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27" iMac i7 - Late 2009 - drive failure warning

sparkie7

sparkie7

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Oct 17, 2008
2,591
306
:eek:

Did a Disk Utility open to try to mount an external drive and low and behold the internal 1TB drive in the 27" iMac was in red highlight - saying:

This drive has a hardware problem that can't be repaired.

S.M.A.R.T. Status: Failing

What is the MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure) on these drives installed?

I do use this iMac for watching TV, using EyeTV with a 20GB buffer, but would have thought the drive would be able to handle it. Its not on 24/7, about 4-5 hours a day on average, then movies on VLC for another 2-3 hours.

I do have care so will be covered but what's your thoughts on EyeTV on this machine, too much for the drive to handle?? or should be fine and not an issue. :confused:
 

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I doubt it's the TV tuner. It's a hard drive and sometimes they just fail. I assume u backup regularly so it's a non issue and you'll take it to apple for repair.

Cheers,
 
Funnily enough, I'm in the exact same situation with my late 2009 27" i7 iMac. HDD has been grinding past couple of weeks and now started producing SMART errors.

Is replacing the HDD with an SSD an option in this model?

Regards,
Kristijan
 
panzer06 said:
I doubt it's the TV tuner. It's a hard drive and sometimes they just fail. I assume u backup regularly so it's a non issue and you'll take it to apple for repair.

Cheers,
Click to expand...

that's pretty poor reliability for only a 1.5 year drive.

but luckily i have care and will get  to fix

Kristijan said:
Funnily enough, I'm in the exact same situation with my late 2009 27" i7 iMac. HDD has been grinding past couple of weeks and now started producing SMART errors.

Is replacing the HDD with an SSD an option in this model?

Regards,
Kristijan
Click to expand...

mine grinds for several seconds and when watching TV it stalls/pauses the screen completely making it more noticeable. personally i'd like to upgrade it to a 2 or 3TB drive. how hard is it to pry one of these open and do a DIY install?

I assume its reasonably involved compared to a Mac Pro
 
Mine's doing the exact same thing. It's like the entire system just stops, then kicks in again after a few seconds. The DIY replacing the HDD for a SSD looks a little daunting from what I've seen.

I might call around some Apple resellers to see how much they'd charge to do it for me.

-Kristijan
 
Kristijan said:
Mine's doing the exact same thing. It's like the entire system just stops, then kicks in again after a few seconds. The DIY replacing the HDD for a SSD looks a little daunting from what I've seen.

I might call around some Apple resellers to see how much they'd charge to do it for me.

-Kristijan
Click to expand...

did you buy applecare for your imac? -- if not then thats a good option (to upgrade to SSD)
 
sparkie7 said:
that's pretty poor reliability for only a 1.5 year drive.

but luckily i have care and will get  to fix
snip
Click to expand...

Yeah, Seagate's had some issues lately. You just never know. Hitachi had a spell of high failure rates a few years back. For Whatever reason Western Digital's has a good rep right now. Most likely Apple will replace it with a new or refurb Seagate drive.

Cheers,
 
sparkie7 said:
did you buy applecare for your imac? -- if not then thats a good option (to upgrade to SSD)
Click to expand...

No Apple Care mate, but even so, I kinda want to go down the SSD route.

Question: Does it matter if I put in a SATAII or a SATAIII SSD in the Late 2009 iMac? As in, are they both compatible?

-Kristijan
 
Kristijan said:
Question: Does it matter if I put in a SATAII or a SATAIII SSD in the Late 2009 iMac? As in, are they both compatible?

-Kristijan
Click to expand...

I believe most SATAIII drives are backward compatible with SATAII ports. You have to check that the make and model are compatible.

I'm actually going to buy 1 or 2 3TB 3.5" internal SATA III Hitachi HDD's to put into my Mac Pro 3,1 which only has SATAII. Apparently from a couple of reviews these are fully backward compatible. Which is greats so if I upgrade to a new Mac Pro with SATAIII they will be future-proofed :D
 
Yep, from what I've been reading as well, most are backward compatible. Now I just need to pick a drive :)

I spoke with an Apple Authorised Reseller, and they said they'd replace it for me. So that's good, as I wasn't %100 sure about opening it up. They did say I can bring in my own drive etc, so they're just charging me for 1 hours labour.

Any ideas on what kind of bracket is required to put a SSD into the Late 2009 iMac, if at all?

-Kristijan
 
Reckon you'll need a 2.5" to 3.5" bracket/bay. Unless you're getting a 3.5" SSD.

Which  reseller you talk to? I'm in Melbourne too
 
There guys here - http://www.beyondthebox.com.au/

They said if I supply all parts, they will do it for 1 hours labour charge (which is $149). It's the only place that I've looked, at it's close to home for me. I'll call around a few more, and if I find somewhere cheaper, I'll update this post.

