Hitachi Harddisks Thread (5K3000, 7K3000, 7K2000)

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odditory

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Dec 23, 2010
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If it were me I guess I'd try re-flashing one more time and then RMA it. Never heard of that behavior where the controller thinks its a 1TB. The firmware file for the 1TB models is completely different, so its not like the flashing tool could use the wrong code because the 3MA firmware file for the 2TB model has no code for any other models.
 

odditory

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Dec 23, 2010
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I think configurable AAM went away beginning with firmware 3EA. However if they did away with it maybe there was a reason.
 

kryptex

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May 13, 2011
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Just flashed my 2TB 7K2000 cold spare from 20N to 3EA then 3MA for testing. It is now a 1TB drive :confused:. Any ideas before I RMA it?
Hi, I have a 2TB 7K2000 model 0F10311, with original firmware 3EA (JKAOA3EA), manufactured APR-2010. Before I update to 3MA, can you please tell me what actually happened to your drive (the one transforming itself into 1TB after the update to 3MA) ? Did you use the JKDL_SP.exe file (not the JPDL_SP.exe, which is for 7K1000.C drives) ?

By the way, my drive has MLC: JPK3EA written on it. What does that mean ?
Anybody did a successful 3EA -> 3MA firmware flash ? I'd like to hear some good / bad experiences.

Regards, LH.
 

kryptex

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May 13, 2011
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Anyone knows what were the changes from 3EA to 3MA ? It is easy to find what was corrected from 20N to 3EA, but nothing on 3EA -> 3MA ? I'm talking about the 2TB 7K2000 (0F10311).
 

JSchuricht

Active Member
Apr 4, 2011
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Used the JKDL_SP.EXE included in the OP. Basically I flashed to 3EA then 3MA, pulled the drive to insert it into my array. Couldn't add the drive to the array, but noticed the size was reported as 1TB. Tried the drive in the machine I flashed it with and one other, both came up as 1TB in the BIOS. RMA'd the drive and got a new 3MA in return, attempted to upgrade another drive to 3MA and was successful, drive showed 2TB. Flashed a few more one at a time till I was satisfied everything was working, then continued to flash the rest of the array.

Guess it was just some weird fluke.
 

kryptex

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May 13, 2011
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I've just flashed my 2 TB 7K2000 (0F10311) from 3EA -> 3MA and it works like a charm ! Random seeks dropped to 13.3 ms (in HDTune 4.60) from 13.6 ms, CPU usage from 12% to 2 % and the transfer rate got a bit smoother. Sequential transfers on the outside of the platters increased by 4-5%, not much.
On the other side, small file copy was definitely corrected somehow. Before, to wait for a drive-to-drive copy of small file-folders, it took me quite a lot. Now, after the flash, it is snappier and clearly faster. About 50% faster in small file copy (unfortunately I don't have a quantitative test).
The noise, the temperature, the Disabled AAM remained the same.
Hope this helps.
 

odditory

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Dec 23, 2010
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Anyone knows what were the changes from 3EA to 3MA ? It is easy to find what was corrected from 20N to 3EA, but nothing on 3EA -> 3MA ? I'm talking about the 2TB 7K2000 (0F10311).
As mentioned in a previous post Hitachi doesn't tend to disclose what changes between firmware revs, remember they don't even publicly post the firmware files, you have to beg them through email. Thus this thread was created -- and as the saying goes "use at your own risk". :)

Why I decided to upgrade all my 7K2000 drives to 3MA was because the very last batch I purchased shipped with 3MA from the factory, and I felt it it was good enough for their latest shipping drives then it would be good enough for all my drives in hardware RAID.
 
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kryptex

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May 13, 2011
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Odditory, could you please tell us in more detail what are the known issues with previous firmwares (20N, 28A) for 7K2000 ? This information has to be gathered by people from all kinds of sites (including in russian !), so it would be nice to have it in one place. I'm a little bit egoistic, since I would like to buy a 28AE (supposedly) from someone for a good price, but don't know if it is worth the trouble. This is, in fact, why I'm asking this.
Thanks !
 
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kryptex

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May 13, 2011
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As a separate question, are there 7K2000 drives with other part numbers (model), apart 0F10311 ? If yes, what are the chances for these 3EA/3MA firmwares to flash and work correctly on those models ?
 

