Western Digital and Seagate reducing warranties on HDDs

[C1]

All of this is sounding like an argument to go solid state

 

[Gigantopithecus]

I am mostly indifferent between a thee- and five-year warranty. But a warranty of just one year? That's unacceptable.

It's a non-issue when both Seagate and Western Digital offer 3 year warranties. It's a big issue to me at least when Western Digital offers a 2 year warranty and Seagate's is 1 year. I won't be buying Seagates anymore.

I could not care less about warranties, I care about reliability. Whether its 5yr warranty or a 6 month warranty, what I value is the drive that has an expected operating lifetime that is at least 2yrs.

I have lots and lots of drives die on me over the years, I've never bothered to rma/warranty one. By the time they die it literally has always cost me more to ship the dead drive to the warranty center versus buying a new one when I pro-rated the $/GB for a new drive shipped.

When my current 1TB drives die I bet I'll be able to buy 4 or 5 TB drives for $100 or less, making the 1TB drive worth about $20 new. Not gonna spend $20 on UPS ground to ship my 3yr old 1TB drive back to the warranty center. Just gonna buy a new, faster, replacement drive.

But I don't want my drives dying every 3 months, regardless the length of the warranty period.

A dead drive that you don't RMA is worth nothing. A dead drive that you RMA costs you $10 out of pocket ($20? What?) and can be re-sold on Craigslist, eBay, or here on the FS/T forum. Right now 500GB refurbs are selling for $50+. It takes 15-20 minutes total to fill out an RMA form, package the dead drive, and ship it back to the manufacturer and then resell it to make $40 on a 500GB drive, more if it's larger. $120/hr is a pretty damn good pay rate...

 

[GotNoRice]

I have lots and lots of drives die on me over the years, I've never bothered to rma/warranty one. By the time they die it literally has always cost me more to ship the dead drive to the warranty center versus buying a new one when I pro-rated the $/GB for a new drive shipped.

That seems a bit silly. It's never cost me more than $10 to ship a drive back for RMA. $10 isn't worth getting a brand new drive in return?

 

[Elixer]

All of this is sounding like an argument to go solid state

How is that any better, they also have warranties that go from 5 years down to 1 year...

I guess if you want a 5 year warranty, you get a SSD now ?

 

[bononos]

Seagate claims that its new reduced warranty is more in-line with 'industry standards'. Do they mean things like mb/cpu, cameras and cellphones or harddrives? Also did harddrives come with 5yr warranties before or was it only instituted after the horrible spate of dead drive problems in the 1990s, so Seagate/WD are merely returning to the old system of warranties.

 

[Elixer]

Seagate's press release about going to a 5 year warranty in 2004, since their drives are "reliable"!

http://e-channelnews.com/ec_storydetail.php?ref=407198
Seagate stands proudly behind its hard drives with the industry's best warranty," said Jeff Loebbaka, Seagate vice president of Global Marketing. "Success for our channel partners and customers is critical to Seagate's success; the new 5-year warranty enables our channel partners to sell the best drives to their customers and minimizes the cost and time they spend on warranty related issues. Seagate channel customers have made it clear that this unprecedented 5-year warranty protection will improve their ability to be successful. The new warranty shows again that Seagate leads the industry in deploying innovative programs to meet the needs of the channel."

"One of Seagate's greatest strengths is that we can leverage our operational excellence to bring the newest technology and products to market first, while always ensuring the highest product quality," said Bill Watkins, Seagate president and CEO. "For several years Seagate has made industry- leading investments in Six Sigma design and quality processes, common design platforms, and advanced manufacturing, and as a result we believe we have shown that reliability and quality leadership are synonymous with the name Seagate."

I bet the marketing guys hate it when you find what they wrote before, and now, they need to spin it to say "Uhh.. we are kinda sorta reliable, but we don't want to take the risk & cost again with a 5 year warranty, so never mind what we said before....please?"

 

[Blain]

Yea, that was back when it was a choice between 3 and 5 years. Cut that down, and people will start to care. As I mentioned already, I didn't care back when it was 3-vs-5. But now that it's down to as little as 1, it does matter.

This too will pass.
Soon the warranty issue will be forgotten and people will be right back to their old Price... Performance... fixation.

 

[BarkingGhostar]

I'd be hesitant to purchase one of the drives with the downgraded warranty, odds are they were shortened for a reason.

Thankfully due to both the increase in hard drive prices and SSD price drops they are finally starting to become cost effective as storage drives.

Maybe their bean counters just didn't want the long term reliability. I had two drives fail on me in 2011, and one was a WDC Black drive. Both were in the 12-18 month age range.

 

[taltamir]

I could not care less about warranties, I care about reliability. Whether its 5yr warranty or a 6 month warranty, what I value is the drive that has an expected operating lifetime that is at least 2yrs.

I have lots and lots of drives die on me over the years, I've never bothered to rma/warranty one. By the time they die it literally has always cost me more to ship the dead drive to the warranty center versus buying a new one when I pro-rated the $/GB for a new drive shipped.

When my current 1TB drives die I bet I'll be able to buy 4 or 5 TB drives for $100 or less, making the 1TB drive worth about $20 new. Not gonna spend $20 on UPS ground to ship my 3yr old 1TB drive back to the warranty center. Just gonna buy a new, faster, replacement drive.

But I don't want my drives dying every 3 months, regardless the length of the warranty period.

Well said.

 

[bryanW1995]

I just had a Seagate 1.5tb die on me again (it was RMA'd once before already). It's still under warranty so I'm gonna RMA it again. It is about 3 years old.

Should I go pay $129 for a new one instead of $20 to RMA?

I'd RMA the old drive then sell it on flea bay.

 

[BFG10K]

To me the warranty of a product shows the manufacturer’s commitment to the customer, and how much they stand behind their product.

In the specific case of Seagate’s 3 TB, it doesn’t look good for the manufacturer to praise their flagship drive and then drop the warranty from 5 years to 2, especially given they weren’t impacted by the floods as much as WD was.

I’m glad WD’s Blacks still have 5 years as they’re my drives of choice. The drive I have now has had daily use as my primary drive since 2008, and I’ve never had a single problem with it.