Samsung Spinpoint F4EG HD204UI 2TB compatibility?

[soixante4]

To all,
I sucessfullly managed to have my 2*Samsung HD204UI 2To recognized in my DS211j, without patching the disks because they are dated 12/2010.

Here is a summary of tips and tricks I got from nbaner (thanks mate!) and some others, with web links that works

SUMMARY
1. Don't install the (unpatched) Samsung HD204UI on DS211 and power on/perform smart test!
2. IF FAB DATE OF HDD is >=12/2010 go to number 4! Made boot CD with Samsung patch using the .iso file made by HarryPotter, found in this thread on page 11: http://forum.synology.com/enu/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=27905&start=150 Source fom Samsung (useless when using iso : http://www.samsung.com/global/business/hdd/faqView.do?b2b_bbs_msg_id=386)
3.Disconnect computer hard drive and connected the first Samsung hard drive, boot computer with above CD, apply patch, power off computer, and then repeat for second Samsung hard drive
(Note: While applying the patch once you see the successful message, you need to directly switch off PC from socket and not use any traditional shutdown method)
4. Install HD204UI first disk on Bay 1 of DS211. (The bay numbering is top down approach where top bay is bay 1 and bottom bay is bay 2).
5. Next through synology assistant install DSM3.0 (before doing that download the latest DSM version DSM3.0-1354 which is synology_88f6282_211_1354.pat available on synology download center.)
6. Reboot diskstation after DSM update.
7. Next download DS211 spin patch file synology_88f6282_211.pat through synology suppport link and update DSM. Here is the link that WORKS (login+pwd included) : ftp://on-line:online_user@ftp.synology.com/on-line/DSM3.0/spinup/
8. Reboot diskstation after update
9. Next install your second HD204UI disk on DS211
10. Once booted up you should be fine and then you can do your checks through disk manager and also do the smart tests
11. You might find the first disk in state initialized but not the second. But don't worry. When you create the volume using the second disk this disk will be first initialized during volume creation and then the volume created.
12. Once the volume is created on both disks you will see the status on both disks same.

I am know struggling to have my Ubuntu accesing the disks, but I think I will survive.
Thanks VERY much for your help, your time and your kindness.
I stay tuned, I am sure to have some questions soon...see ya!

[xcopy]

I'm testing out a new solution for bad Samsung drives that I hope will work...

I received my first HItachi 2TB drive today (model 5k3000) and if it works, I'll switch over to them.

I'm really sick of dealing with these F4 drives. The RMA process on my failed drives won't be done for another month or so (the RMA takes a long time, especially with my delay of trying to manage my remaining data and erasing what I can)...

My recommendation is for everyone thinking of getting a F4 drive to wait until Samsung either issues a formal announcement that they're revised the firmware (with a new, verifiable number) and it's working successfully, or buy another brand of drive. I think my choice will be to use another drive vendor and avoid Samsung drives.

I've got a couple Hitachi drives running in one DS211 already (and they're on the approved list) and Seagate in another DS211 (also on list).. both are fine so far and I don't have to wait for Synology to try and make a bad drive work... this has been a 3 month long ordeal so far, and before it's over it will be 4+ months.. Forget Samsung...

[CocoPops]

Hi,

As per my earlier post.

I've kept an eye on the Smart Info and everything seems ok.
Soixante4 has it spot on with his post instructions
Although as I was using 12/2010 drives I didn't patch them, as Samsung said they were already patched.
So I just used steps 4 through 12.

[soixante4]

Cocopops,
same for me , I adjust my previous post accordingly.
Cheers.

[xed]

I purchased the Synology DS1511+ with five Samsung Spinpoint F4 2.0TB each. They were all dated 2011-01 so they were practically right off the shelf. Did not bother doing any firmware upgrade on them and have been testing the S.M.A.R.T. features regularly without issue.

So far I am pretty happy with the performance, although I suspect that I would have been happy with the WD EARS or Hitachi drives as well. At this point, I believe my old Intel 2.4GHz Dual-core E6600 is the bottleneck in terms of network I/O. WIth a D-Link 1Gbps hub and 1Gbps card on the PC, I can squeeze roughly 70-75Mb/sec maximum and that is with 4K jumbo packets both configured on the NAS and with my PC network card.

[mfenetre]

Hi,

Thanks soixante4 for the detailled walkthrough.
I'm very happy to see the message posted by GhostLink viewtopic.php?f=26&t=27905&start=285#p134554
confirming that drives made 12.2010 and after are already patched (thank you Ghostlink for posting this !)
My install was not "by the book", I installed an unpatched 3.0 DSM, so I guess I'll have to live with the "in_the_past" error
For the moment I have the 3.1 Beta, everything seems ok, but I'll gladly update to a stable realease !

Thanks for your help all !

[Townie]

xcopy, whilst I don't doubt that you have had problems I can't help but think you've been unlucky or there is a compatibility issue with your dock. The data corruption issue is fixed by the firmware update, that's a fact. The guys at smartmon tools. who confirmed it had a problem also confirm it is fixed here. (While also backhandedly slapping them for not updating the firmware rev. no. in the process)
http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/smartm ... GBadBlocks

The fact that many people haven't had any problems with these drives also confirm it's not a design flaw. The long term reliabilty of these drives can only be determined over a longer period, they haven't been out long enough for that data to be collated yet.

