Hard Drive Problem?

[Rubicone]

I have a relatively new hard drive (<1.5 years IBM model ATA 100, 7200 RPM, 45 GB). But for awhile I have noticed that it is making a churning sound on boot-up, or when the CPU is doing some intensive processing (for instance doing a virus scan of my hard drive, defragmentaion, among other things). Should I be worried about a possible head crash, or what exactly is the cause of this problem? I also notice that in Event Viewer I get the following message "The driver has detected that device \Device\Scsi\IntelATA1 has old or out-of-date firmware. Reduced performance may result. " My hard drive is an IDE, so don't know if this applies.

 

[Souka]

Download and try the IBM Drive Fitness Test. It's a free download from IBM that creates a bootable floppy disk.

Also, if the noise concerns you, contact IBM. The drive is still under warranty.

I had a 45GB go out under me (75gxp), they sent me a new 60gxp 60GB as a replacement.

Good Luck!

 

[shathal]

Lucky you Souka ... I merely got the same size back. *sniff*

🙂

- Shathal.

 

[Rubicone]

I tried the Drive Fitness Test and it appears that the drive has a number of corrupted sectors. I did not try to fix them as it may overwrite data I do not want to lose. When I called IBM I was informed that there was no way of determining which specific sectors would be fixed if possible. Not wanting to go through the whole process of having to burn 20 GB of data to CDs I'll probably get another hard drive ghost everything over and then run the test. The IBM person I spoke with said if after running the fix and the problem is not corrected I would get a replacement. He said nothing on whether it would be new or larger drive than the one I currently own. Hey Souka how did you manage to get both a new and larger drive. Is there some magic word, or phrase you know and care to share? You can always PM me, should that be the case.

 

[AU Tiger]

Its all about whats available when they receive yours. They refurbish the drives people return and send them back out as RMA replacements. If they do not have any refurbished drives available that match your model, they will send a different model. I RMA'd mine in May and received the same model back.

 

[Souka]

Well, I didn't quite tell the whole story......

I orginally had a 75gxp 45GB model. It failed within a year. Called IBM, got it replaced with a 75GXP 45GB model(new).

After using the new drive for a few months in a completely different system, it failed. I mentioned it at work and a guy said there was a Class Action suit against IBM regarding the 75GXP line of drives.

When I called IBM, they said they would be sending out a 75GXP 45GB model. I b*tched and said no-way as it's rediculus and that I want a 60GXP series drive isntead. Of course they quoted policy and said they were unable to do this. I mentioned the class action suit, and kept asking for someone who COULD make the decision.

Eventually I recieved a phone call saying a new 60GB 60GXP drive was being sent next-day air and that they apologize for the "highly unusual problem" I had experienced. When the new drive arrived, I eBayed it as a new retail unopened drive, which it was.....it came in an IBM Retail box that was sealed. I sold it for more than I originally paid for the 75GXP. 🙂



So, in otherwords, YYMV.


Also, a few years ago, when 10GB was king:
I had a 10GB IBM drive fail.
Replacement arrived DOA. Had it replaced.
2nd replacement failed after 3 months, had it replaced.
3rd replacement, sold on Ebay and bought a Maxtor drive that has been running 24x7 pretty much since.


I no longer use IBM drives, even in my work laptops/systems. At work, IBM Travelstar drives (especially the 12GB size), fail far more than any other brand drive.


My $.02


Edit: Regarding the Drive Fitness Test (DFT), I've seen the "Corrupted Sector Repair" run many times on drives with bad sectors. I don't recall any of these drives to become unbootable or unreadable. In all likelyhood, the "bad" sectors are already unreadable, but the OS will get hung-up trying to read from them.

Run the DFT, fix all the sectors, and reboot. All the data will be useable. Also, you may have problems ghosting because when the ghost program hits the bad-sector it may error-out (fail, stop....)

 

[Rubicone]

You seemed to have some very bad experiences with IBM. The main reason why I bought this drive when I did was that it was rated tops by Tom's Hardware, among other reviewers. Do you by chance know where exactly this lawsuit is taking place (the name of the group, lawyer representing them, and any other particulars worth mentioning), so when I call IBM in a couple of weeks back should the corrupted sectors not get fixed I can make reference to it and get the 60GXP model and not the 75GXP one that I currently own?

-----------------------------------------------

"Also, you may have problems ghosting because when the ghost program hits the bad-sector it may error-out (fail, stop....)"

Would using Drive Image Pro from Power Quest be any better at overcoming this potential problem? If not, what are other possible options I should consider besides buring cds?

 

[Souka]

No, sorry, it was a couple of months ago. You can probably find it using google.com and searching.

Regardless, soon as I got the 60GXP I read "rumors" about it too having problems....that coupled with the public statement of 333hrs/month only run time, I decided to change brands.

Good Luck!

 

[shathal]

For pretty much the same reason, I distrust IBM HD's too now.

Seeing as I managed to have 2 IBM HD's die on me horribly in the space of a single month (1 x 45 GB, 1 x 30 GB). I fortunately had just bought a 100 GB Maxtor HD, so I could JUST back up everything in time - though it did give me a good run for my money and I had to use pretty much every trick in the book.

At least all is well (well - mostly) ... I doubt I'll be using IBM HD's again - moreso, as they sold the business off anyway.

Getting burned once - OK - HD's do fail. but 2 HD's in the space of 1 month? Nah - not again, thanks.

- Shathal.