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Salty · Apr 2, 2011, 05:15 AM

So it seems the only thing I can find is "Smart Utility" which wants 25 dollars to tell me if Samsung sent me (another!) faulty hard drive. Seeing as I'm getting stutters and random crap I think it's safe to say they did but I'm not sure and I'd like to know before I scream at them and demand a refund. (I'll demand the refund first... and I won't scream I'll just tell them I'm making a complaint with Better Business)

I bought two from newegg that were both faulty, and now one of the replacements seems faulty, don't know about my Dad's yet but I'm guessing. Just a cautionary tale to everyone, do NOT buy Samsung hard drives. (And yes I had to pay shipping to send the originals back to them!)

Salty · Apr 2, 2011, 05:56 AM

Great now nobody's gonna see it.

OreoCookie · Apr 2, 2011, 05:58 AM

Please don't post this type of stuff in the Lounge, Salty, this belongs in the applications forum.

To address your question, you can use smartmontools which is a command line utility. There are a few GUI wrappers, e. g. SMARTReporter which is free.

seanc · Apr 2, 2011, 07:30 AM

Ah so you did return those drives.
Strange that they would send you a duff one, but mistakes do happen.

If you install SMARTReporter, it now includes an option in the contextual menu to perform the SMART values - which is what smartmontools does.

cgc · Apr 2, 2011, 07:33 AM

DiskUtility, which comes with OSX, can report SMART status as can the also free Onyx.

seanc · Apr 2, 2011, 07:45 AM

Yes, but it's the values that are important. That's why the $25 for SMART Utility is worth it if you want something simple and easy to use.
The program analyses the values for you and throws up a yellow warning if you have 1 pending/re-allocated sector, then red for much worse.

In the meantime, SMART will still be verified.

SMART often doesn't care if you have 500 re-allocated/pending sectors, however, it's a big problem if you do!

-Q- · Apr 2, 2011, 08:01 AM

I've also run into issues where a drive manufacturer's firmware wasn't compatible with my macbook pro. The drive head kept parking and that lead to odd (and annoying) pauses and clicks. It may be that the drive is fine from a hardware perspective but will still be an issue due to the firmware.

turtle777 · Apr 2, 2011, 08:59 AM

Originally Posted by Salty

Great now nobody's gonna see it.

Whole lot of nobodies around here.

-t

Spheric Harlot · Apr 2, 2011, 09:11 AM

I really don't understand why any regulars would NOT browse using the "getdaily" or "getnew" search.

Salty · Apr 2, 2011, 04:52 PM

So, it looks like after a week I have 50 bad sectors. I'm gonna phone up Samsung and demand a refund. Then use the money towards a Seagate Momentus XT.

AKcrab · Apr 2, 2011, 05:04 PM

It's possible you have a bad SATA cable. This many "bum" hard drives is certainly not normal.

reader50 · Apr 2, 2011, 05:29 PM

I use Smartctl. If you have multiple HDs, you have to edit the plist inside to specify the right one. Via BSD drive number, which you have to get from Apple System Profiler first. But it is free, and gives the raw values.

Smart Utility flags a drive as failing far too soon, such as after a single reallocated sector. Or one blip above recommended temperature. And when I had a drive failing, it made incorrect assumptions of what the raw values mean. The values start at 100 (sometimes 255) and count down until they hit the alarm threshold. Temp readings are calculated a bit differently.

Smart Utility suggested the drive had run out of spare sectors, which required faulty assumptions about what the raw values mean. I looked up the SMART codes on wikipedia, and watched the drive reallocate a few thousand more sectors before the SMART failure threshold was reached. So in my opinion, Smart Utility has some poor coding.

seanc · Apr 2, 2011, 07:00 PM

You let it reallocate thousands? In my opinion, the SMART threshold is WAY too low.

If a drive has 10 or more and keeps increasing, it comes out!
If it's a server, it's out.
1 pending is enough to bring the OS to its knees. So long as they re-allocate and don't increase, or at least not very often it's OK, but a new drive is unacceptable.

reader50 · Apr 2, 2011, 07:27 PM

I'd pulled all data off the drive, and wanted it to officially fail before RMA-ing. So I copied garbage to it a few times, until it passed ~4000 reallocated sectors. That was where SMART declared it to be failed.

They sent me a replacement a day after receiving it, so the plan worked.

seanc · Apr 2, 2011, 07:29 PM

Oh fair enough then.
I just RMA them as soon as they start getting bad sectors, never had an issue with Seagate or WD.

Salty · Apr 3, 2011, 02:18 AM

not a bad cable, the Toshiba that came in my 13 inch MacBook Pro just recently was perfect (just 5400RPM and not as big as the Samsung I'd already bought myself for Christmas.) I had one previously fail in my Core Duo MacBook, and now I've had another Samsung drive fail in my 13 inch i7 MacBook Pro. This is insane!

I've had the drive in here for a week and I've already for 50 bad sectors, and I've experienced extreme IO related hangs.

ghporter · Apr 3, 2011, 06:31 AM

Could you clarify how many Samsung drives you've had fail in which machines? Sizes and capacities would be important too...

This is actually the first bad I've heard about Samsung drives, but it's possible that we're still only talking about outliers rather than an overall trend-depending on what size and capacity drives you've had these experiences with.

Spheric Harlot · Apr 3, 2011, 06:44 AM

AFAICS, hard drive brand is irrelevant.

Toshiba had a great track record, and then a bad batch of adhesive ruined an entire run.

Individual models and series may not live up to whatever "reputation" - deserved or not - a brand may have.