Seagate 16 meg cache drive purchasers (300 gig SATA, perhaps others)

[Devistater]

(note: the hot deal here is making sure you got the 5 year warranty you paid for)

From some of these recent outpost.com deals I have purchased two 300 gig SATA drives. One each of 8 meg and 16 meg cache models.

http://5yrwarranty.seagatestorage.com/?elqPURLPage=540
Per the above page, all seagate retail boxed drives (and almost all others) are supposed to have a 5 year warranty from any drive purchased after mid 2004.

Warranty check: http://support.seagate.com/customer/warranty_validation.jsp
The 8 meg cache comes up correctly as warranty until 2010.
The 16 meg cache model comes up warranty good until 2007 only.
Everyone still should be able to get the 5 year warranty, just that there's a few steps nessasary. Hence why I'm trying to alert people Below are the details.

And its not that the drive was manufactured years ago, the manufacture date is mid 2005. (seagate didn't even have SATA 16 meg drives more than 1 year or so ago, I think the 7200.8 was released in mid 2005).

I called them and they told me I needed to send in a "high resolution scan" of 3 things: the top of the drive, my outpost receipt, and the box front with the 5 year warranty sticker to custserv@seagate.com and then they can give me the 5 year warranty.

I'm emailing them to find out more, but I know there's been other people reporting the same thing with these drives giving warranties from seagates page of 2007.
(you can see someone else who here: http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=40&threadid=1779765 )
So make sure to check the warranty on yours. You can retrieve your serial and model number using this program (if you dont have the box handy and dont want to open up your computer case):
http://www.passmark.com/products/diskcheckup.htm
Note that you'll need to have S.M.A.R.T. enabled in BIOS, which helps to give early warning of failing drives for this program to work.

A 2 year warranty would really suck on a brand new 16 meg cache 300 gig seagate drive. So I wanted to alert everyone who bought this drive (or is planning to buy it) to make sure to check your warranty.

(my guess is that this 16 meg cache model (and perhaps other capacities) slipped through the cracks somewhere in applying the new 5 year warranties, since its a retail drive only, and probably because its not listed as a model number on seagates product information pages)

 

[intogamer]

 

[imported_IronPlasma]

Thanks for the info. Was going to head to Fry's soon and pick up that 16MB cache version. Btw, was that same drive you picked up from Outpost a 7200.9 model? Is there any sure way to check the box to see if it's a 7200.9 and not a 7200.7/7200.8? Or are the 9 series SATA the only ones from Seagate with 16MB?

 

[IdaGno]

If the mfr is stealthily pulling away from the traditional 5yr warranty policy in this case, that tells me they know something about this product that I really donwanna know.

 

[Devistater]

I dont think they are pulling away from it. The 8 meg still had it. My theory as I said, was that this model fell through the cracks. But apparently if you call them/email them and go through the hoops you can get it "automatically" extended. I linked to the FAQ and stuff, there's no exceptions to the 5 year warranty listed except for external drives.

I'm trying to alert people to the fact that if they have one or are going to get one, they will need to go through some steps to make sure they get the full 5 year warranty.

I'm fairly sure that these are 7200.8 models. You can check the model numbers on the 7200.9 on the website and compare those to the ones on the outside of the box if you wish to check. (the big STxxxxxxxx numbers)

 

[carlwu]

This is rediculous! If it slipped through the cracks, why wouldn't Seagate change the warranty length online when the first person (you?) noticed the descrepancy. I neither have my original receipt nor original packaging. Worse still, I didn't get my rebate check yet!!!

 

[Fant]

Do I have to go thru this right after I purchase my drive or are you saying I will have to go thru this if I ever have to RMA my drive later?

 

[Devistater]

carlwu: Yeah but the drones on the phone dont know any better. They kept insisting that was the only thing I could do, despite trying to explain. It sounded like a call center in china. Odds are this is the procedure for if you bought a drive and the warranty from the manufacture date ran out, but its still within the timeframe of when you actually purchased it. So you'd send in the proof etc. Thats what it felt like they were treating it as. And thats why I'm emailing them to see if I can get someone over there to see sense.

Fant: I'd do it sooner rather than later. They said if I went through that, my warranty would be updated in case I ever had to use it, and the correct warranty would show up on the web page. Plus, like the guy above you, would you even have the packaging and receipt in a couple years?

 

[Fant]

Devistater, can you give me the phone number or email address or fax# of the person you dealt with so that I dont have to spend time on getting my warranty updated? Thanks.

 

[Devistater]

Fant: The email I put in the OP, they told me on the phone to email those 3 scans (or pics) to that email and they would update it. The phone number of seagate is:
1-800-SEAGATE (1-800-732-4283)
Make sure to pick warranty on the menu, I waited 20 mins on the phone to get to technical support, and then they transferred me to warranty. Warranty answered in like 20 seconds, and this was a holiday monday. And the phone ppl told me to email, they probably will tell you the same, but if they dont let us know what happens.

