Samsung Spinpoint F1 1TB problems with Mac Pro

I've never run into that situation, unless the drive was OEM'd by a particular manufacturer (like Compaq or Dell). Can you name a manufacturer that routinely loads different firmware in their retail vs. OEM drives, and what purpose it serves?

I RMA'd the Samsung, unfortunately I just couldnt get anything resolved with the drop outs and freezes. Went with the WD Black Caviar and it hasn't had any issues with anything I've thrown at it.

I wouldn't not recommend the Samsungs, it could have been an isolated issue with that specific drive, others may have no issues. It was my first attempt at trying Samsung. Turned out just like my first Maxtor - not good. I've had good luck with Seagate and WD, but the 1TB Seagates seem to be having issues.

FYI, I wound up getting three of the Samsung HE103UJ drives (http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Samsung/HE103UJ/) from OWC (non-OEMs). These are the "enterprise" versions of the Samsung Spinpoint F1's and are intended for RAID. I set them up in a RAID 0 array in my Mac Pro. I've had them for a month now, and they've been working great. Thanks to hatter for suggesting them.

Glad you had success - and for posting back after insuring a month's use they work.

I will echo your question as I do not think that Samsung sells a "Retail" version of this hard drive. Case in point: I e-mailed both companies and OWC's description of what they sell is virtually identical to Newegg's description of what they cal OEM. As well, I called Samsung Tech Support and gave them the serial number of the "OEM" drive I received from Newegg and they checked their database and assured me it caries the full 3 year manufacturer's warranty.

- Shawn

I have the exact same problem with my Spinpoint F1 1TB. Sometimes when my Mac Pro wakes up from sleep the Time Machine disk (the Spinoint) is gone or not at all responsive. In these situations Disk Utility cannot see the disk. Sometimes it is enough to just reboot, but sometimes I actually have to yank the disk out of the box and insert it again. Then everything is back to normal.

Oh, and I have shuffled the disks so the problem is not S-ATA bus/port specific either.

I first noticed this after weeks of good behavior so there is nothing wrong with the disk structure at all.

Is this a firmware problem? A problem with the current? Bad disk?
Has anyone tried running Samsungs diagnostics programs on a Mac? How?

Hi, I don't see the same problem, but something that may be related.

I installed two F1 750GB drives. I see both of them just fine.

But something between drive install, OS upgrade and Parallels upgrade messed up my machine's reboot. As in, I never shuts down or reboots. Instead, it does all the stuff it is supposed to do, but not the final turn off. I've been doing regular shutdowns, waiting a few minutes, and then hard-powerdowns (keeping the power button pressed for ten or so seconds).

Do you actually have any objective reasons for this? You've said it in other discussions, but have never offered any actual demonstration that OEM products are inferior to the identical item in a retail box.

White box products ARE OEM, contrary to what you might think. If they were retail branded products they'd be in a box with a retail brand on it.

I've bought both OEM and retail versions of the very same disk and have not seen firmware differences other than those related to the age of the drive (a newer drive might have newer firmware). Can you give us examples where manufacturers intentionally load inferior firmware onto a disk drive?

Paying extra for retail is wasteful if you don't need the extra packaging, mounting screws, or (sometimes) data cable. And that's typically the ONLY difference between OEM and retail versions of the same item.