thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan) (08/16/90)
From the current edition (Vol.1,No.6) of the "Seagate Reseller Report" which was just mailed, are the following quotes (without comment) for the benefit of all those who've suffered a hard drive failure with a Seagate drive: page 2: `` INDUSTRY PERIODICALS HONOR SEAGATE PRODUCTS DEC PROFESSIONAL Magazine recently put the Seagate Sabre family through its paces in their DP Laboratory and Testing Center. This state-of-the-art lab is a multivendor testing facility that subjects products to the rigors of real-world DEC computing environments. As a result of the Sabre's performance under these conditions, the product family earned the DEC PROFESSIONAL DP Lab Seal. BYTE Magazine subscribers honored Seagate by voting the ST-251 BYTE's VIP (Very Important Product) Readers Award in the disc drive category. Products receiving these awards were recognized by BYTE readers as outstanding for day-to-day business and personal use. "The VIP awards come from a singular source: 2,000 expert end-users of today's hardware and software," said Fred Langa, BYTE Editor-in-Chief. The VIP awards were presented at a special ceremony at the Capital City CLub in Atlanta during this year's COMDEX/Spring. '' page 3 (extracted from BORN IN THE USA (which itself is a partial reprint of a DEC PROFESSIONAL Editorial by Dave Mallery)): ``Seagate is a national treasure and a strategic resource.'' page 4: ``Callers of Seagate's technical support number (1-800-468-DISC) can now reach a technical representative as early at 6:00AM Pacific Time. [...] The automated telephone database service (1-800-468-DISC) and Technical Support Bulletin Board (1-408-438-8771) continue to be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week [...] The BBS operates at 300 to 9600 BAUD, 8 data bits, no parity and one stop bit. '' ===== OK, OK, I said "without comment"; so I lied. :-) BYTE Magazine honoring the ST-251? [I'm REALLY restraining myself here] The ONLY way to "honor" a ST-251 drive is to toss it as far away as one can. This endorsement by BYTE doesn't speak highly for the quality of that mag. So the awards were presented in a "Club"; so was everyone all boozed up? :-) The item about "national treasure and a strategic resource" made me want to puke. Besides the eleven (ten ST251 and one ST157) drives that went belly-up for me, I have hundreds of email items from others reporting problems with ALL Seagate drives, with the ST251 being the prime offender (re: stiction and non-spin). I'm still reminded of the "OTHER THAN THAT ..." article about the IBM PC retailer who said (in reference to the non-spin of ST251 drives): "Other than that, they're good drives." which was posted by someone else last month. Hmmm, the single 1-800-468-DISC is described as two different services, one answered by human(s) and the other by computer; wonder which phone number is a typo. Don't laugh, they (Seagate) couldn't even spell my name correctly on the mailing label (and I have NO idea how I got on their mailing list). Hmmm, one more item from the newsletter, page 2: ``Seagate, manufacturer of the early ST412 and ST506 drives which established the interface standard, is committed to supporting this demand [for AT and 386-class machines] with award-winning products such as the ST225, ST251 (still our most popular drive family), and ST4096. With formatted capacities of 20, 40 and 80 megabytes, these Seagate ST412 drives deliver the performance and proven reliability for today's PC users.'' Aha! So Seagate drives are ONLY for PC machines, eh? Well, we all know that "IBM/PC" == "Intel Bowel Movement/Piece of Crap". So here's Seagate itself saying one should use those drives only in PC-type machines. Good idea: don't ever put a Seagate drive in your Amiga, UNIX, or other machine. The only award I'd bestow on an ST251 drive is the Rigid Digit Salute, otherwise known as the "bird". :-) And why does Seagate spell "disk" as "disc"? I thought only H-P and the French did that. Thad Floryan [ thad@cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ]
mcc@moscom.UUCP (Mike Corbett) (08/17/90)
In article <32878@cup.portal.com> thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan) writes: >And why does Seagate spell "disk" as "disc"? I thought only H-P and the French >did that. Way back when, in the early stages of development of computers, mass storage had evolved to a magnetic drum. Then one day a _new_ idea was had. Let's make a flat drum that doesn't have that nasty problem of expanding as it spins faster. Ok, we'll make it in the shape of a discus (round flat thing, the original frisbee). And because discus is too long of a word we'll shorten it to disc. It was only since the advent of personal computing that the disc became the disk. I only just converted over to the _new_ spelling recently. I must be getting old. I remember core memory. And switching to the new high speed 300 baud modems (from 110 baud). :-) Mike
desmarai@IRO.UMontreal.CA (Stephane Desmarais) (08/18/90)
