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Maxtor Hard Drive RMA

M

Max Power

Gawd
Joined
Jan 30, 2005
Messages
515
I bought a 200GB 8MB Maxtor on here awhile back and everything was fine and dandy for about two weeks until the drive failed and it now makes a loud clicking noise on boot.

Anyway, I figured I could RMA it and I checked Maxtor's site with my serial number and it says it is RMAable. The only problem is, their RMA procedure confuses the hell out of me. When I RMAed my Western Digital drive awhile back they had a neat little form to be filled out. It seems like Maxtor doesn't actually want you to RMA things :(

If anyone here has RMAed a Maxtor before I would like to know exactly how to do it, thanks.
 
Yes, I have RMA'd to maxtor before. After getting the "code" and putting it in on their RMA thing on the website and getting it confirmed that it was RMA-able.... I chose the advanced replacement method on the website. Waited for my new drive to come, then used that packing to send my bad drive back with the RMA number.
 
Dark Ember said:
Yes, I have RMA'd to maxtor before. After getting the "code" and putting it in on their RMA thing on the website and getting it confirmed that it was RMA-able.... I chose the advanced replacement method on the website. Waited for my new drive to come, then used that packing to send my bad drive back with the RMA number.
Click to expand...
How do I get the "code"?
 
You download their utility, run it by booting from it on a floppy. It then does some diagnostics and will return a code that you then use.
 
Mr. Baz said:
You download their utility, run it by booting from it on a floppy. It then does some diagnostics and will return a code that you then use.
Click to expand...

Exactly. There should be links to the utility during the RMA process. It does a bunch of SMART DST tests and returns a code based on that.
 
Maxtors RMA procedure is a major reason why that vendor is banned from my systems now.

First, the floppy provided is not a plain image, you need that stupid windoze program to make the floppy. Not that easy if you are not running Windoze, eh.

After calling them about it they told me where to find a CD image and that was actually a true image that I could burn from anywhere.

Only to see their f...icking test application just hang on my drive, so I still didn't get the error code I could put into their fascist website.

I called them and had to tell them how the hanging screens looks like and then they gave me a RMA number.

Certainly not worth it if you are a busy professional. All that althought the SMART status of the drive was reported as "bad" by the PC BIOS on startup. That could certainly have been good enough for them to rule out errors on my part.
 
Most of the VAR's I know have HD diagnostics ready to go and expect drive failures. I know that I do, and I'm not even a VAR - I just build boxes on the side. They are mechanical after all. Also, Maxtor is in no way obligated to believe the SMART data returned by the system BIOS. There are several vendor specific SMART codes that the BIOS could potentially misinterpret. Also, most of the users I've talked to, even the ones that say Maxtor drives "suck," were quite pleased with their warranty service and said that the process was pretty easy. My point? Everybody has had bad experiences, and no vendor is perfect. But if Maxtor's service was really this bad, like what I said with SirKenin's bad experiences with WD drives, they would not be in business. The competition is too tight in this industry for it to be any other way. Also, I really don't think that Maxtor's website is "fascist" - perhaps a better expression could be chosen there? ;)
 
Mr. Baz said:
You download their utility, run it by booting from it on a floppy. It then does some diagnostics and will return a code that you then use.
Click to expand...
Oh, so do you have to download their stupid little program, thanks. With WD I didn't have to use their program.

Would it be too much to ask for the link where I type the RMA number in? I'm gonna plug in the drive tomorrow and get the number from it.
 
If the drive is not working and is making a loud clicking sound i question if its even going to show up in the bios such that you can run diagnostics on it

I would call up techsupport and say the drive no longer shows up in the bios, does not spin up, and makes a loud clicking sound and is installed in a machine incompatable with thier test software (EG. IBM RS/6000 or Sun Sparcstation)
they will issue you a RMA number on the spot (or atleast they did for me the last few times)
 
tiebird321 said:
If the drive is not working and is making a loud clicking sound i question if its even going to show up in the bios such that you can run diagnostics on it

I would call up techsupport and say the drive no longer shows up in the bios, does not spin up, and makes a loud clicking sound and is installed in a machine incompatable with thier test software (EG. IBM RS/6000 or Sun Sparcstation)
they will issue you a RMA number on the spot (or atleast they did for me the last few times)
Click to expand...
I'll try that, thankyou.
 
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