(Old Model) Seagate 1TB Desktop SSHD(Solid State Hybrid Drive) SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Bare Drive (ST1000DX001)

I received 2 drives on 9/25. The very first thing I did was use Seagate Disk Tools to clone the disk. After the restart and during the copy process it only made it to phase 2. Then I started seeing errors about not being able to write to the new disk. I booted back into Windows 7 64-bit and started to troubleshoot. When trying to use Microsoft’s Disk Manager or Seagate’s SeaTools, the disk would disappear from the chain otherwise it would “display”. I could not complete formatting the drive as I was getting an I/O error. Using soft restarts I could not see the new HDD during POST. If I powered off the machine and did a cold restart then the drive would appear in POST.On the same late morning I used the 2nd disk. This time I went straight to formatting the disk then trying to clone it. I again couldn’t format the disk. So then I tried cloning the disk. That didn’t work. The drive would show up in Microsoft’s Disk Manager until I tried to start accessing it. Then I stuck the drive into a 2nd computer and tried to install Windows 7 64-bit from DVD. It looks like it copied the data just fine but after the restart BIOS couldn’t find any bootable devices and once again the drive disappeared from POST list.Contacted Seagate’s Tech Support. There are no firmware updates for these drives. There are no support pages at all for these drives on SeaGate’s web site. Tech Support said that all the steps I took were the correct ones for troubleshooting. They have not heard of any problems or defects with any specific batches of ST2000DX001s. They didn’t even have their own stock to replace the HDDs since they are so new.At this point I gave up. Contacted Amazon to get 2 new replacements. So far I’m not happy with Amazon as I’ve clearly stated that I want replacement drives but I’ve just recently saw an e-mail about a refund. Amazon said they tested them and they were fine but they were not clear HOW they tested them even after asking them to explain what they’ve done.I know Seagate’s HDDs will work eventually and I think I just got a bad batch of 2. I’d update the post and stars if Amazon replaces my 2 drives and I can get them to work.Update 2013/10/01Amazon Customer Service apologized for the refund glitch. They offered to honor the original price I paid since the HDDs now cost more plus they offered free 1-day shipping. All I needed to do was place a new order and contact Customer Service with my two order numbers. I placed my order and I’m a little happier. Still need to look at my credit card statements for refunds. I just really want working HDDs.Update 2013/10/09A lot has gone on since my last post…Drives 3 & 4 arrived. They behave the same as drives 1 & 2 but a little bit better but still unusable.I’ve been in contact with Seagate Support again for drives 3 & 4. (Their support rocks. If you have any problems with your drives contact them and explain your situation. They want to help.) I got an advanced replacement disk from them today. That is disk #5 (drives 1 & 2 were returned to Amazon, disks 3 & 4 I still have). Disk #5 passed the SeaTools for Windows tests (the 1st disk to do so) but I still was unable to format the disk or use Seagate’s DiskWizard to ‘clone’ or ‘add a new disc’ to my system. Then I took the 5th drive to a 2nd computer and tried to install windows 7 64-bit from DVD and the installer couldn’t use the disk. I’m returning the advanced replacement drive to Seagate after fighting with it for 4 hours. One thing to note is that DiskWizard does mention that the 2 TB disk is ‘Unsupported’ on one of the wizard pages going through the clone process.All I can really say is that there are either some incompatibilities with the 2 systems I have OR there might be a defect. I’m working with Seagate Customer Care to get to the bottom of this. They want to collect the drives I’ve been having problems with to see if there are any defects. I’m hoping that it is a firmware defect that can quickly be resolved so I can start using these disks. Seagate is a really good company that does stand behind its products. I’ve used them for 15 years and will continue to purchase them.All of the disks I’ve used were model: ST2000DX001All of the disks I’ve used had Firmware: CC43Disk #3’s PN: 1CM164 – 300Disk #3’s FW (firmware): CC43Disk #3’s Date: 14092Disk #3’s Site: TKDisk #4’s PN: 1CM164 – 300Disk #4’s FW (firmware): CC43Disk #4’s Date: 14092Disk #4’s Site: TKDisk #5’s PN: 1CM164 – 300Disk #5’s FW (firmware): CC43Disk #5’s Date: 14102Disk #5’s Site: TK[LAST UPDATE] 2013/12/02 (I was very late adding this last comment – sorry)The problem with my scenario was that my machine/motherboard (ESC G31T-M Rev 1.0) was too old to understand the 4K disk. While the disk would show up as soon as it was accessed it would disappear. There are a couple of workarounds IF you want to keep a drive like this in an old machine. You could try getting a new SATA card instead of using the on-board ports. You could try a RAID card.Also with my scenario Seagate Tech Support went above and beyond to help me. They dug into it as much as they could and came up with an answer. Love them for it. Customer Support has drastically waned over the years. But not at Seagate. They were the definition of ‘Customer Support’/’Customer Care’. I will stick with them because of this experience. They should be a standard for a lot of other companies. Kudos guys (I know you are reading this).Since this posting I’ve ordered an 4 additional ST2000DX001 HDDs.