Samsung Spinpoint F1 1TB problems with Mac Pro

FWIW, I read the Newegg reviews for this drive ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductReview.aspx?Item=N82E16822152102&SortField= 0&SummaryType=0&Pagesize=100&SelectedRating=-1&PurchaseMark=&VideoOnlyMark=False &Page= ). Out of 94 reviews, 5 or 6 explicitly said that the drive was tested on a Mac (some reviews said "Mac Pro" while others just said "Mac"). All these Mac-related reviews had positive reviews for the Samsung drive and no problems reported.

So, I'm torn between getting the well reviewed Samsung or another model. Another possibility is the Seagate 7200.11, although its performance isn't as highly rated as the Samsung (although I'll take reliability any day over slightly better performance, if reliability is an issue). For other folks with the Samsung Spinpoint, what has your recent experience been?

Thanks.

Message was edited by: randman

Samsung has a RAID edition of the F1 but costs significanly more. And avoid OEM. With that, you are as good as gold.

http://eshop.macsales.com/search/Samsung3.5%22+SATA+HardDrive

Thanks for the info. The RAID edition (HE103UJ) is quite a bit more expensive than the non-RAID version (HD103UJ). Aside: the link above for the non-RAID version mentions that its model number is HD753LJ, but HD753LJ is the 750GB version, although towards the top of the page, it says "SAMHD103UJ"; I assume that the "HD753LJ" is just a typo, and it's really the 1TB non-RAID version.

Has there been actual published testing or do folks have actual experience that shows that the non-OEM is better than the OEM and the RAID version better than the non-RAID (other than Samsung marketing info. publishing an MTBF for the RAID version)?

The non-OEM version is a pretty good price. The web page doesn't explicitly say its OEM, so can one assume it's the non-OEM version?

Can you replicate this problem with any kind of consistency? I have the same Samsung HDD and am willing to help replicate the issue(s) -- I haven't had any issues so far (2 weeks) but my heaviest usage has just been moving around RAW photo files in Lightroom.

I haven't had the problem myself. I'm just polling what other folks' experience has been. heycarlos - which Samsung HDD do you have? HD1037UJ or HE103UJ (the Enterprise RAID version)? OEM or non-OEM?

Thanks.

Much more feedback on problems mentioned by users on Newegg and here with OEM drives from WD and Samsung, yes. And you aren't getting the same firmware usually at all. RAID optimized drives do have unique firmware and WD was the first to sell RAID editions.

I have some MaxLine Pro drives. They don't bench well as single drives, but put them in a RAID... and they really walk out front, and surprised me -- so of course I now use them just in RAIDs.

Newegg seems to sell mostly OEM and MacSales carries bare retail drives or 'white box' but not OEM.

The hatter or anyone who knows,

I cannot find a retail version (non oem version) of this drive anywhere and I called the link you gave and they don't sell it either.

Do you know where I can buy a retail version of this 1TB Samsung Spinpoint SATA drive?

Thx-

Looks like I'm having the same issues as others with this drive, the 1TB version from OWC. Mac Pro Dual 2.8 Quad Core running 10.5.4.

Here's what happens for me.

1. Place a Fusion on the boot 500GB Seagate drive and rip a DVD to the Seagate drive. Works everytime.
2. Copy the Fusion VM to the Samsung and rip a DVD to the Samsung drive. Fail 10 of 10 times. The VM locks up and doesn't respond. Disk Utility will launch but sees nothing, then hangs. Finder hangs. Hard reboot required.
3. Go back to the VM on the Seagate drive, rip a DVD to folder on the Samsung. Fail 10 out of 10. Same symptoms with nothing responding.

Also, "put disks to sleep" is disabled - however it almost seems like that is exactly what happens.

I originally partitioned the Samsung as one drive, after a few failures I split it into two partitions, absolutely no difference. After reboot the drives always mounts. The drive is dead silent and the space is great, but I'm not sure it'll work out.

Is this reason enough to RMA the drive for replacement?

That is horrible news. So yes, I'd RMA for something different.

I know VMware has said there are problems with unbuffered writes or something with Leopard.

I'd ask for Seagate or the new WD 1TB Black
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Western%20Digital/WD1001FALS/
seeing how well WD drives have been overall with Mac Pro.

Looks like I need to do some further testing, I was finally able to complete a rip using Fusion on Samsung and saving to the Samsung, but another rip right after failed. I looked into the unbuffered issue and that may be the root cause. I've got a few other machines/drives I can test this buffer issue and will try that in the next few days.

Also, using Handbrake I'm able to save iPod Touch video to the Samsung with no issues whatsoever.

Why should it matter if the disk is OEM or retail? If the specs are otherwise the same (ie: one model doesn't have a bigger cache than another -- in that case it's a different product, not just OEM vs. retail) then the drives are identical. The retail package comes in a box and often includes mounting screws. You don't use the mounting screws with the Mac Pro. Once its out of the box you shouldn't even be able to tell the difference between an OEM and retail drive.

If the OEM drives have problems, then the retail drives do too.

The firmware is often not identical.

OWC does sell these drives. Here is the link

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Samsung/HD103UJ/

I am just about to buy 2 of them (one to to go internal on my iMac G5 and the other to be my TimeMachine backup in an external dock).

- Shawn

I have a Samsung Spinpoint 1Tb in bay 4 and 2 Hitachi Deskstar 1TB in bays 2 and 3, no problem with any of them dropping connection.

What does the S.M.A.R.T status read on your Samsung drive? It is possible you have a duff drive, it does happen every once in a while

"Fastest available" really depends on how the drive is used, not just raw specifications. And Samsung doesn't have a strong reputation for highly reliable mission-critical disk drives. In fact, my recent experience with 3 different Samsung drives convinces me that we won't be buying any in the near future.