ST3500320AS reports its size as 0GB

[msurgeon]

I agree with rekabis in his (her?) frustration with the arrogant, and frequently self-serving bluster of various responders on this thread. Suffice to say that the price one must be willing to pay for the "valuable" advice on this forum is to allow him or herself to be characterized as a lazy, freeloading imbecile who just wants to pick other peoples' brains and give nothing back in return. Some people don't feel sufficiently appreciated if they just give away knowledge to supplicants without exacting a healthy measure of humble gratitude and adoration. As far as getting an answer from Seagate on the zero capacity problem, you might as well give up on that one. Arguments and analogies to the contrary notwithstanding, they're not about to be altruistic. And for those who suggest that the problem is somehow user-related I can state that we've had several of these drives with the exact same problem submitted by various types of users who did nothing more than breathe in the presence of the drive. For those of you who may have figured out the solution through your own independent efforts and fortitude, my hat is off to you.

[bnice]

The problem is not with Doomer The HDD Lamer but with Seagate company itself.

Are the products fit for use as described in the sales blurb. If not you have full right for a full refund and more than possibly data recovery of your data. Seagate sold you bad drives whether direct or indeirect, they are responsible. Forget the five year warranty it has nothing to do with that.

I know of a fridge freezer that failed soon after purchase, the whole item was replaced along with a nice big fat cheque for the contents lost. Why do you think motherboard manufactures deliver bios updates for life of the boards. They would go bankrupt very quickly if they didn't with all the board returned for refunds. Go look on the internet for your country trading rights as a buyer. You will find they not only will give you refund for the drives bought, they also are responsible for recovery of your data. You did not sign a contract on buying the item. Sure they have a clause but it is not a binding one from seagate to customer. The great drive swindle of all the manufactures has one conclusion customers so far is the only loser. Use your countries rights and make any company product that fails within certain time frame pay you back. After all the end result for everyone is better made drives that last the expected durations.

Damn am i peeved after listening to the news today (lehman). Very unexpected to say the least, consequences for us all that don't look good atm.

[dubzero]

I bought the ST3500320AS 500GB SATA-II drive about a month ago and everything was good. But yesterday my drive stopped working - now it is recognized as ST3500320AS 0GB (zero GB)! And of course I can read nothing of it, Windows DiskManager doesn't see it at all (Device manager does, though) SeaTools for Windows are unable to even get info about the drive, though Seagate Enterprise showed me info about it, but is unable to run any tests. Also tried the SeaTools for DOS. It recognized the drive, shows its serial number, but every test is FAILED. I also tried to change the capacity - failed. In info it shows strange big number as a capacity (something like 92323727372372.223GB).
I found the AD14 firmware on Seagate website and successfully have updated HDD by it. Now SeaTools reported the new version of firmware but the size is still reported as 0GB and I can't get access to data (btw, I tested the HDD on 2 different computers)....
I also tried MHDD. It sees it, but the size is reported also as 0. Moreover, it says the LBA is not supported and that is why it actually can do nothing! the LBA Maximum is reported as 0 too.... I really need info from this HDD, please advise!

Im sorry to bump this old Topic

but I have exactly the same problem with my ST3500320AS

Is there any way amateur (like me ) could recover the data??

only way is to go to recovery company??

please advice

[BlackST]

No there is no amateur option unless you know one

[shahij]

Need World Class.....

[wiseleo]

Well, dubzero, look at it this way - at least you have a choice of more than just a few super gurus in the world who could fix. As recent as a month ago your choices were far more limited. You won't fix it without special tools, but at least you now have a choice of evil data recovery companies that invest in expensive tools and updates who can do it for you.

[BlackST]

What's worst is that the best is yet to come... .