FYI:
New Hitachi SATA drive series (at least the 7K160 and the T7K500) default to SATA 2 (300MB/Sec.). Since these drives are configured thru the Feature Tool software, you have to have a compatible controller to set it back to SATA (150MB/sec). The 7K160 doesn't even spin up if a compatible controller is NOT present - some SATA 1 controllers are compatible. So your new drive appears dead if tested with an incompatible controller. I have just ordered a Rosewill RC-210 controller with the Silicon Image 3512 chip which is supposed to be compatible and it supplies one internal SATA port and one eSATA port. I'll post here how it works out. It's a real shame to have to buy a controller just to set the interface speed on my drive... :roll: Their support person said that they will self-adjust with a compatible SATA 1 controller - we shall see on Monday.
I have never seen this "play dead" behavior before. When you supply power to any previous, non-defective drive, it would spin up. All IDE drives will start their motors when power is applied whether it is connected to a controller or not. And SCSI drives are jumpered to start their motors on power up by default too - though you can jumper for local or remote (controller) start and a local startup delay. Most other SATA 2 drives have a jumper to set interface speed, so their owners won't be confronted by this Catch-22...
Hitachi does not give sufficient warning of this behavior so I RMAd a probably not defective unit! Actually they don't give any warning except for a note on the default speed being 300MB/s buried deep within their Technical Specifications Manual. If one reads the whole thing, one might be able to see that the motor won't start simply by applying power but I don't have the time to read the whole thing. Let me know if you do.
Here is the Compatibility List for the 7K160 - should be mostly the same for the T7K500 for which I could not find a list.
.bh.
PS: I just read one report that the Seagate 7200.10 SATA 2 drives may exhibit similar "play dead" behavior. They are also shipped at SATA 300 by default (no jumper) and requires a SATA 1 controller to support Autonegotiation (info buried deep inside the technical manual for the drive). You may get what appears to be a dead drive if your SATA 1 controller doesn't support autoneg. and quite a few don't. At least all the 7200.10 owners will have to do is install a jumper to set them to SATA 150 - none of this software rigamarole. At least my new controller will be here tomorrow so I should finally be able to use my new drive one way or another. .bh.
PPS: I received the Rosewill RC-210 controller card today and it looks very nice. Red PCB matches my mobo. True eSATA external connection - fully shielded with the straight instead of hooked contact tongue. It has the Silicon Image 3512 chip. I suppose it supports hot-swap on both ports, so I may be able to check that out once I've got my new drive working.
.bh.
New Hitachi SATA drive series (at least the 7K160 and the T7K500) default to SATA 2 (300MB/Sec.). Since these drives are configured thru the Feature Tool software, you have to have a compatible controller to set it back to SATA (150MB/sec). The 7K160 doesn't even spin up if a compatible controller is NOT present - some SATA 1 controllers are compatible. So your new drive appears dead if tested with an incompatible controller. I have just ordered a Rosewill RC-210 controller with the Silicon Image 3512 chip which is supposed to be compatible and it supplies one internal SATA port and one eSATA port. I'll post here how it works out. It's a real shame to have to buy a controller just to set the interface speed on my drive... :roll: Their support person said that they will self-adjust with a compatible SATA 1 controller - we shall see on Monday.
I have never seen this "play dead" behavior before. When you supply power to any previous, non-defective drive, it would spin up. All IDE drives will start their motors when power is applied whether it is connected to a controller or not. And SCSI drives are jumpered to start their motors on power up by default too - though you can jumper for local or remote (controller) start and a local startup delay. Most other SATA 2 drives have a jumper to set interface speed, so their owners won't be confronted by this Catch-22...
Hitachi does not give sufficient warning of this behavior so I RMAd a probably not defective unit! Actually they don't give any warning except for a note on the default speed being 300MB/s buried deep within their Technical Specifications Manual. If one reads the whole thing, one might be able to see that the motor won't start simply by applying power but I don't have the time to read the whole thing. Let me know if you do.
Here is the Compatibility List for the 7K160 - should be mostly the same for the T7K500 for which I could not find a list.
.bh.
PS: I just read one report that the Seagate 7200.10 SATA 2 drives may exhibit similar "play dead" behavior. They are also shipped at SATA 300 by default (no jumper) and requires a SATA 1 controller to support Autonegotiation (info buried deep inside the technical manual for the drive). You may get what appears to be a dead drive if your SATA 1 controller doesn't support autoneg. and quite a few don't. At least all the 7200.10 owners will have to do is install a jumper to set them to SATA 150 - none of this software rigamarole. At least my new controller will be here tomorrow so I should finally be able to use my new drive one way or another. .bh.
PPS: I received the Rosewill RC-210 controller card today and it looks very nice. Red PCB matches my mobo. True eSATA external connection - fully shielded with the straight instead of hooked contact tongue. It has the Silicon Image 3512 chip. I suppose it supports hot-swap on both ports, so I may be able to check that out once I've got my new drive working.
.bh.
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