Dead Toshiba(Hitachi) DT01ACA300 with under 400 hours in use.

[Elixer]

This is so annoying.
Booted machine up, all drives were listed in BIOS, went on to boot.
When I got to the desktop, I was trying to go to that drive, and it wasn't shown.
Bah.
Open up disk management, it isn't even listed.
Grr.
Rebooted, drive again appeared in BIOS. (yeah!)
Got into the desktop, and immediately ran DFT, short test on said drive.
All is fine, no errors.
Must be Gremlins right?
Not.
About 1 min after that, it dropped out again. (Grrr!!)
Rebooted again, this time planning to boot into linux, and BIOS now don't see drive.
Sigh.

This irks me to no end. SMART says all is fine, yet, drive then proceeds to die moments after that quick SMART test.

Yeah, tried another machine, another controller as well. It is dead.
Data code on the drive is Apr-2015.
Does anyone know what the etched letters mean on the HD?
AA means what?

For what it is worth, this drive went through a battery of tests when I got it as well as a full format.

Depressing really.

 

[LOCO LAPTOP]

Toshiba. There your problem...

Sorry but I always had bad luck with their hard drives.

 

[Shmee]

My advice would be to stay away from 2.5" HDDs. Especially Seagate and Toshiba.

 

[IGemini]

The drive behavior suggests you have SATA Aggressive Link Power Management enabled. I'd turn it off in BIOS. When enabled the drive will power down like you described when activity stops, sometimes to the point that a full power cycle is the only way to get it going again (rebooting won't work). The only way I can get it to play nice with ALPM enabled with Windows is if Intel RST is installed.

I've had the same drive model "play dead" on me, after a power surge. Turns out my file system was broken, drive would hang while accessing certain files. Saved most of them but still had to reformat. Drive has over 21k hours of run time and still going. Not sure if you have the same problem, but see if turning off ALPM does anything for you.

 

[Elixer]

My advice would be to stay away from 2.5" HDDs. Especially Seagate and Toshiba.

Eh, this is a 3.5" drive.

The drive behavior suggests you have SATA Aggressive Link Power Management enabled. I'd turn it off in BIOS. When enabled the drive will power down like you described when activity stops, sometimes to the point that a full power cycle is the only way to get it going again (rebooting won't work). The only way I can get it to play nice with ALPM enabled with Windows is if Intel RST is installed.

Nothing to do with power management, the HD is still spinning away... just shows no signs of life now.

 

[IGemini]

That's a shame. Thought I'd offer something more constructive than "Toshiba sucks" since this model has put me through a similar experience.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Dat Bathtub Curve.

 

[Elixer]

You know, I am tempted to swap circuit boards from another toshiba drive of the same make & model that I have...however, thing is, I have no idea what could be wrong with it, and I don't want to lose the other circuit board as well.

 

[Soulkeeper]

It might be worth contacting toshiba and seeing what they have to say.

 

[Elixer]

Toshiba is pretty difficult to get in touch with, unsure what they could do in either case, besides a RMA. The only good thing about them is, they will give you a store credit if they don't have a drive in stock, then you can spend it on anything in their store.

However, I think I need to upgrade to a WD RE drive.
I should get a few of these http://www.officedepot.com/a/products/663526/WD-RE-WD3001FYYG-3-TB-35/ right now, before that price of $5709 .95 goes higher!

 

[RecoveryForce]

You know, I am tempted to swap circuit boards from another toshiba drive of the same make & model that I have...however, thing is, I have no idea what could be wrong with it, and I don't want to lose the other circuit board as well.

You can swap the PCB if you wish, but you will have to move the ROM with it.

 

[coercitiv]

Backblaze data isn't encouraging either, although not quite reliable with so few units in service.

 

[Cienja]

I think WD bought Toshiba's hard drive division, didn't they?

 

[Elixer]

You can swap the PCB if you wish, but you will have to move the ROM with it.

Interesting...I thought you just had to swap the PCBs.

I see: (from http://www.donordrives.com/pcb-replacement-guide)

Western Digital.

WD has 2 types of PCBs.

Type 1 has an 8-legged U12 ROM chip that must be swapped. See Step 4 of this Circuit Board Replacement Guide.

Type 2 has a missing U12 chip, and PCB firmware is stored in the big “M” Marvell Controller Chip. That chip can be transferred by a professional with a BGA Rework Station, or reprogrammed by Donor Drives.


Seagate.

These hard drives have 2 architectures: Barracuda (older) and F3 (new generation).

Barracuda Architecture. These hard drives have a dot (.) in the firmware version (“3.CDA”, “8.01”, “3.03”, etc.). Most PCB swaps are simple (~85%). In the other 15%, a ROM chip must be swapped.

F3 Architecture. Hard drives have no dot (.) in the firmware version (“CC44”, “0005HPM1”, “SD01”, etc.). The 8-legged firmware chip will have a number starting with 25, and must be transferred to a new circuit board. See Step 4 of this Circuit Board Replacement Guide.

