Seagate Momentus XT Disaster

It is the cable. If you read this thread all other people have been able to use slower drives and not the Seagate hibrid. Once they changed the faulty cable the Seagate worked fine.

I searched on ebay but cannot find any cables other than the same one that is in my laptop.

Where can I find one that will work for an early 2011 Macbook Pro? Thank you

www.ifixit.com

Find your specific model, then the guide on replacing the hard drive cable. It'll tell you the part number and cost there.

You do know you're looking for the same cable that's in there, right? Just a new one. Your message seems to indicate something else.

EMH2011 wrote:

I searched on ebay but cannot find any cables other than the same one that is in my laptop.

Where can I find one that will work for an early 2011 Macbook Pro? Thank you

Its not that you need a different cable like the people with 2009 models. It is that the cable in your Mac is failing, damaged, going bad. Just replace it with a New one of the same model.

Next time, consult this board first

NEXT TIME, dont use HD in enclosures, the SATA bridges fail at a horribly high rate.

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The best method for your data archives and redundancies, which is also the least expensive, the most reliable, and the most compact option is the purchase of naked hard drives and at least one USB 3.0 HD dock ($40 roughly).

While regarding Time Machine and your Macbook or desktop, your primary backup is best saved to a conventional USB (or Firewire / thunderbolt) hard drive inside an enclosure, the most important part of your data protection begins after your 1st / primary Time Machine / backup; and these are your secondary (most important) data storage devices, archives and their redundancies.

However bare hard drives and docks (below) also work perfectly as a Time Machine backup, this is for home use, since the docking station is certainly not very portable as a notebook Time Machine backup device should be; nor should bare HD be packed around with a notebook, rather remain at home or office.

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Drawbacks:

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If other hard drives boot TOTALLY fine with this cable is it really a bad/going bad cable? 😕

Yes! Those other drives are slower than the Seagate XT. This is the same exact thing others have experienced. System, cable, works with slower standard rotating HDD but does work with faster hibrid, SSD, drives. The cable can't handle the faster transfer rate the hibrid drive can deliver.

Just to add my experiences here.

Macbook Pro 5,4, Momentus XT 1TB (so no firmware required).

Replaced the existing disk with the Momentus and booted from a Mavericks recovery USB.

Disk Utility can see and format the drive without errors.

"Install OS X" option downloads Mavericks from the App Store without error but on reboot gives the "STOP" symbol.

"Restore from a Time Machine backup" option fails with write errors.

I've also tried applying the jumper to force 1.5 negotiation.

I cannot use the Seatools DOS utility with the drive in the Mac as neither the GUI nor command line versions support the mouse/keyboard in the MBP. External USB mouse / keyboard does note work either.

From reading the various threads, it seems like the options are:

1) Downgrade to EFI 1.6

2) Buy and fit a replacement SATA cable (part number 922-9314 - http://preview.tinyurl.com/ocebkxb)

The EFI downgrade seems to have mixed success, and may give problems when OSX updates are issued.

If I refit the original drive, it boots fine, so I'm a bit baffled as to how the SATA cable swap can make a difference. Can anyone explain the technical difference to me please?

I'm wondering if I should just return the drive and get a Hitachi 7K1000 instead.

The SSD exploits the full bandwidth of the channel, unlike an HD. It's like opening the faucet all the way instead of halfway. The cable can't handle the extra load. A good way to verify it's the cable is to put the SSD in an external enclosure. If it works fine there, the cable is the problem.

Did you bother to read any of this thread? It clearly states that the original cable works fine with SLOWER Standard Rotating HDD and doesn't with faster hibrid drives like the XT SSHD and real SSDs.

Everyone that has Changed the Cable has had their problem solved. So I don't understand why you think your original cable would be different.

Returning the drive is up to you. But in the future if you ever want to install a drive that transfers data faster than a standard rotating HDD you will need to change out the cable

@LowLuster: I've read the entirety of the thread, and many other threads on the topic as evidenced by my post.

@BobRz: that's a nice analogy, but "the cable can't handle the extra load" is not a sound explanation.

The speed of SATA is defined by the interface (on either the device or the motherboard), not the cable. The Macbook Pro 5,4 has a 3G/bits interface at the motherboard level, and the Momentus XT 1TB has a 6G/bits interface. So regardless of the cable type, the connection will be limited to 3G/bits.

The original drive in my 5,4 has a 3G/bits interface and works correctly with the factory fitted cable.

So I'll ask again, can anyone explain the technical difference that results from replacing the factory fitted cable with an identically specified cable (except typically explicitly manufactured by FoxConn)?

(Just for clarity, I'm not saying that swapping the cable doesn't/won't work; I just don't understand HOW it works)

The SPEED of anything is determined by it's slowest part. Just like a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.

Just because a car can go 100+++ MPH doesn't mean it can do that on hair pin corners.

The factory fitted cable is of LOW quality, cheap. The replacement style is of a higher quality. I thought that would be fairly apparent from all the posts from other users that have replaced the cable and had No More Problems.

Believe what you like about the cable.

The cable is defective. I don't know how else to explain it. Whether it's resistance, capacitance, or a fracture, the cable is bad. You can take a wire with 20 strands and cut 19 of them. It'll still show continuity with a meter.

https://ca.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110204192300AA4Eeo2

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_ATA