Sorry, but have you already fixed the problem or are you still trying to solve it? (didn’t understand your post)
I downloaded version 1.17 for my MyBook Pro (250GB) and installed it on my Win7 32bit machine. Result: the same “cable test write sector error”.
The hint to use version 1.13 helped me! I’m performing now both tests… . The Quick test sounded terribly!! It sped up and up and i wasn’t sure if my MyBook would fly away or break down in the next few seconds, but it survived Really crazy!
But once again the question: is v.1.17 now compatible with Win7? Looking at the supported OS’s not:
As far as i know version 1.17 has not been updated for use with Windows 7. WD tech support said they would email me when they have an update or fix. Still waiting on that.
Win7 has been out for then to test for 2 years. What’s the hold up? They are about the bigest HD manufacturer and they don;t have cutomer level diagnostics working? If thier driver weren’t so good, this would be laughable. (nuke dukem 2?)
Hope they get this fixed soon, or sooner!
PS I have the samne problem and need to see if the drive is going bad. quick!!
I am having the same problem that many users here describe: my computer seems to freeze up at random intervals, lasting anywhere from a split second up to ten or fifteen seconds. When I originally bought the drive, based on glowing reviews of the company and the recommendation from plenty of tech-heads, I decided that the issue was due to my vid card. I left it alone for months due to school and an impending trip out of the country. Upon returning home I completely changed every piece of hardware in the computer, except, of course, the WD harddrive a good friend emphatically recommended. I trusted the company until the day I assembled the ASUS P6T Deluxe V2 Motherboard, Radeon HD 5870 Video Card, and Intel Core i7-920 Processor and installed Win 7 64-bit. I don’t know much about computers, really, but I know that 15+ techies have told me that with those specs, and 8 GB of ram, my computer should not be hiccuping while streaming video, watching downloaded video, or playing the oh-so intensive World of Warcraft (those graphics really strain the system, amirite?).
As another user has described, I have checked the system’s resource usage – the I/O Bytes spike like mad, watching Resource Monitor is like watching a rollercoaster. The disk I/O spikes from 0 to 136 to 0 to 136 over and over. The graph spends more time above the graphical upper-limit than it spends within it. The “% Highest Active Time” appears to be more “regular,” but I don’t know what regular is for this. At least this value does not spike off the chart more than once per minute while idling (or typing this).
I have upgraded to DLGDiag 1.21. I receive the infamous cable error. Based on the poor performance of this drive thus far I would never purchase another WD drive. If there is some solution to this problem – more importantly the drive’s hiccups, not so much the cable test error – I would be joyous. If it means I can type essays without having to rewrite entire clauses and/or sentences for the last few weeks of school before I have the time trash this thing and start over, that’d be great. Until then, anyone have a good replacement for the WD1001FALS Caviar Black 1 TB? I have to get started on the research early, apparently.
I have downloaded version 1.21 and i’m getting Cable Test:: Read diagnostics sector error!
This is on a brand new WD6401AALS. I have used multiple cables and different SATA ports to make sure it wasn’t an actual cable problem. I plugged the drive in and upon trying to clone my old data to it, it was giving me issues. The SMART failure says it’s re-allocated sector count ID 5, Value 42. I have a failing windows partition that is in serious need of being replaced and to have a brand new drive come in and fail right away is not really that reassuring. I also purchased two WD100FALS drives. I hope this doesn’t happen with them as well.
My motherboard is an ASUS P6T Deluxe with the latest firmware. The test works on all of my other drives. I have a 5000AAKS, 5000KS, and a 1600YS (the dying drive).
I’m also using 1.21 and I’m getting the Cable Test::Write Sector error as well. The drive appears to pass the SMART test upon loading the diagnotic but cannot proceed to do any Quick Test or Extended test because of the Cable Test error. I can browse to the drive just fine and look at the files so its a bit frustrating. This is a brand new drive but I want to give it a thorough test before using it for back up data.
I should have noted this in my first post, but I replicated the error in Windows 7 64-bit. Plugging the same drive and cable into a Windows XP laptop, the tests started up just fine, no cable test::write sector error. What is strange is that I have other Elements drives that I tested on the Windows 7 64-bit OS before and the diagnotics ran fine but are failing the cable test recently.
So there is definitely some capatibility issues here with the lifeguard software and windows and perhaps the USB chipset on the motherboard but the fact that I am able to read and write to the drive under Windows 7 64-bit leads me to believe the incompability is with Lifeguard and Windows 7.
For me, it was because the drive was “offline” according to the disk manager. On the command line type “diskpart”, then:
DISKPART> san policy=onlineall
That fixed the cable test error for me. That is probably the command state you want for a desktop or laptop anyway. Obviously be very careful with the diskpart command.
It sped up and up and i wasn’t sure if my MyBook would fly away or break down in the next few seconds, but it survived 
Really crazy!
