XPS 1530M hard drive replacement from Dell

My XPS had the 320GB 5400rpm Samsung drive (HM320JI) which seems to have died a few months into ownership. Dell to its credit very quickly shipped me a replacement that I just received. Two concerns I have, that I could use some advice on,

One, the static bag the drive was in had *REFURBISHED* on it. This was a little concerning and I was not sure what the warranty was. I contacted support via chat and got the following:

Agent (LIBx Mario 191505): "Okay, based on the records, you have an XPS M1530 with a warranty up to 2011-06-23,basically it was labeled refurbished because the harddrive was opened from the packaging and had to be tested before leaving the warehouse,this is done so that the reported problem would not occur on the replacement part.also the operating system was installed that's why once a part has been opened from its packaging we can no longer label it brandnew.As far as for the warranty, as long as you do have your warranty on, all parts that may have issues or would need replacement would be covered by the warranty as long as its within the warranty info.

Does this sound legit or am I being fed a line?

Second, the drive itself is not the same... it's a Toshiba MK3252GSX - after doing a little research, I get the impression this is one of the very, very earliest 320GB drives on the market. Is this just par for the course with replacement parts? Should I be contacting Dell and raising a stink? Is this drive fine? (I am not terribly concerned in the sense that I likely will replace this drive with some SSD in a year or two anyway, and give it away to family. However, I really dislike being or feeling cheated after spending so much for a premium laptop with allegedly premium components.)

advice appreciated!

 

yeah, you get what the guy shipping grabs off the shelf. the drive was probably used and tested. i have gotten 4 defective drives in a row from dell, one was un imaged and still had the previous owners os with passwords and stuff. dell is shady as hell when it comes to "refurbished" parts

 

heres my personal story with dell m1530 hard drive

i got a western digital 5400 - 320gb.... great drive... i was actually happy with it until my system started freezing... randomly, and i couldnt listen to the hard drive spinning or working, so the system freezing was because of the hard drive just stop spinning whenever the hard drive wanted.... so i called them and agreed so send replacement right away.
- They shipped a Toshiba like the one they sent u. my personal experience with toshiba is not good. but i gave it a try... the booting time was horrible, transfer was horrible.... so called them..... and made a drama out of it..... told them that hard drive was running freaking hot, made tons of noise, computer was slow and other crazy stuff.... XD so they said that shouldnt be hapenning, unfortunately, they sent another freacking toshiba XD cause the thought the first one was faulty, i made another drama out of this one, but my attitude changed, i wasnt asking for another replacement i told them that i want a product with quality that i paid for and that this was my third hard drive and they havent solved my problem, so told them to ship me another Western Digital or Seagate, that there were brands im familiar with and are known to be good brands, after this "demanding attitude" the representative told me stuff like they only send what they have in stock and blah blah blah, i told him i would wait, if i have to, i could use the toshiba for now until u get me the hard drive i want, so they agreed to get me the Seagate. That same night, i thought it was gonna be a seagate 5400 - 320 gb but i saw in my account that they ordered and shipped overnight a Seagate momentus 7200.3 - 320gb with free fall sensor o0..... hahaha man i was jumpin in one leg... got it next day.... and its the best drive for the M1530. its really fast, boot times are minimal. Not as much clicking sound like toshiba drives. i find seagate to be the most reliable hard drives, i got a 40 gb 7 years old barracuda and still goes strong. UH and another thing. Runs cool aswell.... where the western digital and toshibe would be at 40 -43 the seagate does at 36-38. hope it helps if u need some "ATTITUDE" help let me know XD

- Is probably truth what they are saying, mine was brand new, had to make partitions and install everything myself, but i have seem refurbished hard drived, and u can verify with HDTUNE or seagate tools, how many Operating Hours that hard drive have. so in u have like 1 power on hour... is probably what took them to intall the O.S and stuff... if u have like more than 100 hours.... that is unlikely, its definitely used. and u can use this to make them send a new one HANZ CUSTOMER PERSUASION - MANIPULATION


JaV!

