Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!fernwood!portal!cup.portal.com!thad
From: thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech
Subject: Re: Seagate drive and Twilight Zone
Message-ID: <29724@cup.portal.com>
Date: 8 May 90 08:00:16 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Lines: 57

{comp.sys.amiga.tech}
{Re: Seagate drive and Twilight Zone}

mike@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Mike Smithwick) in <48913@ames.arc.nasa.gov> writes:

"	My 65meg Seagate ST277N is posessed. I died quietly a couple of nights
	ago. And when I turn it on, it spins up ok, sounds normal, but the
	activity light blinks 9 times as some sort of internal error code.

	Anyone know what the 9 flashes mean? One of Seagate's techs looked down
	his list from the manual, and it covered 1 to 6 and 8 (7 flashes were
	not assigned). But no 9!

	What gives?
"
As the hundreds of people whom I've helped with their Seagate drive problems
will attest, I have *NO* respect for Seagate, its products, its (alleged)
technical support, etc.   Just had to post another help response to the
comp.sys.att newsgroup just yesterday ... more dying ST251 that don't spin up.

As usual, Seagate doesn't know its own products' specifications.

From the "Seagate ST277N Product Manual", Seagate publication 36034-001,
Revision B, on pages 2-4 thru 2-5:

Flashes	Problem
-------	------------------------------------------
1	Failure of microprocessor/internal memory

2	Microprocessor ROM checksum failure

3	controller failed to initialize

4	controller program RAM failure

5	data buffer RAM failure

6	failure to attain and/or maintain spindle speed

7	Unable to find record ID mark for any record

8	failure to read operating system from drive

9	operating system read from drive is invalid


Mike, I suggest you toss that drive out the window and over the fence. I'd
invite you here to toss it out my window and over the fence, but I've had
to had the fence repaired thrice during the past 4 years (most recently
just last week at $1,000); yeah, there's a lot of crap software and hardware
I've tossed out the window and behind that fence since 1985 as several other
readers of this newsgroup will attest; that pile of crap includes ten ST251
drives from, Guess Who?, Seagate.

Thad

Thad Floryan [ thad@cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ]