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

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MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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Apple yesterday expanded its iMac 1TB Seagate Hard Drive Replacement Program, significantly increasing the number of machines eligible under the program to include iMacs sold between October 2009 and July 2011 with 1 TB Seagate hard drives.
Apple has determined that certain Seagate 1TB hard drives used in 21.5-inch and 27-inch iMac systems may fail. These systems were sold between October 2009 and July 2011.

Apple or an Apple Authorized Service Provider (AASP) will replace affected hard drives free of charge.
Click to expand...
Apple launched the program in July 2011, but at that time it covered only those machines sold between May 2011 and July 2011. Apple has apparently now determined that the issue extends further back in time than previously thought, and has now included machines sold as far back as October 2009.

imacs_2011.jpg
The original program was originally valid for one year, scheduled to expire July 23, 2012, but as that deadline passed the company extended the program for an additional year. With the program now covering a number of other machines, some of which were sold as much as three years ago, Apple has again updated the coverage terms.
The program covers affected iMacs for three years after the first retail sale of the unit or until April 12, 2013, whichever provides longer coverage for you. Apple will continue to evaluate service data and will provide further updates to this program as needed.
Click to expand...
This is not the first time Apple has had issues with Seagate hard drives in its products, as the first several generations of the MacBook had the potential to experience data loss when the read/write heads on the Seagate drives failed prematurely, gouging the hard drive platter. Apple acknowledged the issue soon after it was first reported in late 2007, but waited over two years to launch a repair program to address the problem.

Article Link: Apple Expands Seagate Hard Drive Replacement Program for 2009-2011 iMacs
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2012/10/13/apple-expands-seagate-hard-drive-replacement-program-for-2009-2011-imacs/
Y

Yamcha

macrumors 68000
Mar 6, 2008
1,825
158
Thats good to know.. Might be buying a used iMac 2011 If we don't see an update this month..
 
Pakaku

Pakaku

macrumors 68040
Aug 29, 2009
3,137
4,447
TVreporter said:
How do you know what drive is in the iMac? I have a 2011 refurb I bought earlier this year, would this still qualify?
Click to expand...

Boot up Disk Utility, in the Utilities folder, and it should list all the drives and their brands in the left-side collumn.
 
spork183

spork183

macrumors 6502a
Jul 30, 2006
878
0
TVreporter said:
How do you know what drive is in the iMac? I have a 2011 refurb I bought earlier this year, would this still qualify?
Click to expand...

refurbs are covered like any other mac, though it may have a different drive already. You never know why it was refurbed. But yes, if it fits the manufacture date criteria, it will be covered.
 
1

12dylan34

macrumors 6502a
Sep 3, 2009
884
15
*Sees picture of iMacs

"Oh yes! finally some news about new iMacs!"

*reads article title

Okay-meme.jpg
 
Thunderbird

Thunderbird

macrumors 6502a
Dec 25, 2005
951
789
I too, had a Pavlovian response to the iMac picture.

I guess a lot of us are getting a little twitchy.
 
D

Devie

macrumors 6502a
Aug 30, 2004
556
319
Adelaide, Australia
So mine is elligible.

There are no options to just replace the damn thing myself. Sigh, if I go through with it I'll be out a computer, and someone will have my drive, which even with me formatting it could result in them having sensitive data. If I don't my drive might fall over, which might be ok as I have a time machine backup anyway...

Just ship me a damn hdd please apple.
 
K

krravi

macrumors 65816
Nov 30, 2010
1,173
0
TVreporter said:
How do you know what drive is in the iMac? I have a 2011 refurb I bought earlier this year, would this still qualify?
Click to expand...

I bought a refurb iMac 27 a few weeks ago myself. I went to that Apple site and all it does is asks your Mac serial #, which you can find in "About this Mac". Enter the serial # and it tells you if your hard drive needs a replacement or not.

But looking in Disk Utility is a great idea, mine is a Western Digital.
 
Last edited:
Agent-P

Agent-P

Contributor
Dec 5, 2009
2,502
23
The Tri-State Area
I also thought this was finally some news about new iMacs.


MacRumors said:
Apple yesterday expanded its iMac 1TB Seagate Hard Drive Replacement Program, significantly increasing the number of machines eligible under the program to include iMacs sold between October 2009 and July 2011 with 1 GB Seagate hard drives.
Click to expand...

Well, I would hope those are replaced, especially when I thought I bought a 1TB hard drive.
 
yearofthe

yearofthe

macrumors regular
May 23, 2010
160
0
Earth
*Logs onto Macrumors*
*See's picture of iMac's assuming it's about the new upcoming iMac*
"Ah, redemption with Macrumors restored!" I said
*Reads article*
%#($@* #*@&#%!!!!
 
yuenadan

yuenadan

macrumors newbie
Sep 3, 2010
23
0
Taipei, Taiwan
The hard drive in my iMac is dead (been running on an external firewire drive), so I was so happy to read this article. But then I checked and my drive is Western Digital, not Seagate. (sigh)
 
Y

Yamcha

macrumors 68000
Mar 6, 2008
1,825
158
G51989 said:
Maybe Apple is realizing that when you design a computer to be running to hot 100% of the time, they fail.
Click to expand...

While heat can contribute & decrease the lifespan of a hard drive, this was actually a firmware issue with certain 1TB drives, at least thats the explanation Seagate gave.. I was one of the people stuck with the 1TB faulty drive, performance was horrible, not usable for OS use, was fine as back up drive..
 
R

rusty2192

macrumors 6502a
Oct 15, 2008
997
81
Kentucky
My Late 2009 21.5" had its 1TB hard drive fail about a year ago. Luckily I had Apple Care so it didn't cost me a fortune to fix. It looks like now it may have been covered. I just checked and it has a Hitachi drive in it now (the replacement from Apple). I'm not sure what was in it originally.
 
Nyy8

Nyy8

macrumors 6502a
Jun 12, 2011
523
179
New England
"include iMacs sold between October 2009 and July 2011 with 1 GB Seagate hard drives."

Umm I think there is a mistake there :p
 
S

sap12690

macrumors 6502
Jan 5, 2011
300
1
just checked and my iMac is elgible, how would I go about doing this? Would they be able to replace the 1 TB hard drive with a 3 TB hard drive if I pay more?
 
TMRaven

TMRaven

macrumors 68020
Nov 5, 2009
2,099
1
Way to go Apple! I have a late 09 iMac I purchased in early 2010, and its hard drive has been slowly dying for the past year or so, but I've been waiting for SSDs to drop in price so I could do my own replacement, because Apple was wanting to charge me 200 bucks for an out of warranty hard drive swap.

Now I can get it fixed for free! Props to Apple!
 
figaro331

figaro331

macrumors member
Jul 30, 2011
32
2
Faulty Seagate drives

I knew it, since Seagate have bought Maxtor their quality went deep down. For the past 4 years I've had to replace 7 Seagate drives of different kind-from 3.5" external, internal to 2.5" external and internal.
I will never buy anything Seagate ever !!! :eek::eek:
 
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