WD UNC pattern

[bmedia]

Recently we have received several WD drives (of different series, both 2.5" and 3.5") with the following pattern while reading:



The pattern is present throughout the whole used part of data, usually only on one head. Swapping heads does not change it.

The UNC areas are too close to each other (every 1000 - 6000 sectors, depends on the drive) so the data are unusable

Could it be a SA problem? Any idea how to fix it?

[AJ2008]

Each block is 8 sectors, or 4KB - Any chance you are working on one of the new AF drives with 4KB sector size? If so, I guess each block is a single bad sector (4KB sector size = 8 x 512 byte sectors), or some error in how it is interpreted within DE? Im pretty sure there is some option to set sector size correctly in DE settings

[pcimage]

There is fine scratches to the platters surface, hence the pattern.