QUESTION - Western Digital Hard Drive Warranty Info???

[rcristel]

I just got a brand new 13GB drive (manufactured in 2001) back from western Digital after sending in a damaged unit still under warranty. My question for you is How long of a warranty does the new drive have?

 

[MrBond]

It always used to be 3yrs from original purchase date, I'm not sure if that's the case or not anymore. IE: if I RMA'ed a drive with a year left on the warranty, the replacement would have on year left as well.

I haven't RMA'ed a WD drive in over a year though, so they may have changed things

 

[rcristel]

thanks MrBond,

The original drive only had 2 months left on the warranty. What you are saying is that the new drive only has a 2 month warranty, even though the drive was manufactured in 2001?

that kinda stinks.

 

[blakeatwork]

there should be a warranty date on those units if I'm not mistaken, or is that only the Seagate drives??

 

[EagleKeeper]

Some drives are only warrantied for a year according to WD. Depends on where you bought them I think.

I have a 13G that developed bad sectors last month. According to WD, the 1 yr warranty expired April 2001. Lucky the bad sectors are at the end of the drive, just repartioned the drive at 95% and ignored the bad area.

They will not explain how they determine the 1yr vs 3 yr warranty.

By by WD, hello Maxtor.

 

[rcristel]

thanks for the info guys... I'll have to look on my drive to see if it has a warranty end date when I get home.

 

[bunker]

Quite a while back I had a 1.6 gb drive go bad. I called WD and they asked me for the mfg. date on the drive and didn't care about when it was purchased. That drive had a 3 year warranty on it and I had the problem in the last month of the warranty! They replaced it no problem.

 

[EagleKeeper]

Go to the WD web site and punch in the serial number. It will tell you the waranty on the drive.

 

[HowardStern]

The Warranty expiration date should be on the drive itself someplace. Go by that.

 

[Russ]

MrBond is correct. The warranty on the replacement begins at the manufacture date of the original.

It makes perfect sense for a manufacturer to do that. The drive may very well have failed due to causes beyond their control, for example, a crappy power supply. If they started the warranty period over, the end user could conceivably have free drives for the rest of their life simply by killing it near the end of each new warranty period.

Russ, NCNE

 

[MWink]

Some of the newer "value" WD drives only have a 90 day warranty! I don't think I will be buying from them in the future.

 

[rml]

Link to WD RMA page