WDC74GB Raptor Quandry

[FesterSilently]

I've got a wonderful pair of first-(okay, maybe second?) generation WD Raptors: the original 74GBs. They just passed their 5-year warranty mark and, although I'm not using them anymore, I gave them to a friend who needed an inexpensive rig put together and, after 5 years of wonderful service, on many and varied motherboards/RAID setups, one of them appears to have gone tits-up. But in a rather strange way.

The last board these HDDs were RAIDed on was an Intel DP45SG, and there they worked fine for about six months, until that rig was boxed up and put away. They sat, in their original anti-static bags (I am such an OCD-kinda guy!), in my closet for about a month, until last night, when my friend attached them to his newly-purchased EVGA 780i FTW. Where one (not both) of them was identified (by the 'board) as a WD800BB. In other words, it was seen as a completely different (and rather shitty) old HDD. I flashed the motherboard BIOS up to date (the Jan 2009 "SZ17" BIOS) from the June 2008 that it came with...no difference.

I'm going to attach the poor buggers to my current motherboard (DFI T2RSB) when I get home from work to double-check 'em, but I was wondering if I'd be able to (if I have to) flash the poor beastie back to a WDC74GB firmware.

Peace.

 

[Quiksilver]

Sounds more like an 780i issue to me...

 

[FesterSilently]

Lol - actually, no.

I attached each raptor to my current board - singly and together - and, long story short: the one Raptor has gone tits-up. It has shit the bed. It has gone on to sing with the Choir Invisible. It is an ex-hard drive.

And it (sadly) has died without its name: it still shows up as a WD800BB...with no available space. Any attempt to begin any sort of HDD test fails within seconds (SeaTools; Hitachi DFT; WD Diagnostic).

It's rather sad, really - 5+ years of stellar service, only to die an ignoble, unrecognized death.

Raise one for an original, mates! :beer:

 

[sutahz]

From what I can tell, you didnt ask a question, you were just sharing a story w/ us. With that said:
36GB were the first gen of raptors.
74GB were second, and even then there was a 2nd revision of them, which out performed the first rev.