Hmm, seems like several people are experiencing bad
drives: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductRe ... 6822152102
And still no 320/640gb in site...
Not looking good for the F1 boys and girls. Guess I will
need to move on to a WD GP drive instead. Sigh. I'll
give Samsung another month to get their act together,
than I'm moving on.
Samsung F1 series hard drives w/1TB model
Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee
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Jose Hidalgo
- Posts: 81
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- Location: Lyon, France
"Only for new drives. Figure 5 shows there is a pronounced difference for drives 3 years old and above."
Indeed, but that almost cancels on the whole period, at least for temperatures under 47C - figure 4. That is quite contrary to common sense, especially as cold end ones fail a lot more than the warm.
"The effect of load on the AFR is also quite interesting, whose only significant influence is on the very new drives (Figure 3)."
Correct, so this says once again early stress testing (raid edition style) is good practice. Those willing to diy get a raid edition for free
Early higher failure reports on F1s seem to tie back to the unusualy long launch postponing. Let's only hope those who make it through infancy will be no worse than other models on the average. Perhaps this higher density acts like a very high utilisation% by itself?
What I'd like to see if is there's any correlation between balancing/vibrations and failure rates. I once read that the only important factor in hdd failure is bearing life, but this study seems to contradict that.
Indeed, but that almost cancels on the whole period, at least for temperatures under 47C - figure 4. That is quite contrary to common sense, especially as cold end ones fail a lot more than the warm.
"The effect of load on the AFR is also quite interesting, whose only significant influence is on the very new drives (Figure 3)."
Correct, so this says once again early stress testing (raid edition style) is good practice. Those willing to diy get a raid edition for free
Early higher failure reports on F1s seem to tie back to the unusualy long launch postponing. Let's only hope those who make it through infancy will be no worse than other models on the average. Perhaps this higher density acts like a very high utilisation% by itself?
What I'd like to see if is there's any correlation between balancing/vibrations and failure rates. I once read that the only important factor in hdd failure is bearing life, but this study seems to contradict that.
All drives fail. And usually only people with problems post their problems. Check out and you will read horror stories with all of them from all manufacturers. Right now, there is nothing like the Samsung SpinPoint F1 1TB. Having said that, it is good to have choices. Competition is great for us, end consumers!
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Jose Hidalgo
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klankymen
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Yeah, but I see more reports of F1 failing than the WD GP. So I'm buying the GP. I have a 500gb samsung that I chose over the samsung, and maybe when I buy a 2TB drive I'll go back to samsung, but for this generation WD is the safer choice.SileX wrote:All drives fail. And usually only people with problems post their problems. Check out and you will read horror stories with all of them from all manufacturers. Right now, there is nothing like the Samsung SpinPoint F1 1TB. Having said that, it is good to have choices. Competition is great for us, end consumers!
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Jose Hidalgo
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... in YOUR not-so-humble opinion. Please stop trying to give people lessons on what they have to buy. Unless you know much more than them about hard drives, which is not the case here.
If you're no more interested in the F1's, then I believe this topic is of no more interest to you, and you can go to another topic about the WD's and try to convince people to buy them.
If you decide to stay on this topic anyway, then please stop trying to convince us that WD's are better for totally subjective reasons (because objectivy the F1's are better, there's no doubt about this since the F1's are the only 1TB drives in the world with 3 platters) : this is not a constructive behaviour IMHO.
I have bought 9 x HD103UJ from Newegg (yeah, nine). I will receive them in a few weeks (Europe is far...), and then I'll see what happens and I'll draw my own conclusions.
If you're no more interested in the F1's, then I believe this topic is of no more interest to you, and you can go to another topic about the WD's and try to convince people to buy them.
If you decide to stay on this topic anyway, then please stop trying to convince us that WD's are better for totally subjective reasons (because objectivy the F1's are better, there's no doubt about this since the F1's are the only 1TB drives in the world with 3 platters) : this is not a constructive behaviour IMHO.
I have bought 9 x HD103UJ from Newegg (yeah, nine). I will receive them in a few weeks (Europe is far...), and then I'll see what happens and I'll draw my own conclusions.
I'd agree that most forums people only usually report the bad,
and not the good. And I agree all manufacturers have bunk drives.
However, newegg reviews are a bit different, typically more people report
the good than the bad. The f1 has a higher than usual problem
report for newegg. I contribute this to early production issues (thus their late
entry to market) or a bad batch sent to newegg. I said I'd give them another month to hear more
reports before moving on, because I agree, technically, it IS a
superior drive to most everything else on the market.
All of this is my opinion. I don't bash your opinion or spread 'fud'.
Please report on your 9 drives when you get them. Good luck, I hope
they work well for you.
and not the good. And I agree all manufacturers have bunk drives.
