Apple Expands Seagate Hard Drive Replacement Program for 2009-2011 iMacs

my 21.5 HD was swapped today, I have apple care and got a service tech house call, done in about 20 minutes. (then another 2 hours for the clone to copy back)

I didn't realize I didn't get to keep the old drive so quickly hooked it up to another computer to wipe it.

PS my replacement is a Hitachi.

Adam Cal
http://www.toyland.com.au

G51989 said:

Look on the bright side, the 3TB drive your local computer store installed is more than likely much higher quality than the stock Apple drive.

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That's actually a rather meaningless statement. I've had 'enterprise class' drives fail within a year, and I've had 'residential class' drives last for years running 24/7/365. You just never know how long they are going to last. One thing is for sure, the older drives are, or seem to be, more reliable than the newer ones. We had such great results using Seagate drives and then they had a run of 1T drives that died constantly. We switched to WD, and had great results with them, and then they had a run of bad drives. There was a local company that used Hitachi drives that went out of business, and a lot of their customers Hitachi drives started dying.

The key is backup your stuff, and hope the backup is reliable...

I wonder if this Seagate issue is related to their issue with certain firmware causing issues with certain controllers... How much could be the high internal temperatures inside the iMac.

Just got mine back from union square in Aberdeen expecting to spend all day cloning it back to normal and apple has done a data transfer for me, all I need to do now is restore my bootcamp partition. Yaay apple

Yamcha said:

Thats good to know.. Might be buying a used iMac 2011 If we don't see an update this month..

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I really hope you do if you really need it. It amazes me how many people want a new iMac yet I'm still on one of the first 2009 Versions with 16GB Intel i7.

I'm an IT administrator and a Photographer and heavily multitask, this thing is a beast, what on earth are you people running? Do all of you work for NASA?

I qualify for the replacement, still under Apple care for late 2009 i7. They are sending someone to my house to replace the HD, I have a few questions I am hoping the forum can help me out with:
1) Should I erase my current drive (after backing it up) before they take it out? I am assuming yes on this
2) Anyone ever have an apple certified tech do an SSD install? I am thinking of upgrading since its probably the only time I am ever going to have this thing opened up - if yes, did you have the HD replaced or replace the superdrive?

I am a little weary of doing the work myself, I have done plenty on PC's but I don't want to do anything to my iMac that could mess it up.

OasisNYK said:

I qualify for the replacement, still under Apple care for late 2009 i7. They are sending someone to my house to replace the HD, I have a few questions I am hoping the forum can help me out with:
1) Should I erase my current drive (after backing it up) before they take it out? I am assuming yes on this
2) Anyone ever have an apple certified tech do an SSD install? I am thinking of upgrading since its probably the only time I am ever going to have this thing opened up - if yes, did you have the HD replaced or replace the superdrive?

I am a little weary of doing the work myself, I have done plenty on PC's but I don't want to do anything to my iMac that could mess it up.

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Just a follow up on this - I talked to the tech who is supposed to install the replacement HD and he did not seem to know whether an SSD could be installed in a late 2009 iMac - I get the impression he may not be the right person to do that kind of upgrade.

robertnq said:

Call Apple. I'm already in the process of getting a refund.

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I called them this morning - I'm in process of getting a refund also. They had the record of the HD replacement that was done at my local Apple store, so it should be smooth sailing.

Well, got a Walt Disney World trip coming up next week so I probably won't bring it in between now and then, but when I get back I guess I'll drop it off to get it taken care of.

Might be a good time to buy a new external HDD as well.

adamcal said:

my 21.5 HD was swapped today, I have apple care and got a service tech house call, done in about 20 minutes. (then another 2 hours for the clone to copy back)

I didn't realize I didn't get to keep the old drive so quickly hooked it up to another computer to wipe it.

PS my replacement is a Hitachi.

Adam Cal
http://www.toyland.com.au

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I also have AppleCare on my 2010 21.5 iMac. How did you arrange for the tech to make a house call?

Yes I hope i can get someone to come out to my house to replace mine since it's the 27 in model and really heavy, no way can I carry it to my car, into the mall and up to the apple store but hey if it's my only option I'll have to pay someone to help me because my HD is acting up and runs VERY hot.

TofSanity said:

took my 27" iMac in this morning at 1030am and they called me at 11am to let me know it was ready for pickup. Have had it running the last three hours and it's as QUIET as can be! Only time I heard the HD was when I started the iMac. No more popcorn popping or the sound of a vacuum! sadly, its still a Seagate, so for the moment its perfect.

UPDATE: just looked and the new HD is the same Seagate ST31000528AS but the its a Revision AP2E

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My harddisk failed (disk i/o errors) a few months back and was replaced under applecare coverage.

