Seagate backup drive error "0x8078002A"

Hi Francis,

This could be due to the effect of transitioning the physical format of hard disk drives from 512-byte sectors to 4,096-byte sectors.

What is the drive type that you are having on the hard drive which you are using as a backup drive?

I would like to inform you that the data storage industry such as Seagate have configured their large data drive to use 4096 logical sectors (also known as 4K or 4KB sectors) from 512-byte type. This transition is driven by several factors including increase in storage density and reliability. Although, this transition causes incompatibility issues with existing software (including operating systems and applications).

You can refer to the link to get the details on this update:

“Microsoft support policy for 4K sector hard drives in Windows”

Refer to the information provided for "Windows 7"

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2510009/en-us

To check for the kind of drive that you are using current with the hard drive, you can also follow the steps provided on the link.

For further assistance on this issue and the updates related to it, you can contact Seagate. Refer to the link to do so:

http://www.seagate.com/about/contact-us/technical-support/

Please feel free to ask if you have any other query on Windows.

Hi Francis,

Thank you for the information regarding the hard drive.

As suggested earlier, you may contact Seagate for further assistance.

Please let us know if you have more queries on Windows.

I have a Seagate back up plus, bought it when I had a Dell computer Inspiron with Windows Vista.  I recently replaced my PC with a Dell XPS 8700 that has Windows 7 professional.  This is when the Seagate started giving the I/O error 0x8078002A.  I read this post and contacted Seagate, below is the response I received from Seagate and am questioning what are the risks of following the download of the DiscWizard:

Thank you for contacting Seagate Support.

I've reviewed your case, and I understand your situation. I'm very sorry about the confusion this is causing for you.

Unfortunately, Microsoft made the mistake of not updating the Windows Backup utility in Windows 7 to support drives that use the advanced format (4K) sectors. The advanced format (4K) sectors is what enables hard drives (no matter who the manufacturer is) to go beyond a 2TB size limit. Without the 4K sector, the larger drives like the 4TB Backup Plus would not be possible.

If you were wanting to just backup personal data, the Windows Backup utility would be fine to use, but when you create a full system image backup, Windows Backup not only gets the data, the operating system, and the programs, but it also gets all the sector information on how the data laid out. Since Windows Backup does not recognize a 4K sector, and it defaults to 512kb sectors, it does not know what to do when it tries to read those 4K sectors. That is why you are getting the "failure error code 0x8031004A" message.

But it definitely does not mean the Backup Plus is not usable.

What we can offer in place of the Windows Backup utility is our DiscWizard imaging software. It can read the 4K sectors, and create full image backup to save to the Backup Plus drive. Here is the download link for DiscWizard.

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http://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/discwizard/discwizard-master-dl/
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Here is also the DiscWizard User's Guide.

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http://www.seagate.com/support/discwizard/dw_ug.en.14355.pdf
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For additional assistance, please feel free to contact us again by e-mail, call us at the Technical Support Center at 1-800-732-4283 Mon. thru Fri., 8:00 A.M. - 6:00 P.M. (CST), or search our knowledge base at this web link.