IBM 75GXP, bad harddrives?

AMDSoldier · May 30, 2001

Hey before I start just thougt I'd say hi!

First post here, mostly on sharkyforums. ;-)

Anyways I bought a 60GB IBM 75GXP hdd. Lately I have been hearing bad things about them. Does someone have a link to back this up maybe?

I am losing faith in IBM for hdd's a bit here. Mine died in a few months of use. Just got a returned one and I hoping it may last for a few years.

What do you all think?

Thanks for your time!

MCS · May 30, 2001

They are not bad drives, but recently there has been high failure rates. As long as they dont fail they ARE damn excellent drives. Use the search feature on these Forums and it should bring up a lot of threads on the issue.

I have had a 75GXP since last July and mine has been fine - others have them fail after a month!

Duvie · May 30, 2001

There is quite the number of threads here and elsewhere documenting the high number of failures of these drives. Some have pointed this to a QC problem with drives manufactured in Hungary...dunno personally...However IBM themselves had ended this line and switched to 60gxp's.

The shear number of failures listed here in the last 2 weeks makes me very leary of any 75gxp drive and any IBM product until they prove themselves.

I think they are a defective drive...not all IBM drives but the 75gxp undeniably has major issues.

AMDSoldier · May 30, 2001

Hmm darn I wish I knew about this before I ordered..

Well um thanks for the info, I'll do a search and c what I come up with.

Duvie · May 30, 2001

You may be one of the fortunate ones...read the warning signs and just pay attention, and back up sensitve data regularly...most failures don't seem to go suddenly but build up. Good luck

MCS · May 30, 2001

It seems to me that drives bought last year are not effected by the high failure rates (obviously they can still fail but only by normal percentages).

Duvie is absolutely right, backup regularly (everybody should anyway). If the drive is fine you will be very happy with it, it's a great performer - quiet and fast.

IBM have a util called Drive Fitness Test which you can download from their website. You can run this as a Quick (2 min) test or the Advanced Test and this will 99% pick up any problems. You might want to download this and run it every now and again. Generally though you will know early enough if the drive is going bad because you will get bad clusters/sectors and/or the drive will start making "strange" noises.

Best of luck!

jamison · May 30, 2001

I am pretty sure the problems with the 75GXP series was strictly with the 45GB model.

I have a 45GB 75GXP and a 75GB 75GXP and both work exceptional.

SecureID · May 30, 2001

The problems with the 75GXP were strictly only assosciated with the 45GB models. I bought one many many months ago, and it's the best god damn hard drive i have EVER used or owned. Absolutely no exceptions. It's in my main (this) computer. The problem of concern is a controller chip. When i bought my drive, they were the best damn thing out (imo still are, going by mine). And there was absolutely no word of the problem. I did alot of research on the 75GXP and the bottom line was they rocked. Now i don't know whether they altered components or used a new batch or what, but some time after i got mine the problems started comming up.
All i can say is my experience with recent IBM drives have been nothing but magnificent. This 45GB 75GXP is the best hard drive i've ever used.

Just one final note, Hard Disks are prone to failure. Regardless of brand, it just happens. There are always bad apples. But mine is certainly one the biggest and shinniest of the lot! And i love it.

Jimbo · May 30, 2001

I heve heard of these problems as well. I also own 6 of the 45GB wonders and have not had a single problem. Am I just lucky?
Apparently when they do fail (from what I read) they either do it out of the box, or at least in the first month of operation.
I have also read stories (storage review is full of them) of people with multiple failures in the same machine (up to 5 bad ones). This makes me suspect that the drives are very intolerent of either a flaky power supply, very rough handeling, or there is something else going inside the particular computer, other than IBM just making a drive worse that any Fujutsu (or fill in the blank of any other hated HDD Mfgr).
In closing, I think these things just flat out rock and are the best 7200 RPM drive out today.
If you are really concerned, then just hook up the box and loop IBM's drive fitness or the sandra burn-in for a couple of days before proceeding.

This is just from personal observation with the hardware I have.

SecureID · May 30, 2001

No your not just lucky, your like me, part of the majority. But there was probably a significant amount of problems to cancel the line. I know from my experience with it, along with many people i know, they simply rock. I don't know anyone who's had even the slightest glitch. Awesome drives.

MCS · May 30, 2001

Could a lot of it be a case of the more popular a drive is the more failures you will see, simply because they sheer volume of users owners them?

