Samsung HD204UI dying after 3 years, what's a reliable replacement?

As you can see from these HDTune screenshots, my Samsung HD204UI 2TB drive is on it's way out and is having trouble spinning up. In fact, after resuming from standby this evening I heard it struggling to spin up repeatedly and although I could access it, it showed all the folders as empty! After a cold restart, it's working again and I've already got all the important stuff backed up, so I just need to choose a reliable replacement now.

Most drives seem to only have a 2 year warranty (as did this one) although for an extra £7 I can get the WD Green 2TB with WD Care Express Plan, which increase it to 3 years and provides a 1 day replacement, so that seems worth it.

I already have a WD Green 2TB I purchased more recently and it seems OK and I like quiet drives. I'm using an SSD for my Windows and main games, so I don't really need the HDDs to be fast anyway. So is the WD Green 2TB considered reliable?

I'm surprised no one has shared their opinion'cause there's usually no shortage here. Were I in your position I'd google something like "large HD reliability statistics" or something similar and see what you find. The last time I looked Seagate was slipping. I'd go with WD or HGST these days.

+1 for Western Digital.

I'm using WD greens and I love them - they are nice and quiet.


Now, what's this drive's job? Just holding data or holding games or stuff that will be accessed often?
If the later - look for WD blacks as they are faster than the Greens for stuff like that.

I've actually been storing all my games and movies on my WD Green 2TB, whilst data like My Documents and Downloads, Technical stuff like WinPE builders and so on are on the Samsung, so it's fairly empty, whereas the WD is almost full.

I've got a SSD which holds the games I play most often and need the speed (ArmA, DCS, X-Plane) so it doesn't really matter if the WD Green is a bit slow for loading the other games that I don't play so often and which don't have a load of data to stream load. It probably would make more sense to keep my movies and music on the WD and move all the data and other stuff from the Samsung onto there and put the games on the Samsung, although it's probably best to keep My Documents on the faster Samsung as Windows accesses that folder quite a lot, including when booting, so it would slow things down a bit having it on the slower drive.

I might replace the Samsung with a WD Red but I've just bought a Toshiba 2TB USB3 drive for £65 http://www.ebuyer.com/509715-toshiba-2tb-stor-e-canvio-portable-hard-drive-silver-hdtc720es3ca as I needed another backup drive anyway and it's nicer having a portable one that doesn't need an external PSU, compared to my existing Hitachi 2TB USB3, which is also about four times the size!

Someone told me it might just be the Intel controller that doesn't get along with the Samsung drive, so I'm going to try it on a PCI SATA card I've got to see if that fixes the problem. It's actually not given me any more problems since I rebooted and apparently the spin-up time of 66 in the second screenshot is OK, so it might not actually be failing.

I'd certainly avoid Seagate as I've heard nothing but complaints about them. HGST cost about twice as much as other brands, at least the few I could find here in the UK do and apparently Toshiba 3.5" are using old tech at an old fab in China they got from WD, so they might not be that good (I can only hope that my portable drive was manufactered a while ago at a better facility), so WD seems to be the best choice.

I've had my 5x 2TB HD204UI drives actually for about the same length of time myself. All running in my NAS box actually for that time with 4x in Raid5 and 1x as just redundant backup. Here is my stats from my drive as a reference. Also this one has the most on hours, at 18,301 Hours vs 3x other drives at 12,200 hours and my backup at 4,800 some hours. All run typically at a cool 29-33C.



Overall though WD makes relatively good drives that I've had in the past. I would suggest them if you'd really like to use one. Course all HDD's can fail over time its a lottery draw in most cases.

Well the drive stopped working on me again and I could only browse to the folders, which then didn't show any contents. Rebooting may well have got it working again, as it has before but I took the opportunity to dig out my PCI SATA card and connect it to that. Turns out it's a Via VT6421A chipset.

Here's the screenshots from running on the PCI card:



I think 65 is OK for the spin-up time but I'm not sure why it only shows Warning for Health status now, when it showed Failed when the time was 65 on the Intel SATA, as per the 2nd screenshot in my first post.



As you can see, it also seems to have an issue with Ultra DMA CRC Error Count, which wasn't there before. I don't understand these SMART numbers anyway, why is 200 with a Threshold of 0 OK but 100 is a Warning?



I also seem to have an issue with the same reading for my SSD, connected to the Intel on-board SATA, which is a bit worrying. I'm not using cheap SATA cables, for the two HDDs I'm using the black ones that came with the board and for the SSD, a yellow one that came with my previous board I think, all with latching connectors on both ends.

Whilst running the Samsung HDD off the ViA PCI SATA card seems to have solved the spin-up problem (at least it hasn't happened since, touch wood), I'm now getting strange audio/video glitches.

