except for the beep, my drive has been working fine and I really haven't had any issues with it.  Just the beep scares me because I'm afraid it's indicating it's getting too hot or that I will start experiencing problems.  I've never had a hard drive just beep for no reason.

1. Laptop

2. HP G70-246US laptop w/4GB of PC-6400 (800MHz) RAM (upgraded)

3. Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

4.  The new Momentus XT 500 GB hard drive (ST95005620AS) makes a random beep here and there.  Not sure why.  I do have the latest firmware installed SD24 a day after I got it and heard the first beep.  Upgraded from SD23.

Just feels weird to be out somewhere and your computer starts beeping at you here and there and people look over at you like you are nuts.  I don't need this thing crashing on me when I'm out doing a photo assignment because it had it's "last beep".  Would be nice if a moderator or someone from Seagate could mention what it means instead of just saying they will monitor the thread and let the people know we're having issues.  Makes me feel like they don't know why it's happening.  Not very confidence inspiring.  Except for the beep, I really do love the hard drive and am even considering moving it to my Mac that I'm planning on buying very soon.

[Doug E]

for anybody watching this thread (as I am) who have one of these drives and have not yet really had a chance to use it (as I have), please go and write a review on the Seagate web site

http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/products/laptops/laptop-hdd#tTabContentReviews

This got me to a place to write a review on the Momentus XT.

Like most of you on this list, the drive worked for me at the start.   This meant  for first 2 months during the summer, but I havn't had great luck with any replacement or any update to the firmware.   Nothing I've seen leads me to believe that it will be fixed soon because information is not forthcoming very easily on the drive.  I've been through firmware SD22, SD23, and SD24.   

[bjf2002]

Doug, do you have a review over there?  If not, can you specify which problem you're seeing as of SD24?  Are you pausing or chirping?

[Doug E]

hesitation on my Mac Pro core i7 and nothing to explain it in activity monitor, no hard drive activity.... then all of a sudden, it starts to move.   I've got a second machine (identical) with the same drive.

and I've got a 500 gb stock hard drive that came with the laptop.  When put that back in and let the machine boot ... I don't see those issues.

maddening.

[Mid_west]

I have to jump in here and express my discontent for this drive!  I was down to 3gigs left on my factory 200 Gig 7200 that came stock with my 2008 MacBook Pro 2.5Ghz 4Gig RAM (model before unibody) so I opted to get this drive.  

IF I HAD READ THIS THREAD BEFORE BUYING, I WOULD HAVE SELECTED A DIFFERENT MODEL!

I just updated my firmware to SD24 and it is still having an issue with a LOT of things.   

1. Time machine isnt working and I think as Im waiting for it to do something it may have deleted all my previous backups.  

2. These frequent freezes are real.  

Im heading across the country to work on a very important project that heavily involves my *working* computer.  I cant have this inconsistency the whole week.   Luckily I didnt erase my old drive.  Although Ive installed some new software that Ill need to re-install.  Not to mention that its the day before a major holiday and I have NO time to do this!

As Im typing this on my system, while TRYING to do a backup with Time Machine, the hard drive spins up, then slows down, then spins up...  and the backup isnt progressing.  I really need the extra space on my system but I may have to run to the computer store early in the morning.  

Can anyone here recommend another 500Gig 7200 RPM drive?  I need to fix this right away!

[Doug E]

the stock one that came with my pacbook pro core i7 was a 500 gb seagate ST9500420ASG.

If that helps you.    

I was fed up waiting for this to get better so I just ordered a 480 gb mergury extremet SSD from OWC based on the sadforce controllers (everything I read said very good) and with a 2million hour mean time between failures and 3 year warranty.

I'm taking my momentus XT back for return of money.     Not playing any more.

[AlexanderHood]

Macbook 5,1 Late 2008

Momentus XT 500gb 

FW24 as of yesterday

OSX 10.6.5

 Never had freezing, stuttering or inability to install OSX, ~just~ 2-3 kernel panics per day under FW23.

 Grey backdrop falls into place with the nice big round power off symbol: "You must power off this computer" message pops up. Sometimes an app will panic and abort on it's own, without requiring a power off/on cycle.

 I just upgraded the memory from 2Gb to 4Gb which reduced my HDD access dramatically,  which might be affecting the frequency of the kernel panics. Wondering if the spin-down time delay is a factor or not. 

 Will let you know if they reduce in freq after the new FW, but it's not gone as I had one panic already.

 I'd put the old HDD back in ... but the bigger faster drive is so hard to let go of, is it worth one forced reboot per day?

[AlexanderHood]

 UPDATE:

 FW24 has not fixed the issue. Still crashing every day, once or twice a day.

 I'll give it two weeks for another FW update, then it's going to get returned to the store as defective.

 I'll have to put the old drive back in until there is a new hybrid available that is reliable.

 I'm disappointed because Seagate usually makes good products.

 Now I'm looking at a 15% restocking fee to return the drive plus all the hours mucking about with it.

[Krisdk]

I have been working from home today on my macbook pro and have had 4 craches with FW SD24.... I think we need a SD25 quick! 

[KristenG]

Thank you all for your feedback.  I was considering getting one of these but you've all swayed me and I know to stay clear now!

Thank you!