[ot - sort of] Western Digital recalls PC drives
By Terry Costlow
EE Times
(09/28/99, 12:24 p.m. EDT)
IRVINE, Calif. — Western Digital Corp. is recalling nearly half a million hard disk drives because a faulty chip might cause failures as the drives age. WD did not name the chip supplier.
The unusual move came after WD's testing process revealed that after six to 12 months, the drives might not power up due to problems with a chip from an outside supplier. The roughly 400,000 drives were made between Aug. 27 and Sept. 24. The recall is only for recently-introduced 6.8 G-bytes/platter versions of the firm's Caviar line, which is used extensively in PCs. No other WD drives are involved in the recall, the firm said. The Caviar line is sold to OEMs, resellers and retailers.
In a conference call, WD executives did not name the chip supplier. However, Chief Operating Officer Russell Stern explained that "This is a motor driver for the spindle and the voice coil positioner. We are single-sourced for this part, but there are multiple fab locations. The problems are tied to one fab location."
Chairman Chuck Haggerty noted that the firm can identify the affected drives by serial number. About half the 400,000 that will be recalled are thought to be in inventory, with the remainder already shipped to customer sites.
Spokesmen noted that the time frame before any possible drive failure would provide a window for the exchange of the drives. Failures will normally occur after about a year's use, though that will obviously vary depending on how the drive is used.
The firm did not estimate what the financial impact on the company would be. However, spokesmen noted that sales will be impacted. Over the next few weeks, the firm will not be able to provide replacement drives for customers.
"Our ability to backfill will be limited over the next 14 days," Stern said. "Most of that cannot be recovered." However, he noted that some of WD's financial problems could be offset by reimbursements from the IC supplier.
WD plans to repair the drives by replacing chips or circuit boards. These repairs will be done at WD facilities, not customer sites.
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