I first experienced them the other night playing ArmA3, where the audio would stick/go into a loop (sounds like it's buzzing) and the video would stutter. In the past, when this happened (on my old AMD system I think but maybe it happened on this Intel system when I was initially tweaking the overclock as well) it invariably resulted in it locking up completely and I had to reboot but thankfully that didn't happen this time. I've played it a fair few times since upgrading to the Intel board and CPU without this happening, so the ViA card seems a likely suspect.

I've since experienced it once when watching a streaming video and again tonight playing Alien Isolation, although I think it might have only happened during the cutscenes, where it was quite prevalent. This game was actually running from the Samsung HDD but ArmA3 is on my SSD and I don't think needs to touch the Samsung at all. I'll try moving AI to the SSD and see if that makes any difference but it's looking like I have a choice between the drive not spinning up or these annoying glitches when gaming/streaming video As I was planning to move my games from the WD Green to the Samsung and use the WD for media and data files, it's a bit of a bummer if that's not going to be possible.

That drive is toast man.

Ditch it now.
Take it apart, and you'll have shiny metals frisbees to play with

Silver_Pharaoh said:

That drive is toast man.

Ditch it now.
Take it apart, and you'll have shiny metals frisbees to play with

Click to expand...

Why do you say that when it seems to be working fine on the ViA PCI SATA card? Is it really likely that it just happened to fail the day or so after I switched motherboards, after working faultlessly on my AMD board? So far the evidence seems to support the advice I received elsewhere that the Intel chipset just doesn't like this model for some reason but of course I'm being cautious and avoiding putting anything criticial on there until I've tested it a bit longer.

I'm getting mixed feelings about this drive. Works on that VIA chipset, but not in Intel.
I wouldn't trust it with data you wouldn't want lost IMHO.

If you have a spare rig to test it in, you can hook it up and see if SMART has any warning/errors. If not, then it just might be a bad port/cable or it really doesn't like Intel chipsets...

However, you mention strange audio glitches. Might be nothing, but it could also mean the drive can't read that sector where that audio file is stored.

TL;DR: Backup that data to a new drive to be safe, then you'll have a good drive with your data when that Samsung quits soon.

Even though its working it might really be a sign that the drive is on the way out. I wouldn't trust it with data at least at this time. I'd get a backup drive, copy the data off it and then if needed run some long formats on the drive and see if there is any new errors or if things get resolved on it before saying its fine again and trying it back on the old controller.

Silver_Pharaoh said:

I'm getting mixed feelings about this drive. Works on that VIA chipset, but not in Intel.
I wouldn't trust it with data you wouldn't want lost IMHO.

Click to expand...

Is that the Samsung that had a firmware upgrade to handle compatibility issues with certain Intel chipsets?

Silver_Pharaoh said:

I'm getting mixed feelings about this drive. Works on that VIA chipset, but not in Intel.
I wouldn't trust it with data you wouldn't want lost IMHO.

If you have a spare rig to test it in, you can hook it up and see if SMART has any warning/errors. If not, then it just might be a bad port/cable or it really doesn't like Intel chipsets...

However, you mention strange audio glitches. Might be nothing, but it could also mean the drive can't read that sector where that audio file is stored.

TL;DR: Backup that data to a new drive to be safe, then you'll have a good drive with your data when that Samsung quits soon.

Click to expand...

The problem with that is that it's already registered SMART errors whilst connected to the Intel controller and those aren't going to reset if I connect it to another PC (no more than they have after connecting it to the ViA PCI card). Having said that, I might well be able to stick the Samsung in my other AMD Phenom II X3 720 machine and take one of the drives out of that for my Intel machine. I think the biggest drive in there is only 1TB but that will probably do for now, although I've got a feeling that might be Samsung as well!

Regarding the audio glitches, as I mentioned ArmA3 is running from my SSD, not the Samsung, so it would seem that it's just the controller card being plugged in that's conflicting with something, as opposed to any problem with the drive causing problems reading data.

larrymoencurly said:

Is that the Samsung that had a firmware upgrade to handle compatibility issues with certain Intel chipsets?

Click to expand...

This is the only reported issue that was patched which I could find http://www.smartmontools.org/wiki/SamsungF4EGBadBlocks and it doesn't say anything about not spinning up on Intel chipset.

doveman said:

This is the only reported issue that was patched which I could find http://www.smartmontools.org/wiki/SamsungF4EGBadBlocks and it doesn't say anything about not spinning up on Intel chipset.

Click to expand...

Did you apply that patch?
I have the 155UI version which is susceptible to that glitch. Thankfully it hasn't happened to me yet and since my drive came for the classies here I would assume the firmware was updated on it.

Perhaps that patch/newer firmware would resolve the glitches with the drive and the Intel chipset. Only if it's actually in good health anyway...

Silver_Pharaoh said:

Did you apply that patch?
I have the 155UI version which is susceptible to that glitch. Thankfully it hasn't happened to me yet and since my drive came for the classies here I would assume the firmware was updated on it.