AMDSoldier · May 30, 2001

<< No your not just lucky, your like me, part of the majority. But there was probably a significant amount of problems to cancel the line. I know from my experience with it, along with many people i know, they simply rock. I don't know anyone who's had even the slightest glitch. Awesome drives. >>

I dunno I guess it could be part of the reason. But I've had 4 Maxtor drives and only 1 go out. Compared to owning 1 IBM drive and 1 going out.

Deebone · May 30, 2001

hi all,
I was runnin raid w/ 2 o' those 30gig bad boys on a abit VP-6... nearly two months in (or maybe it was even less) both drives made horrendous squealing sounds (or like metal knashing on metal ) needless to say they died quite soon after that... The rma person didnt sound too surprised on the phone when i said they squealed like stuck pigs (both of them)... the two i'm runnin now since then have yet to make a noise (KNOCKS LOUDLY ON WOOD)- then again i so manny gaddam fans i cant even hear anything. Oh. and just recently my friend's 30 giger just started making noises- i guess thats what he gets for making fun of my fried drives.

KEEP THESE DRIVES FROM BEING RUN SIDE WAYS- LIKE WHEN YOU'RE DIAGNOSING YOUR RIG ON A TABLE... IT SEEMS THE SQUEELING IS COMPOUNDED OR EVEN STARTED THROUGH THIS. at least thats what happened to that unfortunate friend of mine. sorry for the caps.

Celstar · May 30, 2001

So its not just the 45 GB drives that fail?

Deebone · May 30, 2001

yuppers... all of our drives are the 30 gigers... makes me wonder... theres some huge posts over in storage review... none of them are conclusive however.

Pikachu · May 30, 2001

Could someone answer this simple question? Are any of the re-badged Western Digital 75GXPs crapping out like this?

Raincity · May 30, 2001

What rebadged 75 GXP ? The IBM Western Digital deal has been over for along time.

Rain

DoOLiE11 · May 30, 2001

i've been running two 30 gigs for about a year now

when i first got them my main drive failed within a month

but the second one was fine. eveer since i got the rmaed drive

they have been goin strong with no problems

GT1999 · May 30, 2001

I used to think they were good drives until mine died after only 6-7 months of use, just a couple of days ago!

I thought it would never happen ..

Pikachu · May 30, 2001

Damn, the Western Digitals were built around the 75GXP, no? There were tons and tons of those sold, because they had rebates available when the IBMs were full priced. Have those same drives held up any better than the IBMs?

TravisBickle · May 30, 2001

10% RMA is very worrying!
5% is bad but probably a company can manage it.
>50% looks like sueing bait!

the 40GVs are going quite cheap now and show no signs of flagging. what was so different about them? where was the error in the 75GXP then?

Duvie · May 30, 2001

To the guy who asked if this may be a case of a popular sold drive therefore the high number of complaints...I don't think so...

I would think Maxtor is either ahead of IBM or close to them and I haven't come close to seeing problems with maxtor drives at the scale of the 75gxp line...not even a ratio of 6 to 1...

Does anybody know if many of these drives are oem or full retail boxed drives? I have always heard about this link to Hungary made drives...

subman · May 30, 2001

I had all 3 of my 30gb 75GXP drives fail in a period of 2 months. I have never had any other drive fail on me ever since my 20mb Seagate since 1983. I will never again buy an IBM product. Have now shifted to Seagates Barracudas as IBM and Seagate are the only 2 brands available locally.

Pikachu · May 30, 2001

Dang, I hate tracking this stuff down. I thought some people would know this off the cuff:

Western Digital Expert 25.7 (WD273BA)

"The Western Digital Expert 25.7, WD273BA, is identical to the IBM Deskstar 34 GXP. Besides a few different labels on the drives, you would have a hard time telling them apart if you mixed them up. The similarities don?t end at external looks either, as both drives performed so close in the benchmarks that they had virtually identical results. This really comes as no surprise, being that WD has been licensing IBM?s drive technology for the past few years. Just judging between the similarity in appearance, physical specifications, and performance, we would say WD basically is using the IBM design and just adding their logo." - Scott Gooden

Does this mean there was no WD equivilent to the 75GXP?

Edit: Uh, thanks for the help. I'll figure this sh!t out eventually:

Western Digital Caviar WD400BB

"The Caviar 205BA seemed to be WD's first attempt at a 7200 RPM unit without the help of IBM (who's technology assisted in the Expert series of drives)." - Eugene Ra

Looks like WD is building the better drive after all. Who'd of thunk it?

Raincity · May 30, 2001

Yes, The technology agreement between IBM and WD ended early last year and the 34 GXP was a model produced last year.

Rain

IBM 75GXP, bad harddrives?

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