However, newegg reviews are a bit different, typically more people report
the good than the bad. The f1 has a higher than usual problem
report for newegg. I contribute this to early production issues (thus their late
entry to market) or a bad batch sent to newegg. I said I'd give them another month to hear more
reports before moving on, because I agree, technically, it IS a
superior drive to most everything else on the market.
All of this is my opinion. I don't bash your opinion or spread 'fud'.
Please report on your 9 drives when you get them. Good luck, I hope
they work well for you.
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Jose Hidalgo
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klankymen
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- Location: Munich, Bavaria, Europe
Who are you to make assumptions on how humble my opinion is? Not very humble yourself, are you? I have every right to make suggestions to people what they should buy, that is what this forum is for. If you are willing to blindly guinnea pig the drives, good for you (although it kind of contradicts your ideal of spending as little as possible on drives and hoping to save 10 bucks on cache, when you might be getting broken drives that need to be replaced).Jose Hidalgo wrote:... in YOUR not-so-humble opinion. Please stop trying to give people lessons on what they have to buy. Unless you know much more than them about hard drives, which is not the case here.
If you're no more interested in the F1's, then I believe this topic is of no more interest to you, and you can go to another topic about the WD's and try to convince people to buy them.
If you decide to stay on this topic anyway, then please stop trying to convince us that WD's are better for totally subjective reasons (because objectivy the F1's are better, there's no doubt about this since the F1's are the only 1TB drives in the world with 3 platters) : this is not a constructive behaviour IMHO.
I have bought 9 x HD103UJ from Newegg (yeah, nine). I will receive them in a few weeks (Europe is far...), and then I'll see what happens and I'll draw my own conclusions.
I feel people should be able to make an informed decision, and not only get the subjective info from SileX who clearly either works for Samsung, or thinks his stock will rise by blindly advocating everything they make.
I don't know how "less platters" is a more subjective argument than "more reliable" - the bugatti is the only car in the world with 16 cylinders - but does that make it the best car in the world? no.
As a matter of fact, big platters are a con, if big platters mean that the sectors are broken.
So good luck with yours, I hope you won't be having to send any back to newegg, cause that would be a very tedious process for you.
Just wanted to make sure people are aware of this trend - I am not the only one noticing it.
Technically spealing (specs and also reviews and tests published so far), the Samsung SpinPoint F1 1TB is far better than any other 1TB drive. If it fails or not more than others, only time will tell. But in theory it should be more reliable, since it has less (three) platters versus Western Digital or Segate (four) or Hitachi (five). Concerning WD, I will never buy from a company that tried to cheat us with a false 5400 to 7200 rpm claim that still today many resellers still claim (7200 rpm) for a drive that runs at 5400 rpm all the time.
http://gathering.tweakers.net/forum/lis ... /1259539/7
Dutch topic, but I will translate it for you.
One person says the ECC/MC error appears when you have a nVidia motherboard. He had 3 F1 hdd's and all of them had those weird errors with his nVidia chipset bord. He used the same HDD's in a Intel chipset motherboard: no errors.
A other person says that the problem is the hdutil software.
Dutch topic, but I will translate it for you.
One person says the ECC/MC error appears when you have a nVidia motherboard. He had 3 F1 hdd's and all of them had those weird errors with his nVidia chipset bord. He used the same HDD's in a Intel chipset motherboard: no errors.
A other person says that the problem is the hdutil software.
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mattthemuppet
- *Lifetime Patron*
- Posts: 618
- Joined: Mon May 23, 2005 7:05 am
- Location: State College, PA
yikes, it's only a hard drive guys, no need for such vitriol. Until all the current 1TB are tested and compared here or on another reputable site, there's really no need for such fanboyism.
As for reliability data, however reliable forum posts may or may not be, the simple matter is that they're far to few in no. to really draw any firm conclusions. Sure, it's your money so you've got every right to make a choice based on that and anything else, but it's hardly definitive enough to have a shouting war about
so just chill, make whatever constructive and factual insights that you can and leave the FUD to DailyTech
As for reliability data, however reliable forum posts may or may not be, the simple matter is that they're far to few in no. to really draw any firm conclusions. Sure, it's your money so you've got every right to make a choice based on that and anything else, but it's hardly definitive enough to have a shouting war about
so just chill, make whatever constructive and factual insights that you can and leave the FUD to DailyTech
RE: The now very sore issue of cache vs storage and whether its worth the money. The answer depends on what you are doing with the drive. I have just bought a 1TB F1 which should arrive today, I am going to to be using a 64GB partition on my main PC where I want fast performance, the rest of the drive is being used for backup purposes. I want both fast performance and a shedload of storage, and I am happy to pay a small sum to gain extra performance via extra cache memory.
RE: Reliability: as someone else said, only time will tell. The first thing I will do is warm my drive up to room temperature, the second thing I will do is to give it a full test (nVidia chipset), if it fails, I will take it home and try it on a different chipset (where it will actually be used).
Hopefully I will be able to report back to here my findings within 48 hours.
Andy
RE: Reliability: as someone else said, only time will tell. The first thing I will do is warm my drive up to room temperature, the second thing I will do is to give it a full test (nVidia chipset), if it fails, I will take it home and try it on a different chipset (where it will actually be used).
Hopefully I will be able to report back to here my findings within 48 hours.
Andy
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Jose Hidalgo
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- Joined: Mon Dec 11, 2006 3:25 pm
- Location: Lyon, France
After some initial testing and a quick read-up on the issue of Samsungs own test tool having issues with nVidia chipsets, I can conclude that is very likely.
At the start of the "Quick Test", the drive fails when hooked up to an nVidia MCP55 SATA controller (AKA nForce 550).
I then hooked it up to a silicon Image SIL3114, it passed the MC ECC check that failed on the nVidia chipset, but it then failed on things that passed on the nVidia chipset.
I am going to run the full test using the nVidia chipset as I expect it will be faster due to not being restricted by the PCI BUS for bad sectors. And when I get home I will run a quick test on my own PC (read Sig). strongly suspect that something odd is going on with the testing software vs the drive.
It is every bit as fast as other peoples tests have proven BTW (tested manually and via HD Tach).
Andy
At the start of the "Quick Test", the drive fails when hooked up to an nVidia MCP55 SATA controller (AKA nForce 550).
I then hooked it up to a silicon Image SIL3114, it passed the MC ECC check that failed on the nVidia chipset, but it then failed on things that passed on the nVidia chipset.
I am going to run the full test using the nVidia chipset as I expect it will be faster due to not being restricted by the PCI BUS for bad sectors. And when I get home I will run a quick test on my own PC (read Sig). strongly suspect that something odd is going on with the testing software vs the drive.
It is every bit as fast as other peoples tests have proven BTW (tested manually and via HD Tach).
Andy
We have had horror stories with any hard drive name after testing thousands over many years. The only protection is a good backup. Having said that, the Samsung Spinpoint F1 1TB seems the best current drive, hands down.nicko wrote:So, do you people recommend me to buy new Samsung (640gb or 750gb)? I'm on Intel 975x chipset...
I'm little concerned about drive failures...don't wanna lose my data
If not, what is the alternative? I'm searching for fast and reliable drive...
Thx!
I am currently testing my drive on a 3rd chipset, (Gigabyte GA-M61PM-S2) with an nForce 6100/430 chipset.
On all 3 chipsets on the full test I have got "ECC errors" and "Sector ID not found", I am going to abandon the current testing, and try it on my main PC at home.
Its a total bastard if the drive is a DOA, but it is very difficult to identify whether this model/range of drives are any less reliable than another.
Before I started testing it using the Samsung test tool, I copied a folder to it with 451 files with a total capacity of 1.69GB, I then copied that folder 5 times and recorded the time it took. I wrote a total of 8.45GB of data to the drive with no loss of performance and a very respectable time. When I have been using the test tool, It has found errors by the 2% mark (18.6GB) and by the 0.8% mark on the Silicon Image controller (7.44GB). (the tests on the 2 nVidia chipsets were not being watched, they may have found errors at the 2% mark as well.
Apart from the tests themselves being inconsistent, my own read/write tests showed no sign of failure well into the 0.8% mark that the Silicon Image controller had.
After I have tested the drive using the Samsung test tool at home, I will copy loads of data to it, if the drive fails at home as well, but the manual copying tests are OK I will be quite confused as what to believe, is the drive OK or not.???
I am now up to 15% with failures between ~2% and 5%, but none between 5% and 15%.
More later.
Andy
On all 3 chipsets on the full test I have got "ECC errors" and "Sector ID not found", I am going to abandon the current testing, and try it on my main PC at home.
Its a total bastard if the drive is a DOA, but it is very difficult to identify whether this model/range of drives are any less reliable than another.
Before I started testing it using the Samsung test tool, I copied a folder to it with 451 files with a total capacity of 1.69GB, I then copied that folder 5 times and recorded the time it took. I wrote a total of 8.45GB of data to the drive with no loss of performance and a very respectable time. When I have been using the test tool, It has found errors by the 2% mark (18.6GB) and by the 0.8% mark on the Silicon Image controller (7.44GB). (the tests on the 2 nVidia chipsets were not being watched, they may have found errors at the 2% mark as well.
Apart from the tests themselves being inconsistent, my own read/write tests showed no sign of failure well into the 0.8% mark that the Silicon Image controller had.
After I have tested the drive using the Samsung test tool at home, I will copy loads of data to it, if the drive fails at home as well, but the manual copying tests are OK I will be quite confused as what to believe, is the drive OK or not.???
I am now up to 15% with failures between ~2% and 5%, but none between 5% and 15%.
