Karlston

Huh? Why not? You think we should do the direct opposite and flash it anyway? After you... Absolutely! SD15 fixed the non-bricking issue of previous firmware. SD17 fixed the non-stuttering issue on RAIDed drives or during video streaming. :-)

Stated very clearly and openly on the update page... * Note: If your drive has CC or LC firmware, your drive is not affected and no further action is required. Attempting to flash the firmware of a drive with CC or LC firmware will result in rendering your drive inoperable.

Interesting post (allegedly) from a Seagate employee explaining what happened... http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=109...mp;cid=26542735

It's quite possible that Seagate's software can access the drive with low-level commands. If they can't, nobody can... I'd still like to find out for sure, a local firmware upgrade is a lot better than sending it to Seagate for data recovery.

Has anyone tried the update on a PC where the drive is not visible in BIOS? In other words tried the "S" (IIRC) to scan for drives, and see if it appears. Perhaps the firmware updater can see the drive, even though BIOS can't.

Woo Hoo!!!!!!!!!!! Updated my SD15-firmware-bricked ST31000340AS Part No 9BX158-303 to the latest SD1A firmware and it bloody well worked. The drive and all its data is again visible. Many people are saying that this firmware upgrade won't help if the drive is already bricked, but this experience contradicts that. Some notes... After being bricked, the drive was not visible to BIOS in my Windows box, but was visible in the BIOS on another machine. I used the other machine to do the firmware upgrade, then moved the drive back into the Windows box as a data drive, and can now see it all in Windows. I don't know if using that other PC made a difference, but may be worth trying if you have other ones.

An update update has been released as of Jan 19, 2008 3:15PM CST (whatever the heck CST is, probably a US time zone known only to them)... http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/self...sp?DocId=207951 Recognises -303 part numbers.

An update update has been released as of Jan 19, 2008 3:15PM CST (whatever the heck CST is, probably a US time zone known only to them)... http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/self...sp?DocId=207951 Recognises -303 part numbers

Isn't it on the label on the top of the drive? "P/N" = Part Number...

http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/self...sp?DocId=207931 has been updated with links (by drive model) to firmware downloads. The firmware for some models is still being QA'd. On a local forum, people are getting errors trying to do the firmware update, one guy tried 3 different PCs without success... http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-repli...1&p=12#r240 Please post your results, good or bad... EDIT: Looks like Seagate stuffed the release... http://forums.seagate.com/stx/board/messag...e.id=5287#M5287

From Seagate's contact us page... 0.800.443988, 12:00 AM to 9:30PM, Monday - Friday, NZ Standard Time (GMT+12) Hope that phone number makes sense...

Just wanted to say thanks for your efforts during this trying time. And also to MSFN forums. Also, plugged my "not seen in BIOS" bricked 1 TB (entry 50 in the DB) into my Ubuntu Linux box and the drive was visible, but reported as 0 GB. I could put it in my older Windows box and if it's visible but 0GB then try what this earlier poster tried... http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showto...st&p=827567 The question is, should I or shouldn't I try? The data is not vital, it'd just be nice to get the drive working again enough to drag a little data off it and do the firmware upgrade myself instead of the hassle of sending it off to Seagate. Any takers?

As fate would have it, I lost this drive a few minutes after reading the story on The Inquirer site... 50:5QJ0JRE3:ST31000340AS:9BX158-303:SD15:08516:WUXISG:13-11-08:14-01-09:RETAIL:Karlston:Australia:(no detect in BIOS) (dates above are dd-mm-yy)