You have had so many problem drives I cannot help but think there are other issues. I have had many drives die prematurely but not at the rate you are experiencing which is staggeringly high.

Is there a compatibility issue with the Advace Format Technology patition alignment and Windows formatting them properly?

Samsung Advanced Technology patition alignment tool for Windows 7 and Vista is here along with estool.
http://www.samsung.com/global/business/ ... n_aft.html

Do you have the latest driver for your Intel Chipset as referenced here.
http://www.intel.com/support/chipsets/i ... 031502.htm

Format the drives using estool and then try them on a mainboard SATA port and see how they behave
Only by eliminating all other possibilities can you definitively say that the hard drives are at fault.

Everyone has an opinon about HDD's and all manufacturers will be on someone's "Don't touch with a bargepole" list due to a personal experience. If I held that opinion about every hard drive that had died prematurely there would be none left for me to buy.
My own opinion is that all HDD's seem to be getting more unreliable but no one manufacturer stands out as being either great or bad.

[JoyrexJ9]

I've just ordered a DS211+ and two of these drives.

Now I find this 21 page thread and I'm more than a bit worried! One of the big problems is I don't have access to a desktop PC to install the disks in if I do need to patch the firmware.
Can the firmware be patched via a USB SATA enclosure?

[cfuttrup]

I'm really sick of dealing with these F4 drives.

Based on feedback in this forum + QNAP forum (with equally long thread > 20 pages) and other sources on the internet, I decided to by an F3 drive instead ... yes, it is based on 4 x 500 GB platters, it is almost 20% more expensive, it is slower and so on ... but I have not found any reports about problems with F3 drives.

/Claus

[Schwartz]

I purchased the Synology DS1511+ with five Samsung Spinpoint F4 2.0TB each. They were all dated 2011-01 so they were practically right off the shelf. Did not bother doing any firmware upgrade on them and have been testing the S.M.A.R.T. features regularly without issue.

So far I am pretty happy with the performance, although I suspect that I would have been happy with the WD EARS or Hitachi drives as well. At this point, I believe my old Intel 2.4GHz Dual-core E6600 is the bottleneck in terms of network I/O. WIth a D-Link 1Gbps hub and 1Gbps card on the PC, I can squeeze roughly 70-75Mb/sec maximum and that is with 4K jumbo packets both configured on the NAS and with my PC network card.

I just got a DS1511+ too and installed 3x of these drives. I flashed them on the PC first to be sure they were up to date. I also upgraded the DS1511+ ram to 3GB. I have a i7-930 running at 4.2Ghz with a add in Intel NIC and Jumbo set to 9K on everything. I am seeing the same performance that you are.

I also have a HP Mediasmart EX495 and I get 110+MB/s from it so I am not sure why the performance with the DS1511+ is what it is. I have 2x more of the drives on the way and will be installing them and checking my speeds again. I'm not sure if it is the disks limiting my speeds or what. I was expecting better performance.

[xcopy]

xcopy, whilst I don't doubt that you have had problems I can't help but think you've been unlucky or there is a compatibility issue with your dock. The data corruption issue is fixed by the firmware update, that's a fact. The guys at smartmon tools. who confirmed it had a problem also confirm it is fixed here. (While also backhandedly slapping them for not updating the firmware rev. no. in the process)
http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/smartm ... GBadBlocks

The fact that many people haven't had any problems with these drives also confirm it's not a design flaw. The long term reliabilty of these drives can only be determined over a longer period, they haven't been out long enough for that data to be collated yet.

You have had so many problem drives I cannot help but think there are other issues. I have had many drives die prematurely but not at the rate you are experiencing which is staggeringly high.

Is there a compatibility issue with the Advace Format Technology patition alignment and Windows formatting them properly?

Samsung Advanced Technology patition alignment tool for Windows 7 and Vista is here along with estool.
http://www.samsung.com/global/business/ ... n_aft.html

Do you have the latest driver for your Intel Chipset as referenced here.
http://www.intel.com/support/chipsets/i ... 031502.htm

Format the drives using estool and then try them on a mainboard SATA port and see how they behave
Only by eliminating all other possibilities can you definitively say that the hard drives are at fault.

Everyone has an opinon about HDD's and all manufacturers will be on someone's "Don't touch with a bargepole" list due to a personal experience. If I held that opinion about every hard drive that had died prematurely there would be none left for me to buy.
My own opinion is that all HDD's seem to be getting more unreliable but no one manufacturer stands out as being either great or bad.

Thanks for the post, I know it sounds overwrought and I agree with you almost completely,but...Very few could be that unlucky when it comes to drives, and the odds are astronomical against. The fact that many people don't have problems is because they're either not looking, or their system won't trigger it.

I've never had drives die like this. I'm certainly willing to say the docks and/or external enclosures *could* be at fault, but docks from multiple (3x) manufacturers? It' highly unlikely, especially since there are many more millions of the docks and enclosures in use than F4s. None of the other complaints I've read have been from dock users, yet many others have also had a rash of dead F4s. if we do say that it's my usage environment, would you seriously want to buy a drive that wouldn't work in an external drive dock/enclosure? For me, the answer is no.

