Seagate Offers Firmware Fix for All Problematic Barracuda 7200.11 Hard Drives

djisas · Mar 2, 2011

Well, let me join the party...
I actually bought a seagate .12 after one of mine died, but ive also bought a samsung f3 1GB after that, cheap, fast and reliable...

With all this 2 died on me...

BazookaJoe · Mar 2, 2011

Well, after a LOT of research, and failed attempts I was able to REPAIR all of my failed 7200.11 Seagate drives and recover EVERYTHING on all of them.

It's Important, I think, to point that out - that the drive is NOT broken - and is just suffering from a firmware programming error (In the Majority of cases) - it IS POSSIBLE to unlock the firmware, and REPLACE the firmware with a totally safe one - rendering the drive completely repaired.

Don't just throw yer drives away

Completely Bonkers · Mar 2, 2011

Thanks for the tip/experience Bazooka. When I find my "archived" .11 drives, I'll attempt a restore via firmware upgrade.

djisas · Mar 2, 2011

BazookaJoe said:
Well, after a LOT of research, and failed attempts I was able to REPAIR all of my failed 7200.11 Seagate drives and recover EVERYTHING on all of them.

It's Important, I think, to point that out - that the drive is NOT broken - and is just suffering from a firmware programming error (In the Majority of cases) - it IS POSSIBLE to unlock the firmware, and REPLACE the firmware with a totally safe one - rendering the drive completely repaired.

Don't just throw yer drives away

I tried all sort of things to fix them, they where unrecognizable by the bios or any program, so i sent them back to the shop and got me new drives which i sold right away...
Even tried replacing the pcbs since i had repeated drives from same generation but didnt solve anything either...

BazookaJoe · Mar 2, 2011

djisas said:
I tried all sort of things to fix them, they where unrecognizable by the bios or any program, so i sent them back to the shop and got me new drives which i sold right away...
Even tried replacing the pcbs since i had repeated drives from same generation but didnt solve anything either...

Yes, as I said the FIX is to Re-Program the PCB on the drive itself with a NEW working Firmware.

Finding the correct information was really difficult - but Once I had it, actually DOING it was reasonably easy.

In my case I had drives containing information that I was NOT willing to simply throw back to the store, and as it turned out they are completely recoverable with the right help.

I'm just saying to anyone else reading that if you have important data on a "failed" 7200.11 drive - you MUST know that it is probably NOT failed, and can almost always be recovered.

I had to build my own Rs232/TTL Shifter - as I cannot buy them in my country, but I just built this one on project board for less than $5 in component costs, and once you have a ttl shifter using very specific procedures you can log into the drives console interface in "Hyper Terminal", and prompt the drive to reset the corrupt data in its firmware which allows the drive to start up normally again (And does NOT damage your data on the drive)

Now the Mo-Bo bios can detect the drive again -you can boot it up, then you just upgrade the firmware and you're done - drive 100% fixed - faulty firmware is now replaced and it will live on a full happy healthy life.

newtekie1 · Mar 2, 2011

Just an FYI, the 7200.11 drives I had at the beginning of this thread, that I flashed with the fixed BIOS 2 years ago, are still going strong in my main rig. *Knock on wood*

Mr McC · Mar 2, 2011

djisas said:
Well, let me join the party...
I actually bought a seagate .12 after one of mine died, but ive also bought a samsung f3 1GB after that, cheap, fast and reliable...

With all this 2 died on me...

newtekie1 said:
Just an FYI, the 7200.11 drives I had at the beginning of this thread, that I flashed with the fixed BIOS 2 years ago, are still going strong in my main rig. *Knock on wood*

erocker · Mar 2, 2011

newtekie1 said:
Just an FYI, the 7200.11 drives I had at the beginning of this thread, that I flashed with the fixed BIOS 2 years ago, are still going strong in my main rig. *Knock on wood*

I have one of those drives and still going strong. I have two 7200.12 drives in Raid 0 that have been perfect for over a year and a 1tb 7200.12 that has also been perfect.

Of course, this is the internet. Any type of problem with hardware gets easily overhyped by forum members thinking all of these drives will blow up. I can't say I don't find overdramatic internet folk not entertaining post above me included.

BazookaJoe · Mar 2, 2011

Yeah - to repeat myself - once properly re-flashed the drives are 100% OK - there is nothing AT ALL wrong with the drives, and there never ever was - they just had a batch with some bad SOFTWARE programming - and if you correct the software , they are just as good as any other drive.

AND even when the software failed - the DRIVE DID NOT - your data is (or was if you decided to throw the drive away) still 100% in tact and can be fully restored in about 5 minutes with a TTL shifter / Rs232 interface.

brandonwh64 · Mar 2, 2011

I had 3 1.5TB Seagate 7200.11 drives die on me and i never seen this thread

erocker · Mar 2, 2011

brandonwh64 said:
I had 3 1.5TB Seagate 7200.11 drives die on me and i never seen this thread

When buying any storage device (or any other device for that matter), it's always good practice to check the manufacturer's website for any kind of firmware updates.

brandonwh64 · Mar 2, 2011

Thanks erocker

i even RMAed them all three times and they didnt mention it to me about there being a fix. i got tired of RMAing and sold it

Melvis · Mar 3, 2011

I still have one of these drives, didnt even bother Flashing it, and it still is going strong. Ive had more problems with the later drives (1TB & 500GB) then back then. Im getting sick of these bad Seagate drives. I have had no issues with any WD's in the past few yrs.

djisas · Mar 3, 2011

You mean problems with the 12th generation??