Just checked now, the current HDD is ST31000528AS revision AP2E. Not sure if this revision will be more reliable, sigh...

Funny thing is, if I punch in my iMac serial #, apple says I am still eligible for replacement program. Well, at least I am covered until end of program in Apr-2013.

How to verify that your iMac has the affected hard drive? Mine was bought in very first year of the 27" iMac which I believe was in October of 2010.

This is pretty messed up. We had a 27 inch imac that we bought new in 2009. It had 13 years of photos, including our baby's first 15 months, and 6,000 songs on it. We were definitely morons for not backing it all up, but we lost almost everything a few weeks ago when it crashed. Obviously it would have been good to know about the prior issues with Seagate, especially given that Apple has been aware of problems since 2007. We have been baffled about what caused the crash. And the staff at our local Apple store, our local Microcenter outlet and our local Tech Fusion shop all have seemed equally ignorant about a Seagate problem. No one has been able to recover anything. We got a new hard drive under Apple Care but only got an email from Apple today about the recall. Thanks, Apple.

jenmiller said:

We were definitely morons for not backing it all up, but we lost almost everything a few weeks ago when it crashed.

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So sorry for your loss - but hard drives *will* fail. (Not "might fail", but "will fail".)

This Seagate issue is merely that one run of drives will fail earlier than expected - not an issue of "will fail" vs. "won't fail".

My home systems do nightly incremental backups to RAID-5 disks, and I copy the backups to an offsite backup disk (have 2, and rotate them).

That means that I have 5 copies of every file (counting RAID-5 as two copies).

Time Machine/Time Capsule backups are better than nothing, but not by much. (...if the time machine/capsule disk isn't redundant RAID, the backups can disappear in an instant...)

mwidjaya said:

My harddisk failed (disk i/o errors) a few months back and was replaced under applecare coverage.

Just checked now, the current HDD is ST31000528AS revision AP2E. Not sure if this revision will be more reliable, sigh...

Funny thing is, if I punch in my iMac serial #, apple says I am still eligible for replacement program. Well, at least I am covered until end of program in Apr-2013.

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I thought that too when I put in my serial # but unfortunately you are not qualified for the replacement [or covered until 4/2013] like me. I was told when I visited the Apple Store with my iMac that I would not be getting a replacement because they have already had it fixed a year ago and that is considered to be a part of their replacement program (even though they just announced it a week ago for late 2009 imacs). I also spoke to a CS on the phone and they also confirmed this.

Hopefully nothing happens to my iMac after my applecare runs out!

user418 said:

I also have AppleCare on my 2010 21.5 iMac. How did you arrange for the tech to make a house call?

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Aye, I'd like to know this too. I made an appointment at the Apple Store for next Friday, but did make a note that my iMac has Apple care and I'd prefer if I didn't have to carry it to the store.

Be interesting to know how you can get them to make a house call.

Imola Ghost said:

How to verify that your iMac has the affected hard drive? Mine was bought in very first year of the 27" iMac which I believe was in October of 2010.

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Check here

Does anyone know what the drive that they replace them with is?

Miharu said:

Oh finally! I've had this 2010 iMac for well, 2 years now. I have the Seagate 1 Tb HDD and it's loud as hell, like someone making popcorn in a microwave constantly. I've gotten used to it but I've always been planning on changing the hard drive but I've read it's a daunting task. I'm definitely taking it to be replaced.

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^^ This... i hope it will be a lot quieter...

Peruvian said:

^^ This... i hope it will be a lot quieter...

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I will get my iMac tomorrow so I'll report then

I'm pleased to say the new Hitachi drive that they put in is much much quieter! Very happy with this service

Miharu said:

I'm pleased to say the new Hitachi drive that they put in is much much quieter! Very happy with this service

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Excellent news, will book a genius appointment tomorrow..

Just got an email saying that I can come in and replace mine, just wondering if it's worthwhile since I haven't had any problems with mine. 2009 iMac.

I just got an e-mail
well done apple

Insilin1i said:

Just got an email saying that I can come in and replace mine, just wondering if it's worthwhile since I haven't had any problems with mine. 2009 iMac.

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I put mine in for repair today. The guy walked me through the whole process, as well as replacing the hard drive they also take the time to give it all a good clean. Whilst in the store they also ran some checks to ensure all my hardware was still working fine. Will get my iMac back in 3-5 days.

I'd say, do it.

Oh, someone asked if iMac was returned with or without an OS installed. According to the guy in store they put the same version you have on your system on to the new hard drive. All you need do is restore your backup.