 

Thanks for the advice, both of you. I just finished letting the thing do its stock OS install and my goodness, this Toshiba drive runs hot. It's almost too hot to touch the laptop to the left of the touchpad, right where the hard drive is. HDTune says the drive is currently 46C, it's hard to tell the performance because there is so much bloatware installed on the laptop. The power on hours is 139. I'm a bit frustrated, I feel I've been lied to.

 

yeah.... you probably gonna have to make a drama, tell them drives makes noise, runs hot, u want another brand, or drive. they shouldnt complain, stick to your story, u have lastest bios, drivers up to date, hard drive is well mounted.... and actually u are not lying that thing is hot, and useless, performance is pathetic...talk to them right now... over chat they are 24/7 with XPS support... make sure u include ur service tag.... and maybe u can get it faster... go now! XD

JaV!

 

Problem solved, hopefully. While windows update etc., was running, hdtune showed the temperature increase to 54C. There's something wrong with this drive--I've worked with many a 15K SAS and FC drive in poorly ventilated server rooms that never got so hot. That temperature was all it took, the XPS phone support person is sending me a replacement.

They said the same things as you - cannot give a specific model, just what's available, however he did say he can request a different part number than what they had given me, and he tells me he will do so. I guess that means it's a crapshoot but frankly I'll take anything over what appears to be an 18 month old drive. I did some research, the Toshiba drive was pretty much the first announced and available 320GB 2.5" drive, back in 3rd quarter 2007, two platters, with a peak STR of about 60MB/sec. Back then it was a pretty decent drive. Today, not so much.

The guy did say the part number he's sending me has a date of June 08. Well, here's hoping that's a decent drive.

Thanks again,

 

no problem, anytime. good, they told me that many times until i told the i want a seagate no matter what, if i have to wait until u have it on stock or whatever.... and they upgraded me with this one XD free fall sensor and cool, fast, i get a peak transfer rate of 80 - 82 mb/s but of course its 7200... i think that if u get a western digital or even segate 5400 u should be more than fine.... toshiba dont know how to make hard disks.... poor quality transfer rate, shouldnt be on the XPS line... anyway. hope u get it soon, and if u are not satisfied, go tell them u want seagate.... check the power on hours in the new one, thats another thing u can use against them, they will tell u they need to make a image drive and that takes 200 hours in the hard drive on XD tell them u want brand new, u can handle partitioning, formatting and setting up your operating system... good luck them, i think if u get into your dell account, where u see the status of your system when u buy it, get in there ad u can see the datails or at least the brand of the har drive they ar dispatching! and u can track it.

JaV!

 

geez!

i hope they will not give me refurbished HDD replacement for my 1530!!

 

well i dont' even think these drives come from dell but from one of their suppliers.

Case and point, 3 years ago i had my HD fail on my HP ZD8000 with a bad HD.
HP sent me a replacement drive, i plug it in and i get a Gateway Windows setup screen. Im not even joking lol. It loaded Windows, and started yelling about Gateway drivers missing. I had a good laugh, reformatted the thing and went on my way.

 

that would be HP XD dell wont do that, maybe sent refurbished one with image, and would be very weird, if u ge a drive wit previous data on it, all hard drive they sent me are sealed, new. motherboards, say refurbished, but they never been used, or only say refurbished because seal was broken, i checked carefully usb conectors, power conector and video outs, and they dont have any marks o any cable being attached or anything, but i once got on that had dried thermal paste on the chips.... told them to send something that i paid for XD and they did....

 

wait, dell sends you Motherboards to put in yourself for warranty repairs? When did they start doing this?
Or for Motherboard/parts you buy personally to fix yourself?

If thats the case, thats comparing apples to oranges my friend, my experience was a warranty repair, if I BOUGHT the HD from HP, then i'd expect it to be sealed.

 

Well, I received the second drive. It's a Fujitsu 320GB 5400rpm model (there are two, a G1 and a G2 and mine appears to be the G1, though with a date of 2/2009 on the drive sticker...) with low power on hours. It's also not as fast as the Samsung I had before, but unlike the Toshiba drive this one actually runs completely silent and cool. Very impressed by the low temps so far.