Hard Disk Failure or something else???

[CotswoldCS]

My system is

AMD AthlonXP-1500
ABIT KR7A-133RAID Mobo - Latest drivers and BIOS installed
256Mb 266mhz DDR
2 x IBM Deskstar 75GXP 30Gb in RAID 0 Array
Windows XP Pro - single partition on RAID array using NTFS

Here is my problem

The system runs fine when I use it. However, when idle, after 15-20 mins of inactivity the hard disk goes into turbo mode and starts chugging away doing something (not sure what). The process lasts for a good few minutes and then back to normal. After another 15-30 mins it starts again. When the hard disk is working away it consumes 100% of CPU and if, for example I am playing MP3 music in the background the music starts skipping like a 9 year old on drugs.

I can't run Scandisk - it freezes during process or I receive an error. Is there any way of telling whether the hard disk is damaged or if there are any bad sectors/ clusters? With Windows 9x I could boot into DOS and run Scandisk from C:\> What can I do in WinXP?

I have tried disabling Antivirus activity, turned off Hibernation mode (?). Could it be system restore?

Any ideas?? Am I going to have to purchase 2 new drives or do you think a reinstall will put this right?

 

[mastertech01]

Open up task manager and monitor applications and processes, and see what is running in background when this occurs.

 

[CotswoldCS]

I get the problem even when nothing is running - no applications active, NAV disabled.

 

[Maezr]

Look under processes, not applications.

 

[bacillus]

try disabling Indexing Service in services!