Trouble writing to my hard drive...

[Maxxarcade]

One of the drives in my computer is acting up. I can apparently read from it fine, but writing to it in any way, I get a data error/CRC fail. I think it is connected through a SATA to PATA converter, but why would that only cause write problems? Another drive that is connected the same way is working fine still, so I don't think it's the motherboard. Any ideas?

[acstech]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

Usually the drive manufacturers will have diagnostic tools available for download; have you tried one of those?

Tried it in a different computer?

Maybe check the integrity of the filesystem?

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

Does this drive use perpendicular recording technology?

.

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

R.I.P. Maxtor 6Y160P0, and all my data with it. Windows now says the disk is not formatted, SMART log reports 32 bad sectors, and not even HDAT2 can read it anymore. Tried it on a USB adapter with the same trouble.

I guess I'll just add it to my bad Maxtor collection of about 32 drives

Tell me, what are the odds that the one drive I use to back up my file server will fail, on the one time out of several years I've needed it for something important. The ONE TIME I format the drives in my server, I have to pick the flakey drive on my desktop PC to save the stuff on. Of course everything copied to it fine last night, and it showed no signs of trouble, nor did it the last few years I've had it.

Sheesh, and people think Western Digital is bad. Though my server has 2 WD and 6 Seagates, so I'll see how long those last at 24x7 duty.

[acstech]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

You might try Restorer 2000 from bitmart.net. I've seen it pull data off of dead hard drives that *nothing* else would read (clicking "dead" IBM Deskstar's to be exact). They have a demo version too so you could try it first before parting with any money. Of course it only supports Microsoft file systems, so if you were running Linux on your server it probably wont work.

Edit: I see you were running Windows. Never mind the comment about linux compatibility then.

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

I'm going to try cooling down the drive with the freezer trick tomorrow, and see if I can use another PC to recover the data.

Oddly enough, I have a DVD-R disc that only reads when cold too. I'm thinking of using an IDE to USB adapter and putting an old DVD drive in the freezer, and reading the disk that way. Same goes for the hard drive. Hopefully they won't be able to generate enough heat on their own to condensate in the freezer.

Last time I had to read that DVD-R, I was putting it between ice packs on my desk, wiping off the condensation, reading a few sectors till it quit, and repeating until I had all the data. Figures that the data recovered from that disc was lost again when this hard drive quit

I'll also give that Restorer program a try if I can't get anything else to work.

[shadow]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

Damn, I guess you had a lot of bad luck. I guess this situation remind's us all that a good and reliable backup is extremely important if you have important information.

[Krankshaft]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

I recently had a Maxtor fail as well this year in fact it was a 120GB IDE that I've had since 2002 it wasn't even in 24/7 operation either. I recently replaced it with a WD 500 GB HDD and copied all the data over to the new drive and set the old 120 GB aside.

So while formatting another computer I decided to use it I copied my important files to it and wouldn't you know it the copy utility freezes in the middle of the process. So I reboot and the HDD motor is dead no biggie in this case.

But when I think of how close I was to losing my data when that drive was on my primary computer it makes me cringe good thing that I replaced it when I did.

[shadow]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

Damn, I guess you had a lot of bad luck. I guess this situation reminds us all that a good and reliable backup is extremely important if you have important information.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

>>> R.I.P. Maxtor 6Y160P0 <<<
Do we send flowers?

I had a Maxtor go phewy around 3 years ago and I tried OnTrack EasyRecovery Pro.
[Full but older version courtesy of FOSI.]
It found my data and I was busy copying it to another drive when POOF the drive started working again. And it's STILL working fine.
I think their software somehow (inadvertently) repaired the master boot record.
Not sure what happened but I was pretty happy.

[gonzo0815]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

When my 6Y120P0 Maxtor drive was failing (brand new, two weeks old) it was the same scheme. Gradually losing data until Windows would not boot anymore and CHKDSK can`t fix it anymore.
I backed up my data with "Get your Data back for NTFS" and it was no problem (this is IMHO the only restore programm, which can really do, what it is supposed to do).

Now, a few years later, i wanted to replace the Maxtor in my second system with a SATA one, to build a fancy viedo NFS server for my Dbox2 DVB receiver.
Now i am getting the annoying "Ladeprogrammfehler 3" (~ "Loadprogramfailure number 3").
When i boot into windos setup, til the point when it detects the Partitions and older OS installs, i can boot again into w2k once.


I am not sure, if the freeze trick will work with this drives, as this is probably not a read write head problem.
But may be it works.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

The SATA to PATA converter could cause only write problems because the read and write signals pass through different wires. It's easy enough to have a bad connection on one pin and not the other. (Don't even need an adapter to have that problem.)

[kikkoman]

Re: Trouble writing to my hard drive...

About that bad DVD-R: have you tried DVDisaster yet? So far it has worked for every single bad DVD-R and CD-R. You need more than one DVD drive, though.