> >And why does Seagate spell "disk" as "disc"? I thought only H-P and >the French did that. > >Thad Floryan [ thad@cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ] Hey, we don't want to be associated with Seagate for any reason. That's why I'm glad to announce that we decided to change the spelling to: disque P.S. Hey, wait a minute, haven't we always spelled it that way ??? -- Stephane M. Desmarais desmarais@iro.umontreal.ca (le Domaine Canadien) Departement d'informatique uunet!mcgill-vision!iros1!desmarais Universite de Montreal C.P. 6128 Succ. A Montreal Quebec Canada H3C 3J7 Projet IBM/CRIM/UdeM sur MAP/MMS (514) 343-6111 poste 3541
BAXTER_A@wehi.dn.mu.oz (08/18/90)
> > And why does Seagate spell "disk" as "disc"? I thought only H-P and the French > did that. > > Thad Floryan [ thad@cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ] In fact, disc _IS_ spelled disc. "Disk" was a contrary Americanism created by Webster as part of the anti-British, anti-tax, anti-no-representation passive resistance. The changing of spelling of several hundred words was introduced with an alteration in weights and measures and formed the basis of eliminating international trade with European/British countries. After independance the new spellings were enshrined in a "dictionary" and trade with Britain prevented by legal impediments to ensure "free" trade in the new union. Unfortunately, with the passing of time, many people who reside in the Land of the "Free" have spent their whole lives without venturing outside its confines to find the 3.5 billion people who think disc is spelled disc, colour is spelled colour, Amtrac is a kind of mouse, Amex is a brand of cosmetics, and social security is when you don't starve to death if you can't get a job. Regards Alan
tkevans@fallst.UUCP (Tim Evans) (08/18/90)
In <32878@cup.portal.com> thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan) writes: >Besides the eleven (ten ST251 and one ST157) drives that went belly-up >for me, I have hundreds of email items from others reporting problems with ALL >Seagate drives, with the ST251 being the prime offender (re: stiction and >non-spin). ^^^^^^^^^^ Every time I turn my machine off (very, very rarely), I have to open it up, take out the ST-251, and give it a whack against the heel of my hand to get it to spin up. Other than that, it's a great drive... -- UUCP: {rutgers|ames|uunet}!mimsy!woodb!fallst!tkevans INTERNET: tkevans%fallst@wb3ffv.ampr.org Tim Evans 2201 Brookhaven Ct, Fallston, MD 21047
thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan) (08/24/90)
For the edification of all ... especially those using Seagate hard drives.
the following material is reprinted without permission from the August 1990
"Drive Service News" published by:
Drive Service Company
6151 Golfview Drive
Birmingham, Michigan 48010
``
STICTION: What is it?
We use the term stiction fairly often. Stiction is the term used in the disk
drive industry to identify the phenomenon where the heads get stuck to the
platters.
The primary cause of stiction is clear: too much of the wrong kind of
lubrication on the platters. Another cause is leakage of spindle motor
lubrication onto the platters. Lubrication builds up on the heads, creating
a little gum ball; when the hot drive is turned off, the gum ball cools and
sticks the heads to the platter.
Stiction shows up in three ways:
- Drive will not spin, because the heads are stuck fast to the media.
- The stuck heads break free and take patches off the media, as
ripping tape off a painted wall will take a patch of paint off
(with a patch of plating stuck to the heads, errors multiply).
- Heads detach from the arm.
Stiction usually occurs on plated media, almost never on oxide media. Some
manufacturers have few stiction problems, while others have problems with all
drives using plated media.
STICTION: What to Do About it?
Unfortunately, YOU cannot do much about stiction. The only cure is to replace
the platters with ones with little or no lubrication, and clean the heads.
That can only be done in a Class 100 clean room.
When a drive will not spin, you can often retrieve the data using the famous
"kick start". Rapidly rotate or snap the drive horizontally, so that the
spindle motor acts as a flywheel. Hopefully, the platters will turn while
the heads remain in place. DO NOT HIT THE DRIVE; that will cause head slaps.
You may have to do this several times before the drive spins up. Once the
drive is spinning, back up your data IMMEDIATELY. If you turn off the drive,
the heads will probably stick again, so either keep it spinning or send it in
for repair.
Seagate 4000 series, ST251/251-1, ST277, and ST100 series drives are noted
for stiction. Even when the problem was only electronic, as a preventative
measure we replace the plated media in these drives and rewrite the servos,
except on the ST4053, ST4096, and ST4144R, for which unlubricated media is
not available.
''
All the HD repair places in Silicon Valley with whom I checked say essentially
the same thing as does Drive Service Company.
From my own experience and that of hundreds of thousands of others (and let
us not forget that Apple had to replace over 650,000 drives during 1989 under
warranty due to stiction), the message is clear:
DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES BUY OR USE A SEAGATE HARD DRIVE
Thad Floryan [ thad@cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ]