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Maxtor Cheating on Warranty?

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porkbun

Senior member
I have two Maxtor 160GB 8MB drives with serial numbers Y42Pxxxx. Both were manufactured 13OCT03 but warranty ended 28MAR04. I wonder if any other forum users own drives like these. I already contacted Maxtor about this. They wanted me to fax over the receipt. I managed to find the receipt for one and already faxed it. I will see what they are going to do about it. I do not like the idea of having to fax to prove when I bought it. It says clearly on the drive label that the drive was made 13OCT03. How the heck would it be possible for me to buy it before that?

This seems really fishy. I think I will go with Seagate from now on. If not for all the rebates, I probably would not have gone with Maxtor anyway.
 
Originally posted by: porkbun
I have two Maxtor 160GB 8MB drives with serial numbers Y42Pxxxx. Both were manufactured 13OCT03 but warranty ended 28MAR04. I wonder if any other forum users own drives like these. I already contacted Maxtor about this. They wanted me to fax over the receipt. I managed to find the receipt for one and already faxed it. I will see what they are going to do about it. I do not like the idea of having to fax to prove when I bought it. It says clearly on the drive label that the drive was made 13OCT03. How the heck would it be possible for me to buy it before that?

This seems really fishy. I think I will go with Seagate from now on. If not for all the rebates, I probably would not have gone with Maxtor anyway.
Click to expand...

That's pretty bizarre. I was under the impression that they gave a 14month warranty (12 months end-user, plus two months of lee-way, for the drive to make it through the distribution channels and into the end-user's hands) by default, and if you had original proof-of-purchase, then it was 12 months from then.

Sounds like a database screwup, most likely.

This is also interesting, because there is a thread in ATHD about CompUSA's current sale on these drives for $79.99 out-the-door.

(The one I picked up starts with a serial of "Y44", I guess I should check the warranty too, just to be safe. Thanks for the heads-up.)
 
Those drives weren't RMA'ed were they?

I RMA'ed a drive once and noticed that the drive that I received in return had the same warranty expiry date as the one I sent them.
 
I would contact them again and advise them of their very own warranty page located here.

One weird thing, from that page it appears all Retail HD purchases only have a 1 year standard warranty in North America, while the bare drive models have a three year in most cases. 😕

From that page...

All Maxtor products purchased on or after May 12, 2003 will carry the following Maxtor Standard Worldwide Warranty policy:

Maxtor Fireball®, DiamondMax® ATA drives will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 1 year.

Maxtor DiamondMax Plus ATA drives that have an 8MB cache buffer AND capacities of 120GB or greater will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 3 years. All other DiamondMax Plus drives will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 1 year.

Maxtor MAXLine? ATA drives will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 3 years.

Maxtor Atlas® SCSI drives will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 5 years.
Click to expand...

🙂
 
RE bluntman's post:
When you RMA a drive, the *replacement* will CONTINUE the warranty of the original drive.

RE porkbun's post:
I think the issue you ran into is a goofy database error (as someone else stated) I've noticed/seen with a few drives before as well... We should be able to go, "yeah its in warranty" and setup a replacement...but *per the "rules"* we must go through and get copies of the reciepts. I know its a pita...I wouldn't wanna go thru it myself, but...I'm just doing my job. =\

Usually another thing we can do is have a pic of the label itself (stating the Manuf date) faxed in . . so that should be another option if finding the reciept is an issue.
 
Its not a problem. I ran into the same issues myself. I just called up and told them about it, and Maxtor allowed for my RMA to go through.
 
Originally posted by: bluntman
Those drives weren't RMA'ed were they?

I RMA'ed a drive once and noticed that the drive that I received in return had the same warranty expiry date as the one I sent them.
Click to expand...

that's how it works, you apparently don't get a new drive with a new warranty.

I've RMA'd about 20 Maxtor drives so I know how it works well at this point... heh
 
Originally posted by: bluntman
Those drives weren't RMA'ed were they?

I RMA'ed a drive once and noticed that the drive that I received in return had the same warranty expiry date as the one I sent them.
Click to expand...

No, they were not RMA'ed drives. They are retail drives purchased from Staples/OD/OM. Thanks for all your input!
 
Ahhh....since it was retail, it only carries a year warranty. That is weird...it now makes more sense to buy a OEM bare drive than retail box...the warranty is longer on the OEM bare drive than on the Retail unit...WTF?

