Apple 'looking into' duff Chinese hard drive claims
Responds to above-average drive failure rates
Apple has admitted it is examining claims that a number of its MacBook laptops include poorly manufactured hard drives that expose users to data loss.
“We've received a few reports that some MacBook consumer notebooks may have hard drive issues,” a company spokesman told Information Week, “and we're looking into it.”
The comment comes a month after Register Hardware reported on UK data-recovery company Retrodata's warning to Mac laptop users that it had received far more failed 2.5in drives from Apple machines that it would have expected given typical hard drive failure rates.
"We're getting 20-30 times more failed drives of this kind than others," Retrodata chief Duncan Clarke told Register Hardware at the time. He's has almost as many more since then.
Damage to the disk surface
Retrodata found a common factor: all the failed drives were made by Seagate in the manufacturer's China factories and installed with firmware version 7.01. Every failed drive displayed scratches on the disk surface, which Retrodata identified as the result of the read/write head unexpectedly hitting the disk.
This kind of damage would likely destroy data held on the hard drive.
Clarke believes Apple should recall all of its computers fitted with such a drive and provide owners with free replacements. The drives, he claimed, are not being manufactured to a sufficiently high standard, a result of low-cost production in China, rather than a flaw in the drives' design.
We asked Seagate to comment too, but it has not yet done so.
COMMENTS
Come on Apple, are you kidding ?
my macbook disk died some weeks ago.
Ok, it happen.. I was thinking.. Then I've read on the net about all of this faulty seagate disks mounted on Apple macbook and guess what ? Mine was one of the model claimed to be defective (Seagate ST98823AS firmware 7.01 made in China)
http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=2087130488&size=o
I've called Apple Care support today, they say there's no official document from Apple at the moment regarding this drive so, being my mac out of warranty, there's nothing they can do..
Apple should look seriously into this, this silence is unacceptable
Pot calling Kettle black, Chinese Junk MacBooks!
This is hysterical, the Commie Chinese made MacBooks have been GARBAGE since they were introduced .... continuing the HISTORY of Flawed and Buggy iBooks back to the G3 iBook ... and you Apple Kool Aid Drinkers point fingers at Seagate's cheap Commie Chinese hard drives!!?? Bwah ha ha ha ha!
Seagate's hard drives made in Singapore are flawless, with optimum longevity (we exclusively use them at our 23,000 computer school district), but they AREN'T CHEAP either like the Chinese ones. Our school district BANNED Apple computers from purchases years ago, after we had a 21% failure rate on G3 and G4 iBooks within the first 15 months of purchase!
Here the ROOT OF THE PROBLEM - Apple makes and OBSCENE PROFIT on they're garbage because they FORCE the OUTSIDE OUTSOURCED companies that MAKE their garbage (Apple MAKES NOTHING) to build it as cheap as possible and that means these contract manufacturers in CHINA chooses the CHEAPER HDs made in CHINA!
When you buy any Apple BRANDED product, you get what you deserve ..... NOT what you pay for.
@Martin
Why finger Apple in this? If the hard drive had failed in any machine and you hadn't backed up the data who's fault is that?
Hard drives fail, people breathe... it's a fact of life, the fact you hadn't backed your data up is entirely and utterly your fault (every manufacturer of machines and hard drives has clauses that state they are not responsible for data loss due to system failure.....)
My hard drive failed on my MBP, it was replaced within 2 days by the local Apple store, was dealt with extremely efficiently and professionally - i was asked if i would like them to restore from my backups, partitions required etc etc Try that at PC World....
That said i too would have preferred paying a premium for higher quality components too, but that's because my work pay for my machine and i'm sure Apple will get a far greater market share by selling slightly cheaper products to the masses, testament is that i have an iBook G3 500Mhz that is still going strong, i only upgraded the hard drive recently as it was full!
I stopped buying Seagate...
...when they bought Hitachi. Until then, they were pretty much top contender for me.
I wouldn't go near Hitachi with a very long bargepole, or anyone who owns them. Seagate's loss is now Western Digitals's gain; I buy their drives now.
Oliver.
No it's not
It's not hard to find a drive that works well at all try a WD I haven't had one go feet up on me yet and I have owned quite a few stop trying to make excuses for Seagates QA failures thats unnatural if they screwed up they deserve to be punished I am sure Apple will punish them if it's convenient.