I don't hate Samsung, Seagate, or any other drive mfg. We agree that no mfg, not even WD, makes quality drives any more. I've had many Seagate failures in the last couple of years and have learned some hard lessons, but I've also had failures from every mfg. They're mechanical devices and hence are ephemeral.

One caveat is that all my drives were mfg'd in Oct/Nov and the first 3 died before the patch was available. I accepted the patch requirement for new drives thinking that it would solve the problem. It didn't, as I've outlined here ad nauseam. I've also maintained the firmware release was to blame - not the hardware - rendering 100% of the drives bad.

Regardless of the smarttools problem, it was clearly NOT the only problem. I'm using at least 20 other drives from WD (most Black, some Blue, no green), Seagate (multiple models), Hitachi (1TB and 2TB now), and have even thrown some Maxtor in for fun. Not one has a problem in any dock or external enclosure (the exact same docks/enclosures). Any who know software/hardware development can tell you that not finding any bugs does not mean none exist. Samsung's original patch has not solved this problem, of that I'm sure, and I'm told there is now a NEW patch (not confirmed yet).

So is the problem mine, or theirs? They've admitted a problem with their firmware, confirmed that my problems were caused by it, and with Win 7 x64 boxes, AF issues are unlikely. When I get the drives back from Samsung (they had better be 2011 models) I'll decide then what to do. For now, if this Hitachi 2TB solution works, the Samsungs will probably be dumped.

UPDATE- newegg.com, my US source, shows lots of good reviews (many are duplicated though), but if you want to find out what's really going on, read the negative, or 1, 2, and 3-star reviews. A particular 1-star review where the drive went up in smoke was pretty funny; the author wrote in the "Pros" section, "Holds a lot of data for you to lose".

No, I'm not the only one experiencing the data loss problem and though I'm upset about all the hours I've wasted loading, unloading, and moving data from 5 failed drives (20-30 hours, at least), at least I can laugh about someone's more humorous view. BTW - I even left a 3 star review there after the first failures thinking it was a fluke. In reality, even the 3-star reviews are littered with failure stories and I'd remove my review if possible.. So much for Samsung quality...

[xcopy]

To all,
I sucessfullly managed to have my 2*Samsung HD204UI 2To recognized in my DS211j, without patching the disks because they are dated 12/2010.

Here is a summary of tips and tricks I got from nbaner (thanks mate!) and some others, with web links that works

SUMMARY
1. Don't install the (unpatched) Samsung HD204UI on DS211 and power on/perform smart test!
2. IF FAB DATE OF HDD is >=12/2010 go to number 4! Made boot CD with Samsung patch using the .iso file made by HarryPotter, found in this thread on page 11: http://forum.synology.com/enu/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=27905&start=150 Source fom Samsung (useless when using iso : http://www.samsung.com/global/business/hdd/faqView.do?b2b_bbs_msg_id=386)

And if <=11/2010, throw in trash?

3.Disconnect computer hard drive and connected the first Samsung hard drive, boot computer with above CD, apply patch, power off computer, and then repeat for second Samsung hard drive
(Note: While applying the patch once you see the successful message, you need to directly switch off PC from socket and not use any traditional shutdown method)

Are you saying that if you use the power switch, it won't work?

I'm not sure if I understand you, but according to Samsung's web site, they say don't do a "warm boot", which means shutting down by using the OS. You won't be able to do that if you're booting from the DOS disk as outlined in this thread; you have to physically shut the machine down by using the power switch. There is no requirement to "pull the plug" if that's what you mean by "socket".

[mark]

@xcopy: I have 5 F4EGs running 24/7 in JBOD (manufactured aug/2010). I have not experienced any problems thus far, but I keep an eye on them.
You say you will switch over to HItachi 2TB drive (model 5k3000) but I do not see them on the compatibility list for
the DS509+ which I have. Are they really on the Synology compatibility list?

[xcopy]

@xcopy: I have 5 F4EGs running 24/7 in JBOD (manufactured aug/2010). I have not experienced any problems thus far, but I keep an eye on them.
You say you will switch over to HItachi 2TB drive (model 5k3000) but I do not see them on the compatibility list for
the DS509+ which I have. Are they really on the Synology compatibility list?

The Hitachi 2TB is not on the list yet, nor do I know if they're testing it. It's a new drive that has just been released so I'm taking a chance that it will be OK. I'm testing it as a backup drive in a PC. I want to see what happens to it under daily use where I can keep an eye on it...

I also have Hitachi drives (1TB) running in one DS211and I'll put them in another one too if it works.

As for your Samsung drives, unfortunately they're old and have bad firmware. You should fix them, or try to fix them I should say. If Samsung gets the firmware right in the future, these drives may be fine, but IMO there's still a problem today.

[mark]

@xcopy,

I still need to buy 5 extra 2 TB harddisks. But they all have problems. Let us hope that the Hitachi HDs work well.
Once they are on the compatibility list, I will buy them as well.