😕
 
Moral of this story...buy all of your hard drives from Newegg and get a 3 year warranty. That policy blows. I don't think I will be buying any Maxtors any time soon.
 
Originally posted by: farmercal
Moral of this story...buy all of your hard drives from Newegg and get a 3 year warranty. That policy blows. I don't think I will be buying any Maxtors any time soon.
Click to expand...

Now if you could just conivce everyone to think this way... I think the 1 yr warr on Max drives is crap too personally... People still call me and complain...but what can I really do about it? If you don't like a 1 yr warr...don't by the drive...simple, no? Thus being the reason I have WD's in my system. 😛 I think its a joke to go from a 3 yr to a 1 yr. But in reality, my opinion won't make a damn'd of a difference...apparently they need ppl to quit buying their drives (to lose customers) before they go back to having a *real* warranty...so be it. Apprently Maxtor is making enough $ off the ones who don't know the difference..or..they just think the product is so far superior a longer warr isn't needed (which is also false..but eh..)

😛 Work for Maxtor...yet, don't like the way they do things... <shrugs> I'm just another in the collective.. 😛
 
well, you could go with the Seagate approach...on certain models they offer a 3 year warranty extension for 2-3 dollars...not a bad deal, IMHO.

cheers,

dave
 
Maxtor bare drives over 120GB with 8mb cache do carry a 3 year warranty. The moral of the story is don't buy retail, not don't buy Maxtor. The DM+9's are great drives..and their fluid bearings are quiet, not Seagate quiet, but quiet. All the WD's I've owned ended up whining because they still insisted on using normal bearings. I'm not sure if this is still the case, but as of now, I primarily use the DM+9 in my customer builds. The Hitachi's are nice and a bit faster, but that meowing noise they make rules them out for me.

Anyway, it seems silly to say "I'll never buy Maxtor again" just because you weren't aware of their warranty periods. The site I linked has been there for awhile, and their warranties were clearly explained. If people would just check these things before they bought a drive, there might be less of problem.

As always...IMO.

🙂
 
Originally posted by: Insane3DAnyway, it seems silly to say "I'll never buy Maxtor again" just because you weren't aware of their warranty periods. The site I linked has been there for awhile, and their warranties were clearly explained. If people would just check these things before they bought a drive, there might be less of problem.

🙂
Click to expand...

You are absolutely correct!
 
Originally posted by: farmercal
Moral of this story...buy all of your hard drives from Newegg and get a 3 year warranty. That policy blows. I don't think I will be buying any Maxtors any time soon.
Click to expand...

good idea, stick to it 😛
i send back so many of them, sick!
 
At various times, I have seen name brand drives on sale in big retail stores, with only three and six month warranties. Is it possible you happen to hit one of those sales?
 
Originally posted by: redbeard1
At various times, I have seen name brand drives on sale in big retail stores, with only three and six month warranties. Is it possible you happen to hit one of those sales?
Click to expand...

Hmm? I've never seen that on new HDs sold at retail. Whatever you saw must have been refurb/OEM/off-brand/grey-market or something. It was bad enough going from 3-year to 1-year, I've never seen anything lower than that though.
 
Retail drive just has 1-year warranty, so the retailer (e.g. Fry's, Best Buy, CompUSA) can sell customers their extend to 3-year warranty.
 
maxtor has been good to me. I bought a drive last min from stales = they gave me a one year waranty through staples and then after that ends, my maxtor warranty kicks in = 4 years.

and porkbun, they probably asked that just for proof as you were the one who purchased it. I was a network admin for a state gov agency and i went through that when i was first hired as soon as products began to die out. a lot of companies dont want thier warranties tansfered if private consumers trade or sell between each other (unless the item is new, never used). or i should say they dont like it.

they wearing their seat belts by asking you for a proof of purchase.

maztor's been good to me and i love their products!
 
I never said that Maxtors are bad drives. I have one running my system now. Of course, I bought it from Newegg and have a three year warranty. I just don't think their warranty policy is a good one. If you support your local computer stores and buy the retail drive you get screwed out of 2 years of warranty but if you buy online, you get their full warranty. This is the only instance I think I have ever seen where OEM has a better warranty than retail. I just don't like it, that's all. There I'm through ranting.
 
Got it resolved. Maxtor changed the expiry date in their database. Could not find the receipt for the other one and sold the drive.
 
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