Seems to be an oft repeated thread on all the forums with a lot of "I thought..."s going about (including my own
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Snipped from variuos websites:
SEAGATE:
New Warranty Policy
All Seagate enterprise products (SCSI and FibreChannel interface products) ship with a 5 year limited warranty. Warranty begins on the date of shipment by Seagate.
For warranty periods on Seagate personal storage products shipped through distribution channels,
click here. Warranty begins on the date of shipment by Seagate.
All Seagate retail kits (which include a box, hard drive, cables, installation guide, resource CD) have a 1 year limited warranty. For more information on retail product warranty,
click here.
FYI, Looks as though I was wrong about the extension possibilities through Seagate, although WD does appear to offer that...
MAXTOR
Maxtor retail-packaged products purchased on or after May 12, 2003 will carry the following Maxtor Standard Worldwide Warranty.
SCSI Hard Drive Kits 5 years
ATA Hard Drive Kits 1 year (In Europe 2 years)
xternal Hard drives 1 year**Maxtor Personal Storage 3000LS has a 90-day warranty in North America**
UNder a seperate link labled "hard drives" and assumed by some to mean OEM drives :
All Maxtor products purchased on or after May 12, 2003 will carry the following Maxtor Standard Worldwide Warranty policy:
* Maxtor Fireball®, DiamondMax® ATA drives will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 1 year.
* Maxtor DiamondMax Plus ATA drives that have an 8MB cache buffer AND capacities of 120GB or greater will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 3 years. All other DiamondMax Plus drives will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 1 year.
* Maxtor MAXLine™ ATA drives will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 3 years.
* Maxtor Atlas® SCSI drives will carry a Standard Warranty Period of 5 years.
WESTERN DIGITAL
Western Digital has adopted a new warranty policy effective October 1, 2003.
Western Digital Hard Drives
WD Caviar® and WD Protégé® EIDE hard drives carry a Standard Warranty Period of one (1) year. WD Caviar® SE EIDE, and WD Caviar® SE SATA hard drives carry a Standard Warranty Period of three (3) years. WD Raptor™ Enterprise SATA hard drives carry a Standard Warranty Period of five (5) years. Western Digital external hard drives carry a Standard Warranty Period of one (1) year.
Western Digital-branded Retail Hard Drive Kits
All Western Digital-branded retail hard drive kits, with the exception of WD Raptor drives, carry a Standard Warranty Period of one (1) year unless indicated otherwise on the package. Western Digital-branded WD Raptor retail hard drive kits carry a Standard Warranty Period of five (5) years.
IMHO, Maxtor lead the way on this "watering down" of retail warranties and deserves to be punished....
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