If you decide to take it to a reseller, let me know if you find it anywhere cheaper :)

-Kristijan
 
that's pretty good that they'll allow you to BYO lol

maybe try..

mymac.com.au
mybyte.com.au
nextbyte.com.au
streetwise.com.au

but guess if distance is an issue than you might be better BTB
 
Hey!

You do realize there is a RECALL out on those drives and if your Macs' serial number is covered under the recall whether you are in warranty or not you could get a replacement drive for free.

There was a thread here that linked to the Apple website and you could enter your serial number to see if you were covered.

My own machine is covered under Applecare and according to Apple my drive is not part of the recall, luckily but you never can tell. Drives like to fail.
 
I believe the recall is for a small batch of 2011 iMac models.

Mine is a late 2009 model. But I'm pretty sure I bought care when I bought it so SHOULD be covered
 
thanks for the link. i tried it, says: your iMac is not eligible for this program.

so will fall back onto care
 
The hard drive in my iMac 27" late 2009 failed a few weeks back.

The hard drive model: Seagate ST31000528AS.

My iMac wasnt part of the recall plan.

I went ahead and replaced it myself following iFixit's guide and using the same model number as my previous as i dont have applecare.

Now the fans or hard drive have started making alot of noise.

I installed smcfancontrol and it tells me that the fans are running at 999 rpm and temp is 49 c.

Anyone know what i can do to help this problem?
 
thomasheldrup said:
The hard drive in my iMac 27" late 2009 failed a few weeks back.

The hard drive model: Seagate ST31000528AS.

My iMac wasnt part of the recall plan.

I went ahead and replaced it myself following iFixit's guide and using the same model number as my previous as i dont have applecare.

Now the fans or hard drive have started making alot of noise.

I installed smcfancontrol and it tells me that the fans are running at 999 rpm and temp is 49 c.

Anyone know what i can do to help this problem?
Click to expand...

You can read more about this over here http://www.hddfancontrol.com/ In a nutshell, it's due to the drive temp sensor which Apple used from the Late 2009 iMac's onwards.

From what I've been reading, the two most used solutions are to;
  1. Short out the pins.
  2. Use an application to manage the fans. The site that I linked to has one which is AUD$30, and uses the drives SMART features to adjust fan speed accordingly.

If my drive arrives in time, I'm hoping to get this fixed over the weekend. The fans will run at high speed, so I'll ask the guys at the Apple Reseller on what they normally do. I may end up forking out the $30 for the application, as I don't really like the idea of shorting the pins out.

-Kristijan
 
Kristijan said:
You can read more about this over here http://www.hddfancontrol.com/ In a nutshell, it's due to the drive temp sensor which Apple used from the Late 2009 iMac's onwards.

From what I've been reading, the two most used solutions are to;
  1. Short out the pins.
  2. Use an application to manage the fans. The site that I linked to has one which is AUD$30, and uses the drives SMART features to adjust fan speed accordingly.

If my drive arrives in time, I'm hoping to get this fixed over the weekend. The fans will run at high speed, so I'll ask the guys at the Apple Reseller on what they normally do. I may end up forking out the $30 for the application, as I don't really like the idea of shorting the pins out.

-Kristijan
Click to expand...

I used the hdd fan control software in osx while windows 7 seems to work just fine.

Cheers,
 
Kristijan said:
You can read more about this over here http://www.hddfancontrol.com/ In a nutshell, it's due to the drive temp sensor which Apple used from the Late 2009 iMac's onwards.

From what I've been reading, the two most used solutions are to;
  1. Short out the pins.
  2. Use an application to manage the fans. The site that I linked to has one which is AUD$30, and uses the drives SMART features to adjust fan speed accordingly.

If my drive arrives in time, I'm hoping to get this fixed over the weekend. The fans will run at high speed, so I'll ask the guys at the Apple Reseller on what they normally do. I may end up forking out the $30 for the application, as I don't really like the idea of shorting the pins out.

-Kristijan
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply.

I found the application after i posted and it works therefore i can recommend doing it that way.
 
Mine went downhill the day I installed Lion. SMART - failing.

It's my understanding one can only replace the drive with the same brand due to the temperature sensor?

Mine is a Seagate. Does anyone know which is better the Seagate Green or Seagate XT? XT has 7200 RPM vs. the Green's 5900. I currently have a 7200.

Wondering if my speed will go downhill with the green?
 
These ST31000528AS or ST31000528ASQ (Apple branded) are ****** disks !

All of them got wrong firmware.

They started to ship them with firmware CC38, then released upgrade to CC3E, then CC46, and finally CC49: http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=213891

Only this year I got 8 dead ST31000528AS drives.

The new version ST31000524AS with SATA 600 interface is also terribly failing.

Just remember to check your SMART status as often as possible and make backups !
 
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