Western Digital cuts hard drive warranties

Back in 2008 Seagate lowered its hard drive warranties from 5 years to 3 years in a move that angered the consumer market and the trend quickly spread with 3 years being the new standard for warranty. Now it seems Western Digital is taking it one step further, lowering their warranty again from 3 years to 2 years on selected models. The lines that are to be affected by the cut in warranty are Caviar Blue, Caviar Green and Scorpio Blue hard drives while the Caviar Black, Scorpio Black, A/V drives and external drives all retain the 3 year warranty. The transition takes place over the next few months and customers can check if their drive has a 2 or 3 year warranty by checking its serial number on the Western Digital website. The new changes come into affect on January 2012…Western Digital’s way of saying Happy New Year to its customers. Western Digital is considering a measure to allow users to essentially buy back the extra 1 year of the warranty and get an extended warranty by paying a bit more, seems like a below-the-belt money grabbing measure to us.

“This new warranty policy will be effective for drives shipped from January 2nd, 2012. It is important that you take a moment to update your website(s) and collateral to reflect this change for effected drives shipped after January 1st, 2012.

All drives shipped to distributors prior to Jan. 2nd 2012 will retain the current warranty terms. Because of existing inventory in the distribution channel there will be a short period of time when some drives with a 3-year warranty will be sold at the same time as drives with a 2-year warranty.

If you have any doubt about the warranty of a drive you purchased, you can go to support.wdc.com, select Warranty and RMA Services and proceed to the Warranty Check page.”

Source: The Register