Note: If your hard drive has a new PCB recognized by incorrect parameters (such as wrong model, different SN, or incorrect firmware), a computer electronics professional or Donor Drives, LLC must swap the chip.


Toshiba.

Most Toshiba boards have an 8-legged firmware chip that must be swapped. The chip will have a number starting with 25. See Step 4 of this Circuit Board Replacement Guide.

For some Toshiba families, the chip might be missing unique adaptive data stored in the large controller chip. That chip can be transferred by a professional with a BGA Rework Station, or reprogrammed by Donor Drives.


Hitachi and IBM.

All Hitachi and IBM circuit boards have an 8-legged firmware chip that has a number starting with 25. See Step 4 of this Circuit Board Replacement Guide.


Maxtor.

Adaptation service not required. A simple PCB replacement should work.


Samsung.

Most of the time there is no need for adaptation service, but in some cases an 8-legged firmware chip (with a number starting with 25) must be transferred. See Step 4 of this Circuit Board Replacement Guide.


Fujitsu.

PCB adaptation is not required, but occasionally, a firmware chip transfer is required. See Step 4 of this Circuit Board Replacement Guide.

I wonder if I got the one that says:

For some Toshiba families, the chip might be missing unique adaptive data stored in the large controller chip. That chip can be transferred by a professional with a BGA Rework Station, or reprogrammed by Donor Drives.

?

 

[LOCO LAPTOP]

I think WD bought Toshiba's hard drive division, didn't they?

No, They got Hitachi and recently SanDisk. Toshiba is still their own but might as well be owned by Seagate. D:

 

[Charlie98]

Question for Elixir...

Did you monitor your Toshiba drive temperature?

I've got a new 5TB in my HTPC and it's running 40-42C when the other drives are 27-32C.

 

[Elixer]

Question for Elixir...

Did you monitor your Toshiba drive temperature?

I've got a new 5TB in my HTPC and it's running 40-42C when the other drives are 27-32C.

Both Toshiba drives run around 38C, which is higher than my REDs that are in the same case.

 

[Charlie98]

Both Toshiba drives run around 38C, which is higher than my REDs that are in the same case.

That's what I have found... one of the other drives is a 3TB Red, too, along with the evil Seagate 3TB. I put the Toshiba on the bottom thinking that would be the coolest place for it, too, right in front of the case fan.

 

[Elixer]

Heh, that is funny, I also had the failed Toshiba at the bottom, which is closest to the fan, so it is one of the first to get fresh air.

I just can't wait for the day spinners are finally dead, and we can have cheap, reliable, solid state devices, but, I think that won't come with NAND, it needs to be another technology.

 

[WilliamM2]

No, They got Hitachi and recently SanDisk. Toshiba is still their own but might as well be owned by Seagate. D:

Actually, WD bought Hitachi, and then sold the consumer 3.5" division to Toshiba as part of the agreement. The drive the OP is posting about was designed by Hitachi. I have several of those Toshiba's, no failures yet after over 2 years of 24/7 use.

 

[cruzinforit]

400 hours is definitely within the infant mortality range, where you have high drive failure rate. I have 3 of these drives, two of them with over a full year of solid 24/7 operation, and one with about a month on it so far.

 

[Shmee]

Eh, this is a 3.5" drive.


Nothing to do with power management, the HD is still spinning away... just shows no signs of life now.

Oh, lol I heard Toshiba and I assumed it was a 2.5" drive from a toshiba laptop.

 

[Elixer]

OK, this is really odd.
I took off the PCB to see which one I had, if I needed BGA Rework or not, then put it back together, and threw it into a SATA cage I had to make sure it was still spinning up.
I did that, then, all of the sudden, the drive is seen again.
I did another SMART test, all is fine, as before.
Disconnected the drive, it powered off as usual.
Reinserted it into the SATA cage, and again, it came back to life.
Did more SMART tests, (short & long), and it passed both.
This time, I rebooted the system, to see if BIOS could see it, and it could.

I don't get it.
All I did was remove & examine the PCB, so, how could that bring the beast back to life?
I even put it in the same location and the same SATA cable as before, and it appears to be working fine again, through multiple system power cycles. (As in, turn it off for 5-10 mins, then on.. off again for another 5-10, then on... and so on)
Wrote 100GB of data to it, checked the hash, and all is well.

Right now, I inserted it into another machine, doing a full R/W surface test, then, I plan on running bonnie++ on it.

RecoveryForce, ideas on why it is working again? I am assuming this is a fluke, and it will die during one of the tests procedures I am doing to it?

 

[ArtForz]

Rectally extracted guess, cold/dry joint on the PCB?
I certainly wouldn't trust that drive, but considering it now magically works again with no sign of failure, good luck RMAing it. :|

 

[Elixer]

Well, it is still doing tests 24/7 since the last update.
SMART values haven't changed except for power on hours, and the additional power cycles I did.

The PCB looked OK when I saw it, so, I don't think it was a cold joint on it.

I have no idea why it is working fine now.
Puzzling!