 

[RaiderJ]

Good to know!

 

[cmv]

Originally posted by: carlwu
This is rediculous! If it slipped through the cracks, why wouldn't Seagate change the warranty length online when the first person (you?) noticed the descrepancy. I neither have my original receipt nor original packaging. Worse still, I didn't get my rebate check yet!!!

How long have you been waiting on the rebate? Mine have come within 3-4 weeks for the last 3 or 4 Segate rebates I've done.

Oh, and thanks for the post -- this is a hot deal IMHO .

 

[Bad Dude]

Shouldn't they know what drive you have by looking at the serial number? Why make you jump through hoops?

 

[Eeezee]

Not hot

 

[Auzner]

It's ST3300631ASRK (Retail Kit)
7200.8 16mb cache SATA150 NCQ.
These must be rare because they're not on the pdf datasheet
The ST3300831AS is on it; the 8mb cache version.

The 7200.9 is ST3300622AS and these don't apply to the rebate.

I don't think there's any difference except that the .9 is 3gb/s and the .8 is 1.5gb/s. With 10bit bytes that's 300mb/s and 150mb/s. When I ran HDTach the max the drive got was ~70mb/s anyways. It's not like any drive will ever go above 150. So it doesn't matter unless they use different platters or something.

 

[NeezyDeezy]

This is absolutely absurd. I am calling and I am not going to hesitate in letting them know how poor a move this is to require customers to jump through these unrealistic hoops just to get the warranty they should have had all along.

 

[Auzner]

Well I just scanned my stuff and I'm going to email them now. I bought it in the store and not on outpost. Also there's no sticker saying 5 year warranty, but it is printed on the back of the box which I'm also emailing. 1mb of jpegs is their problem.

 

[Devistater]

Originally posted by: Bad Dude
Shouldn't they know what drive you have by looking at the serial number? Why make you jump through hoops?

The problem is that thier computer warranty check system says 2 years warranty when it should say 5. And everyone knows computers NEVER make mistakes and ALWAYS know it all and ALWAYS are 100% correct.

The instructions they are telling you are so you can get your particular drive's warranty changed to the correct 5 years. But unfortunately, it looks like they are going to require EVERYONE to do this to get the warranty. Since odds are a couple years down the line people wont have the original package or receipt, its best to take care of this NOW.

If anyone gets any further information about this issue please let us know. I will post anything I find out from my email I fired off. Also, feel free to call the 800 warranty service line to confirm anything I've told you. It was a like less than a 20 second wait for the warranty people when I called, and that was on a holiday monday afternoon.

 

[Auzner]

Oh I just believed your post and figured it wouldn't hurt to throw them an email with jpegs attached. I'll definately report back here my results.

 

[gizmoaddict]

:evil:

Just got off the phone with these jokers! they also wanted me to fax them all kinds of non-essential stuff. I told them that I would not and if they would not correct the warranty length, I would return the used drive to OM and contest charge with CC.

Will give them a couple days to get it updated.

 

[Fant]

What kind of non-essential stuff? In the email to me they indicated 3 things:

- copy of outpost.com invoice
- pic/scan of label on drive
- pic/scan of box/sticker showing 5 year warranty

 

[Auzner]

Dear Auzner,

With regards to your request, we have forwarded the proof of purchase along with the drive details to our order maintenance team so that they will investigate.

Kindly allow us some time so that we will be able to do the needful.

Regards,
Dolly
Seagate Warranty Support

 

[Fant]

"so that we will be able to do the needful" ? Anyone wanna bet her real name aint Dolly?

 

[feelingshorter]

Originally posted by: IdaGno
If the mfr is stealthily pulling away from the traditional 5yr warranty policy in this case, that tells me they know something about this product that I really donwanna know.

yea...maby since they are pushing the limits on the densities of the drives that they tend to break easier and the warranty reflects the company trying to make a profit?

 

[Devistater]

Originally posted by: feelingshorter

Originally posted by: IdaGno
If the mfr is stealthily pulling away from the traditional 5yr warranty policy in this case, that tells me they know something about this product that I really donwanna know.

yea...maby since they are pushing the limits on the densities of the drives that they tend to break easier and the warranty reflects the company trying to make a profit?

They aren't pulling away from it. I linked to thier FAQ, there's no exceptions. As far as I know this is the only drive, and like I said, I think it slipped through the cracks when they were telling thier computer what models had the 5 year warranty.

If that was the case, they would have stuck with the 1 year policy that every hdd manufacture switched to within a month of the the others that they had a few years ago. Instead they now have a 5 year warranty. I'm thinking most hdd manufactures found out that a 1 year warranty didn't save them all that much over a 3 or 5 year, because most have since switched back up to longer warranties (other than WD and some retail drive weirdness).