Defective (clicking) Seagate Expansion 2 TB External Hard Drive
This is my new Seagate Expansion 2 TB external hard drive, which seems to be defective. I’m uploading this here to hopefully help Seagate RMA people to understand what’s wrong, but also as a warning to people considering buying one of these drives.
The sound it’s making in the clip is very intermittent, sometimes it will run for hours completely fine, other times it will just keep making the noise constantly with not even a half-second gap between each click. It’ll just keep making the noise continually until I stop trying to do anything with it.
While it’s making the noise, it seems to still work, but read/write speeds slow down to almost 0.
But even when it’s completely idle, if I try to shut down Windows, my computer gets stuck at “shutting down” and will just sit like that indefinitely until I unplug the drive… after which my computer immediately shuts down.
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard of Seagate drives having serious problems like this, but I thought by now they would’ve solved the problem. I just bought the drive a couple weeks ago (June 2010 sometime)… but apparently the problem still exists.
This is a well-known issue and the problem is being reported everywhere. I gave Seagate the benefit of the doubt since I’ve bought 3 other external drives from them and been very satisfied with their performance.
Seagate is very aware of the problem but they continue to sell the drives. See a huge thread on their support forum here:
http://forums.seagate.com/t5/Other-External-products/Seagate-Expansions-producing-loud-clicking-sound/td-p/30962
Duration : 0:2:2
@mvurbdy007 Same …
@mvurbdy007 Same here, I have a Seagate external 500, 750 and 1500, all good drives. But apparently now they’ve switched over to some lowest-bidder Chinese manufacturer.
It’s a pity, because most people with a guts to take the enclosure apart (void warranty) say the drive itself is perfectly fine, but Seagate just HAD to save an extra 3 cents and go with a bad controller chipset or w/e.
Reminds me of the problem affecting their entire 7200.11 line. They’ve got to clean up their act, fast.
@ashahry081085 For …
@ashahry081085 For you maybe. And for how long? In the Seagate forum thread people report replacing the cable and everything being fine for a few days and then the problem returns.
I’d take this chance to copy everything off and try an RMA if I were you.
Just replaced my …
Just replaced my cable with one from a high-quality reputable manufacturer. It’s only a 3-foot cable so length definitely isn’t a problem, and it has a ferrite core. Drive is still clicking as bad as ever.
My research tells me that the drive inside the enclosure is probably OK but the USB interface or drive controller chipset inside is of low quality. This would explain why a better cable helps some people. Still defective. It’s no coincidence they’re discounted everywhere. I’ll RMA.
I change my usb …
I change my usb cable with the ferrite choke IT WORKS!!!
@caydr hi all, …
@caydr hi all,finally after a period of research for find the problem and solution, of this clicking issue of the external hard drive,I can say that the problem is the case,and the solution is the case,it’s not a joke I spent a considerable part of my time;well the problem is the case not hd so if you open the case and take only hd and put this in another case(for precisione in a not miniusb case as the original, but a normal usb female->male) the problem magically disappears and is much fast
hi all, finally …
hi all, finally after a period of research for find the problem and solution, of this clicking issue of the external hard drive,I can say that the problem is… the case, and the solution is the case, it’s not a joke I spent a considerable part of my time; well the problem is the case not hd so if you open the case and take only hd and put this in another case (for precisione in a not mini-usb case as the original, but a normal usb female->male) the problem magically disappears and is much fast
hi all,finally …
hi all,finally after a period of research for find the problem and solution, of this clicking issue of the external hard drive,I can say that the problem is… the case, and the solution is the case, it’s not a joke,I spent a considerable part of my time; well the problem is the case not hd so if you open the case and take only hd and put this in another case (for precisione in a not mini-usb case as the original, but a normal usb female->male) the problem magically disappears and is much fast
hi all, finally …
hi all, finally after a period of research for find the problem and solution, of this clicking issue of the external hard drive,I can say that the problem is… the case, and the solution is the case, it’s not a joke I spent a considerable part of my time; well the problem is the case not hd so if you open the case and take only hd and put this in another case (for precisione in a not mini-usb case as the original, but a normal usb female->male) the problem magically disappears and is much fast
hi all,finally …
hi all,finally after a period of research for find the problem and solution, of this clicking issue of the external hard drive,I can say that the problem is… the case, and the solution is the case, it’s not a joke I spent a considerable part of my time; well the problem is the case not hd so if you open the case and take only hd and put this in another case (for precisione in a not mini-usb case as the original, but a normal usb female->male) the problem magically disappears and is much fast
@TheTecnobiker I …
@TheTecnobiker I read about that too, but it didn’t help with mine.
Even if a better cable solves the problem, you’ve got to wonder what was going on in Seagate’s QA department when they decided to ship a cable that doesn’t work with their product.
I’m sorry to say …
I’m sorry to say that the clicking started today. After 2 days with no clicks I thought the problem is sorted out but I was wrong. The problem with these drives seems to be more serious. Today I’m going to take it back and I will not buy any more products from seagate. the old hard disk I have from seagate runs very well but this one is defective it seems all new ones are(according to the user reviews). My last word to all of the readers don’t buy this product.
@mvurbdy007 very …
, and the last is the cable of my toshiba camcorder, so both cable have a plastic cylinder before mini usb, I’ll try to do this when I backup my macbook pro and air; I think that if you upload a reply vid whith solution can be very helpfull.
@mvurbdy007 very thanks man, well I think that I have 2 or more of this type of cable, first is the usb cable that recharge my ps3 controller
peace
@TheTecnobiker to …
@TheTecnobiker to be exact you need a:
male Mini B (5-pin) usb to male standard A cable with ferrite bead.
Wikipedia: “A ferrite bead is a passive electric component used to suppress high frequency noise in electronic circuits.”
@TheTecnobiker I …
@TheTecnobiker I actually didn’t buy the cable because I found it among my old stuff I geuss it is for my old camera or maybe a printer. You need to look for a 1.5m mini usb to usb cable. Use the cable which came with your HDD as a reference when you want to buy the new cable. The ferrite choke is a little cylinder shaped thing which is attached to the ends of the cable (near the mini usb socket).
My guess is the cable coming with the HDD catches Electro magnetic interference.
@mvurbdy007 can you …
@mvurbdy007 can you send me a message with a link where I can buy it ? I have this cable but I’m not sure if it is ok.
thanks
I bought the same …
I bought the same drive about a week ago and the clicking started from the first days of use. After searching for answers on the net all I could find was that clicking is sign of a big problem. I backed up the data on it, while I was doing so I was reading the seagate forum page about the problem with these drives. Someone in the forum suggested the change of the usb cable with a high quality one with a ferrite choke. Luckily I had one available and changed the cable and the problem was solved.
I replaced my first 2TB Seagate Expansion External Drive after clicking started until 120 hours uptime. the changed drive was clicking after 40 hours uptime. Now, i have returned the 2nd drive and the 3rd is already clicking. Seams to be an problem with the whole charge. It isnt only annoying, there are write errors in the windows log and the performance is low! sometimes the drive letter is disconnected from windows.
DOENT BUY THIS SEAGATE PRODUCT! THERE IS AN HIGH RISK OF LOOSING YOUR DATA!