Iomega Home Media 1TB NAS Device Appears to Fail Far Too Often

If reading the 2 star reviews on Amazon regarding the Iomega Home Media 1 Terabyte NAS doesn't cause you some concern perhaps this article will drive it home. I no longer work on computer hardware for a living. When I am pressed into service, I do as I always have, troubleshoot. Suffice it to say, troubleshooting isn't a 'solo' activity. Manufacturers tech support and the experience of others found on the internet play a huge role in successful troubleshooting once the simplest forms of failure are ruled out. It didn't take long after I began working with the Iomega Home Media NAS Cloud Edition device for me to begin searching the web for clues that might help me resurrect it. What I found was disturbing to say the least. Iomega Home Media NAS Device History Without going into detail or doing a great deal of research, I can tell you I have extrapolated, Iomega® introduced the Home Media NAS (Network Attached Storage) device around 2009 after its purchase by EMC®, and the devices promptly began to fail consumers expectations. LenovoEMC® now represents Iomega products. In a news release June 11, 2013, http://news.lenovo.com/article_display.cfm?article_id=1693, accessed 4/22/2015, LenovoEMC proudly announces the Iomega rebranding with no mention of the Home Media products. I believe Iomega, Lenovo®, EMC, LenovoEMC have produced many wonderful stable products over the years, but there is just a slight chance that when it ventured into the low priced Home Media NAS market…..things didn't go so well. I don't know how many devices were produced, nor how many have been operating for an extended period without incident, nor how many were simply thrown away once they failed. But, I do know there are as many as one hundred online requests for help resolving solid red lights, or blinking red and white lights, designated as hard drive failure. At this time, LenovoEMC is handily rid of any responsibility for the one I've just worked on, as the warranty period for it was only one year; two years in the EU, extended to three for those who register within 90 days of purchase. This one had not been registered. Even with a 3 year warranty I am unsure of the warranty's value, as it reads as follows: Excluded Products and Problems This warranty does not apply to: (a) Iomega software products; (b) expendable components such as fuses or bulbs; or (c) third party products, hardware or software, supplied with the warranted product. Iomega makes no warranty of any kind on such products which, if included, are provided "AS IS." This warranty also excludes damage caused by accident, misuse, abuse, use of non-Iomega approved media, exposure of media to excessive magnetic fields, or external environmental causes.

In the case of the Home Media NAS I worked with, the hard drive had failed - solid read light. That is a third party piece of hardware, a 2012 Seagate Barracuda 1TB drive. Seagate normally offers a three year warranty for their hard drives if purchased directly from Seagate. But, because the hard drive is in an OEM device the warranty is not with Seagate, it was with Iomega. Do you see the dilemma? The Resolution Throw it away. I can't bring the Home Media NAS back to life. Well... in truth, I can replace the hard drive. But, when I gave up working on PC hardware I also gave up interest in running a dual boot computer. The Home Media NAS Device hard drive is structured using Linux partitions. I can easily use a Live Linux CD and follow the instructions posted on Iomega NAS Central, January 15, 2012 http://iomega.nas-central.org/wiki/Recovery_%28Home_Media_CE%29, retrieved 4/22/2015, but all the good stuff on the drive is gone. Why bother. For $115, the cost of a new hard drive, I can buy a new low priced NAS Home Media Cloud Edition with a hard drive in it, ready to go. Backup, Backup, Backup With my experience, I'll be the first to say, never trust the things you want to keep forever; your pictures, videos, letters, receipts, etc., to be safe in any one electronically based format. Backup, backup, backup! Data has become so large and so cumbersome, backing up to electronic based media such as a secondary hard drive or a solid-state storage device, i.e. flash/thumb drive, seems the only realistic option. If you are lucky enough, or have planned ahead, and have stored your data in more than one electronic or hard format, you may be saved from the day your heart drops, when you realize something has gone horribly wrong with the media you had been using. They become corrupt. They can be damaged. They fail. Keep this in mind and be wise.

Trouble Shooting

On the off chance you are wondering how in-depth my troubleshooting was? I followed nearly all the advice the Lenovo online support wiki had to offer: Ethernet connect both the PC and NAS to the router. Perform arp -a. Check router and PC configuration for obvious network protocol issues. Reboot, and so on. Last but not least, I pulled the drive out of the case and hooked it up to a USB SATA bridge, then tested the bridge with a spare SATA drive I had lying around. The hard drive was definitely toast.