I can see your point, the freezing thing is really only a desperate measure for if there's something you really want to retrieve. If this is purely a backup drive and you're not missing anything, I'd say eat the cost of a new hard drive for your immediate needs while you process the warranty (for what will end up an extra drive). Granted, you might want to try deleting whatever data the drive will let you before sending it back, as you don't know what they'll do with your original platters (yes a zero wipe would be preferable, but any amount of deleting is better than nothing).