Perhaps that patch/newer firmware would resolve the glitches with the drive and the Intel chipset. Only if it's actually in good health anyway...

Click to expand...

I think I did when I got it but I can't be sure as rather stupidly the firmware number remains the same after patching.

Anyway, the drives having troubles even on the ViA card now, so I'll have to get a replacement.

I don't really need a particularly fast drive, as although I'll keep my games on it the ones that need to constantly stream a lot of data will be on my SSD (I'll probably get another SSD at some point to move some more games onto). I thought the WD Red were fast drives but it turns out they're only 5400RPM, so I'm not sure what advantage they have over the WD Green. I do prefer my drives to be as quiet as possible though. There's no point having two drives constantly spinning and making noise, so I'd keep all my data/My Documents and other files that are accessed frequently on my current WD Green 2TB and let the new drive with games and other stuff that isn't accessed very often spin down when I'm not using it. From what I've read, the Red doesn't spin down at all, so maybe I should avoid that?

I'll either get a 2TB or 3TB drive, so any comments on the following? I'll obviously shop around for the best price but these are the prices from Scan, for comparison purposes.

Western Digital 3Tb WD30EZRX SATA 3 Caviar Green Hard Drive £78.36
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3tb-...en-sata-6gb-s-intellipower-64mb-cache-8ms-ncq

Samsung/Seagate ST2000LM003 2TB Spinpoint M9T 2.5" SATA III £83.04 (whilst there's a price premium for 2.5" compared to 3.5" drives, they do tend to be a lot quieter)
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2tb-...ata-6gb-s-5400rpm-12ms-oem-ps3-4-pc-mac-ready

Western Digital 3TB Red WD30EFRX Hard Drive for 24x7 for 1 to 8 Bay NAS Boxes £91.57
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3tb-...intellipower-8ms-ncq-oem-24x7-with-nasware-20

HGST H3IKNAS30003272SE 3TB Deskstar NAS 24x7 Use HDD 3.5" 7200rpm £99.22
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3tb-...hdd-sata-iii-6gb-s-7200rpm-64mb-cache-8ms-ncq

HGST is WD just so you know.

The Reds are meant to be powered up 24/7, NAS and server type stuff.
To store your random everyday data, that WD30EZRX will be fine.

Also and FYI, It was found that the Greens spin around ~5000 RPM


Now, you want to avoid reds because they are always spinning? I would rather go with those IMHO In that case.
An HDD constantly spinning up and down is louder than one that is just spinning.
Take that 155UI Samsung I have. Makes a nice loud *click* right after what sounds like a huge fan spinning up. It's awful LOL.

That said, I only hear my Greens spin up when I boot. They are quite quiet.

Greens if you are tight on $$, Reds if you have the extra $$ to spend.

Ah, didn't know that, thanks.

Sure, when they spin up it can be more noticeable than if they're left constantly spinning but the air transmitted motor noise (and sometimes vibration) when they're running is quite noticeable as well, so when they spin down that noise is no longer present and the difference is quite noticeable. My second drive shouldn't be constantly spinning up and down, as I'll only keep stuff on there that's not regularly accessed.

If it's easier to keep the WD Green spun down when unused (I used to have wdilde run at boot to set the idle timeout to something sensible but it doesn't seem to work with Win8.1/ my Intel board, so hopefully I can do it from a DOS boot), it might make more sense to keep my games on that and put all my data that's frequently accessed on the WD Red, which might speed things up a bit as well. Having said that, once I get another SSD I'll probably move My Documents, etc to that, leaving mostly infrequently accessed data on both drives, meaning I'd probably want both drives to stay spun down a lot of the time, so maybe I need to get another WD Green to be able to do that?

With Greens, you (most likely) are able to control the idle timer with that utility.
That and pretty much any drive via Windows's "Turn off Hard Disk after x minutes" feature.

Yes, from that POV, a WD Green would be best for having a drive spin down often.
Another option is to run a program called Hotswap!

I use it to unmount my backup drive when not in use, so it naturally spins down. (from what I can tell anyway)
Basically, SATA is hot swappable, that program is the same as unplugging the SATA cable from the drive. (Which I can do and have done in the past.)

I'm not sure if the Windows timeout will work properly with the Reds though, if what I read about them constantly spinning is true, maybe it ignores that or goes into a low-power state but keeps spinning.

With the Greens, there's the opposite problem in that they timeout too quickly and so will probably spin-down before the Windows timeout is reached, resulting in regularly accessed drives constantly spinning up and down unless you increase the timeout with wdidle. Although I will want it spun down a lot of the time, I don't want it constantly cycling when I'm actually using it!

I'll have to check I can actually use wdidle from DOS with my current WD Green but assuming that works, another Green probably would be the best choice for me.