More later.
Andy
Of course, there's no guarantee. What I'm concerned about is unusually high number of users bad feedbacks...It's not first time that some manufacter sc**wed up the whole batch!SileX wrote: We have had horror stories with any hard drive name after testing thousands over many years. The only protection is a good backup. Having said that, the Samsung Spinpoint F1 1TB seems the best current drive, hands down.
I always backup important stuff, but I'm buying new hdd because I need more space. If I'm gonna make backup of whole 750gb, I'll need one more hdd
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klankymen
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Well, it's not only on nvidia chipsets. (google translation)
The Samsung F1 is known to have problems right now.nicko wrote:So, do you people recommend me to buy new Samsung (640gb or 750gb)? I'm on Intel 975x chipset...
I'm little concerned about drive failures...don't wanna lose my data
If not, what is the alternative? I'm searching for fast and reliable drive...
Thx!
The WD 7500AAKS/EACS and Hitachi 7K1000 drives are not known to have problems right now.
Does that make the decision clear for you?
Clear as a skyLuminair wrote:The Samsung F1 is known to have problems right now.nicko wrote:So, do you people recommend me to buy new Samsung (640gb or 750gb)? I'm on Intel 975x chipset...
I'm little concerned about drive failures...don't wanna lose my data
If not, what is the alternative? I'm searching for fast and reliable drive...
Thx!
The WD 7500AAKS/EACS and Hitachi 7K1000 drives are not known to have problems right now.
Does that make the decision clear for you?
Hitachi has 200gb per platter, does WD have 250? What about Seagate 7200.11? As far as I know, it's the fastest drive available (not counting samsung f1).Damn...I was waiting for F1 hdd
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Jose Hidalgo
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- Location: Lyon, France
Oh really ? And known by WHO precisely ? By you maybe ? Would you please tell us who in the world has real authority to say that a brand new drive is "known to have problems" ? I'm curious.Luminair wrote:The Samsung F1 is known to have problems right now.
It's always the same story : when a new product comes up with disruptive technology, there's always a lot of activity in the forums, and there's always people ranting. Some of them are even hired by the competition to spread rumors. No joking here, it's a very serious business.
I'm not talking about you Luminair. I'm just saying that I don't think you have any serious proof of what you are pretending. Otherwise, give us the facts. Because such a strong assertion without any facts is just... well... nothing.
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klankymen
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There is no proof. but the fact that more an more people are turning up having heard about people with problems should be some indication of something awry.
I have no proof for evolution, but still I laugh at people who believe that the earth was created 4000 years ago, even though all evidence points elsewhere.
Jose, have you tried running HUTIL on your drives yet?
I have no proof for evolution, but still I laugh at people who believe that the earth was created 4000 years ago, even though all evidence points elsewhere.
Jose, have you tried running HUTIL on your drives yet?
You are doing a disservice to good products by lumping bad products in with them. And the F1 isn't disruptive technology at all.Jose Hidalgo wrote: It's always the same story : when a new product comes up with disruptive technology, there's always a lot of activity in the forums, and there's always people ranting. Some of them are even hired by the competition to spread rumors. No joking here, it's a very serious business.
I'm not talking about you Luminair. I'm just saying that I don't think you have any serious proof of what you are pretending. Otherwise, give us the facts. Because such a strong assertion without any facts is just... well... nothing.
This isn't rocket science, just look at all the people complaining. This doesn't happen on hard drive forums unless something is very wrong. Smoke usually does mean fire.
But to satisfy your skepticism, I just looked at every Newegg review that mentioned Hutil, and every one of them said the drive had errors. That is 7 drives that were checked with Hutil, and 7/7 drives had errors. Of the ~20 other drives that were not checked, ~13 were positive reviews and ~7 were negative reviews.
Do you know of anyone with an F1 who has run Hutil and not come up with errors? I don't.
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Jose Hidalgo
- Posts: 81
- Joined: Mon Dec 11, 2006 3:25 pm
- Location: Lyon, France
There is still not a firm problem with my drive. I installed XP onto it, drivers etc, and then started copying data to the drive in an attempt to test its performance writing large files, and to see if I had any issues with the drive whilst writing large files.
I wrote 264GB of data to the drive with no issues, or slowdowns.
I the took my drive home and tested it on my own PC which is running on an Asus A8R-MVP motherboard with a ULi M1575 southbridge, it found errors, I cancelled the test at 75% because it was not worth testing any more.
I am now going to run a "generic" test using Seagates test tool.
Andy
I wrote 264GB of data to the drive with no issues, or slowdowns.
I the took my drive home and tested it on my own PC which is running on an Asus A8R-MVP motherboard with a ULi M1575 southbridge, it found errors, I cancelled the test at 75% because it was not worth testing any more.
I am now going to run a "generic" test using Seagates test tool.
Andy