Seagate Barracuda IV Question

[Justorq]

Hey people,
I have a seagate Barracuda IV 20GB and at first it was completely silent... now it's as loud as my old quantum 6.4 GB ... is this normal for those kind of drives ?... If not ... then what should I do ?
thx in advance,
Justorq

 

[Rand]

A rather significant number of the Barracuda IV's had a bug that caused them to begin to emit a rather high pitched squeal after prolonged operation.
Does this sound similar to what your experiencing?

 

[Viper GTS]

<< A rather significant number of the Barracuda IV's had a bug that caused them to begin to emit a rather high pitched squeal after prolonged operation.
Does this sound similar to what your experiencing? >>



That one can be corrected by software, right? Or is that a separate issue?

Viper GTS <-- Has a 'Cuda IV that has the shopping wheel squeak but can't hear it over his dual Athlons

 

[kgraeme]

This seems to happen to all my drives. My WD400BB was completely silent when I bought it, now it's a real whiner. My completely silent Fujitsu 5400rpm fluid bearing drive now has noticeably loud seek/write head noise. And those are only a year old.

 

[340mopar]

Hmmmmmmm set on getting one of these, 20GB getting hard to find and not a good $ deal any longer, and Justorq's 20GB is getting a noise.

"Viper GTS <-- Has a 'Cuda IV that has the shopping wheel squeak but can't hear it over his dual Athlons"

Viper GTS, what size is your Cuda IV ??? I'm looking at the 80GB.
Geo

 

[Justorq]

yup it's exactly that sound... it's annoying... do u guys have a clue how to fix this if possible ... ?

 

[Carrot44]

My Cuda 40 gig did that sound kinda like a bearing in its last stages of death and it just got louder til the drive started viberating and then it stoped.................. Cold DEAD Just imagine a platter spinning around 120 times a second then stoping. No more HD after that RMA on the way back to me

Ken

 

[gunf1ghter]

Well, if it is a really high pitched whine, and it wasn't there before it would tell me that chances are the bearing is slowly going out... this could however take a really long time before the drive finally dies (like something around a year or more, depending).

I would say get your data backed up anyway, better safe than sorry.

I was tempted to get the new Quantum fluid bearing drive... it's extremely quiet... instead I got a WD 800BB... I got it for $50 after rebate and pricematch so I couldn't pass it up... however, it's loud as hell... emits a high frequency whine in the 2-3Khz frequency range and others have complained about it so I don't think that the unit itself is bad.

I ended up ordering one of those Silent Drive Enclosures... along with a compunurse to monitor temperatures.... after running it full bore in the enclosure surface temps on the drive don't go about 45 C. According to WD the drive can operate in environments up to 55 C so hopefully I am not seriously cutting the life of the drive... it is definitely much quieter in the silent drive enclosure.

 

[Auric]

You may want to hold off a bit on buying a Barracuda IV. Apparently the RAM timing defect has been corrected with a new design so they will no longer fail to perform correctly in a RAID. Presumably any other known shortcomings would have been fixed also.

 

[gunf1ghter]

With hard drives it's very difficult to know when they have been manufactured (most retailers can't/don't provide this info).. so even if you wait 3 months you could get a drive with the defect.

 

[nmos]

Wait a minute, I thought these Seagates were a fluid bering design used specifically to prevent this sort of thing?

 

[Auric]

gunf1ghter, true dat. What you could do is buy from a shoppe with no inventory like buy.com or otherwise a high turn-over. If you do not receive the new version then get Seagate to send a replacement. I know it is a hassle, but these drives are relatively unique right now.

 

[John]

<< A rather significant number of the Barracuda IV's had a bug that caused them to begin to emit a rather high pitched squeal after prolonged operation. >>



OK, now we can start a class action lawsuit.

 

[340mopar]

"OK, now we can start a class action lawsuit."

I can see it now..... listening to dying Barracuda IV's and 75 GXP's used as incar Mp3 players, while stranded in your Ford on expressway due to
dead (class action lawsuit) TFI module.