Patrick

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 21, 2010
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kryptex: one thought I have is to see if you can get this information direct from Hitachi. The reason is that they track this sort of stuff very well and user-based reporting can have issues (e.g. someone has a loose cable.) If you do want to collate info you find, you can feel free to make a post. The SAMSUNG HD204UI important firmware patch required post has helped a bunch of people (4,400+ views and counting.) It is a bit hard for me to do something like this with every product myself.
http://forums.servethehome.com/showthread.php?39-SAMSUNG-HD204UI-important-firmware-patch-required
 

kryptex

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May 13, 2011
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Did anyone try to play with the Advanced Power Management (APM) for 7k2000 ? The Default is 255 (Disabled), so the heads stay always on the platter, thus more heat is generated. Wondered if anyone tried to set APM=128 in ftool, the temperature should go down, if the hard drive is not constantly accessed, only from time to time. Also, the LCC (Load/Unload Cycle Count) would start to increase. Anyone any experience with this ? It is a little difficult for me to use the ftool, since the drive is in an external eSATA enclosure and ftool doesn't recognize it; so each time I want to change APM I have to take the drive out and install it in a desktop computer.

Interestingly, for my WD3200BEKT drive, the APM = 254 or 255 do not increase the LCC, while APM = 253 or smaller values impose head parking about 20-30 times/hour. However, the temperature with APM=254,255 increases by ~8-10 deg C. I would like to know if this effect is observed by someone on the Hitachi 7k2000 drives.
 
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kryptex

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May 13, 2011
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I've just flashed my 2 TB 7K2000 (0F10311) from 3EA -> 3MA and it works like a charm ! Random seeks dropped to 13.3 ms (in HDTune 4.60) from 13.6 ms, CPU usage from 12% to 2 % and the transfer rate got a bit smoother. Sequential transfers on the outside of the platters increased by 4-5%, not much.
On the other side, small file copy was definitely corrected somehow. Before, to wait for a drive-to-drive copy of small file-folders, it took me quite a lot. Now, after the flash, it is snappier and clearly faster. About 50% faster in small file copy (unfortunately I don't have a quantitative test).
The noise, the temperature, the Disabled AAM remained the same.
Hope this helps.
Take a look at how the values (Current, Worst, RAW Data) changed for a few SMART entries (Throughput performance, Spinup time, Seek Time Performance) after flashing the 7K2000 from 3EA to 3MA. It is a bit strange why this happened. I will reflash to 3EA to see if the RAW values will reappear.

Here is the SMART status for the 3EA firmware (original)
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/857/smart3ea13may20112208.png/

This is for the 3MA firmware (after update)
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/810/smart3ma13may20112208.png/

EDIT: After 2 drive reboots, the Spinup Time raw value changed (from 0). Throughput + Time performance won't change anymore (0 raw values). Maybe after some serious drive activity...
 
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kryptex

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May 13, 2011
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I flashed back to 3EA and the SMART values are the same as after the first flash to 3MA. So I finally went back again to 3MA, performance-wise it seems the best.

I also set APM = 128 by using FTool (the default value was Disabled, i.e. APM=255). Heads park after ~2 min of inactivity and the drive temperature decreased by 5-10 deg, which is awesome ! I was never able to do this with my Seagate 7200.11 1.5 TB drives, which do not have APM at all and were running quite hot (55 deg C in external enclosures)

The only issue I have with the 7K2000 drive is that it is rather noisy when seeking. It is definitely much louder than the 1.5 TB Seagate 7200.11, of which I have several drives (including CC1H, CC1G, SD1A firmwares). However, 7k2000 IS faster in almost every aspect.
 
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Patrick

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Dec 21, 2010
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Pretty nice results there! Keep the info coming as I know a lot of people are using these Hitachi's.
 

kryptex

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May 13, 2011
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I will be able to soon test 4 more 7K2000 drives and quantitatively check the temperature in the same Vantec Nexstar 3 eSATA enclosure, in comparison with the 4-platter Seagate 7200.11 drives.
 

PigLover

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Jan 26, 2011
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Had my first Hitachi 2TB drive fail this weekend. It reports a non-specific "smart tripped" in the BIOS of any MB I try it in, can't even recognize it well enough to run any tools or diagnostics.

Drive is a 7k2000, one of 14 of these that I have (8 in Raid6 on my video editing machine, 4 more in an ICH10R Raid5 on this same machine, and 2 in a Raid1 on everyday machine). The one that died was from the ICH10R Raid5. Spare'd in a 2TB Seagate that I had laying around and I didn't lose a bit of data (thankfully). I also have 20 5k2000s running ZFS on my file server. 1 failure in over 34 drives...not too bad, not unhappy.

I'll give an update on Hitachi RMA process later...
 

odditory

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Dec 23, 2010
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Not sure Hitachi's RMA process is any real mystery :) You send a drive in, you get one back. I've only ever had to RMA one Hitachi, got it back within a week if I recall.