Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ncrlnk!ncr-sd!crash!news
From: news@crash.cts.com (Usenet News)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Seagate \
Message-ID: <4636@crash.cts.com>
Date: 16 Jul 89 07:41:54 GMT
Organization: Crash TS, San Diego, CA
Lines: 58

I posted the information that Thad left about his Seagate "stiction" woes and
here is one persons reply...

 Sub: Re: Seagates and other HD's
  To: Bob Lindabury (#145)
From: Dr. Ken (#1)
Date: 07/14/89 18:58:31


Bob - Before you lean on the panic button, I would try to find out if Seagate
has remedied the manufacturing problem which occurred 15+ months ago (since it
manifests itself after 15 months, it was most likely a problem 15 to 20 or more
months ago).  I would be surprised (shocked might be a better word) if they
haven't already resolved it.
      Thanks for sharing that info with us.  Funny, but with all the hundreds
of thousands of Seagate owners out there, I never heard of this problem before,
especially if its a wide-spread as that single author leads us to believe, I
wonder why.  Anyway, I wouldn't worry about it until you have a problem - IF
you have a problem.  If there are 1,000 such bad units out there and there are
a total of 1 million Seagate drives on the market, that's only 0.1%, which is a
VERY small error rate (QC problem) by many (most?) manufacturing standards.
Compare that number to 20%-25% problem rate with CMS (power supply problems
account for almost all of those returned items) or 30+% for Chinook.  When I
had my problems with the CMS drive, the first problem was the power supply went
out, the 2nd drive's problem was they simply returned to me a bad, rebuilt
drive per se.
       I must say that, being a Biologist with a VERY HEAVY chemistry
background, I find it almost impossible to believe the statements regarding
people using a cloth to put down a 1-2 molecule thick layer - that is pure
balderdash, the product of an overly-active embellishment of a story.  And I
find it equally difficult to believe that a 5-6 molecule layer of lubricant can
"glue" anything to anything, especially a head which, in molecular
measurements, flies well over the surface at quite a distance.  This is NOT to
say the story isn't basically true, but these specific remarks about molecules
doesn't ring true.  Maybe the author confused "molecules" with "microns" or
some such measurement.
       Despite the embellishments, its good to get such comments - consumers
should have all information available BEFORE purchasing, and they can decide
what to believe and what not to believe and what chances they want to take.

                                                        Ken
P.S.
      Upon rereading my above comments, I want to make sure that everyone
appreciates the fact that I did NOT quote "1,000 bad units" and "1 millions
units on the market" as numerical facts - rather, I simply plucked those
numbers out of thin air (the million number is in the ballpark according to an
article I read on hard drives a few months back) and were meant only to
illustrate how "a large number of faulty drives" can be a comparatively minor
manufacturing QC problem (to the company - if you're one of the consumers who
received a defective unit, it is quite a BIG problem for you!).

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