BazookaJoe · Mar 3, 2011

So far every Seagate 7200.12 drive I have used has been a dream - perfect, fast & quiet.

I stopped using WD years ago because almost every WD drive I have ever sold develops bad sectors or other failure like.. 2 days after manufacturers warranty expires, but I have Seagate drives well over 9 / 10 years old now that still run all day every day, and just don't give up.

I don't have ONE WD drive over 3 years old in any machine I have ever sold still running in any of my customers anywhere - because they just crap out after 3 years +

I was REALLY pissed off when I started having 7200.11 failures - and Seagate's terrible response to the problem aggravated me even more - but it was just ONE programming mistake made by ONE human being - and ALL human beings make mistakes, every single one of us.

It didn't cost me any data - they where all recovered, and all restored to perfect working order, and I'm quite happy to accept that one wobble on what has otherwise been for me a virtually perfect run of Seagate drives over the last 15 years + (Almost ALL of which are still working and those that where thrown out where dumped because the Customer wanted bigger drives down the line , and for no other reason - I only ever suffered ONE GENUINE failure of seagate Hdd, a 7200.9 I think it was - suffered genuine head failure)

cdawall · Mar 3, 2011

bump for a 2 year old thread that was dead let it die again

Melvis · Mar 3, 2011

djisas said:
You mean problems with the 12th generation??

Ummm i guess so if it means 7200.12 is that generation?

CrAsHnBuRnXp · Mar 3, 2011

I saw this thread in the latest posts section and said to myself "lol not again." Then quickly realized this thread is 2 years old.

Frank Sardina · Nov 20, 2014

lenovo e3000 has seagate 7200-11 loaded window 7 in it its saying can,t find driver whats wrong

vAiO · Mar 13, 2015

I had a Seagate Baracuda 1TB 7200.11 HDD which one day wouldn't be recognised on BIOS or load windows at all. I found out that these drives have this firmware bug and after doing a quick search I found this complete FW-FXR kit on youtube

which repaired my drive in less than 30 minutes. I also repaired a couple of friends drives with it and even got a small profit out of it

Yes there are cheaper solutions like what is mentioned here but I found it safer for my data to spend 25Euro for this kit (which also include click by click repair software) than to buy random adapters and try to decode messages....

I bought mine from Amazon but it is also avaliable on ebay.

JackFrost · May 10, 2015

Here I am with my daughter's 10 year old Dell and a Seagate drive that may have the firmware glitch. Probably does have the firmware issue as the model and firmware build all match the problem ones. It is doubtful that my daughter did a firmware update. It appears to be too late to fix the drive but after reading the thread comments I have my own experience to add. I pulled the drive and ran it on a usb adapter on my regular PC., It would run for about 3 minutes and then totally die. I found that cooling spray on the electronics card would revive it for up to nearly 10 minutes. I recovered all the data files but am wondering if it is worth the trouble to fix the firmware. The link to Seagate in the original article is dead and I have not tried Seagate directly to see if they still even offer the update. With better drives so cheap now I probably will just junk it but 500 Gb is big enough to save for other uses if it can be fixed with just a little investment in time.

95Viper · May 10, 2015

I believe, they are part of Fujitsu now... you can go to this link (Firmware Check); or, this one (Seagate Download finder) and get the files.

Also, directly, here: Firmware Update for ST3500320AS, ST3500620AS, ST3500820AS, ST3640330AS, ST3640530AS, ST3750330AS, ST3750630AS, ST31000340AS
And, here: Firmware Update for ST31500341AS, ST31000333AS, ST3640323AS, ST3640623AS, ST3320613AS, ST3320813AS, ST3160813AS

vk1dx · Apr 9, 2018

Brilliant - the links are broken. My Barracuda is frozen and I would like to see if it is affected by this issue.

And yes I apologise firstly for stirring up an old topic.

It was only through Google that I found this site and thought it would be useful to try and recover the drive. It stood idle for most of the time. Silly tossing out a 1Tb drive if it can be fixed.

Phil

nemesis.ie · Apr 9, 2018

Time to contact Seagate support I think. Do let us know how you get on please,

Edit: The links are working for me.

vk1dx · Apr 9, 2018

nemesis.ie said:
Time to contact Seagate support I think. Do let us know how you get on please,

Edit: The links are working for me.

Maybe you are correct. I also followed 95Viper's hints and checking that out before I contact Seagate. Thanks mate

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Seagate Offers Firmware Fix for All Problematic Barracuda 7200.11 Hard Drives

djisas

BazookaJoe

Completely Bonkers

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newtekie1

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Mr McC

erocker

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erocker

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Addicted to Bacon and StarCrunches!!!

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cdawall

where the hell are my stars

Melvis

CrAsHnBuRnXp

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