Bizarre disk behaviour

[I.C. Koets]

I apologize for the crosspost, but I am unsure whether I am having a
hardware or OS problem.

In my PC are three physical disks. Each of these is chopped up into a
primary partition and an extended partition, which is subdivided further
into logical disks.

All logical disks behave normally, except for disk K:, which is located on
the extended partition of a physical disk I don't boot from.

Disk K: has been operating flawlessly for two years. Never any problem with
it. Then trouble started, some weeks after I had added the third physical
disk. It alone is having trouble writing. When I write to it, the write
proceeds at 3 MB per second for a few seconds, then chops down to zero. This
seems to be after about five seconds, totalling 15 MB. The listed write
cache of my disk is 16 MB. This could be coincidence. Or not. The speed this
SATA disk usually manages in writing is 55 MB/s. It still reads normally, as
quick as the other disks can write at the very least.

The other logical disks on the partition (in fact, *all* other logical
disks) run normally, merrily writing themselves completely full with speeds
ranging from 45 MB/s for my oldest PATA drive to 60 MB/s for my newest SATA
drive.

The problem exhibited itself first when trying to defrag. This caused the
system to freeze. The HD light is on continuously during the freeze. The
same happens when trying to write more than 15 MB to disk per boot session.
But if I write less than this amount, the PC freezes on shutdown, and hard
rebooting corrupts or destroys the data I wrote.

SMART status is perfect for all disks.
All disk controllers report using UDMA. UDMA4 is set in BIOS.
Reinstalling the IDE channels does nothing.
CHKDSK /r finds nothing wrong.
Disk Management finds nothing wrong.
Western Digital Data Lifeguard Diagnostics finds nothing wrong.
Formatting doesn't help.
Removing the logical disk and recreating it doesn't help.
Oddly, the 'write all zeroes to disk' option in Western Digital Data
Lifeguard Tools reports success, but doesn't help.

My system:
P4 3.0 GHz
2,620,652 KB RAM (PC3200)
ASUS P5GD1 mobo
PATA Western Digital 200 GB disk (boot)
SATA Western Digital 120 GB disk <-- the offending article
SATA Western Digital 500 GB disk
PATA NEC 3500A DVD burner

I hope I left nothing out. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Kardon Coupé]

Then trouble started, some weeks after I had added the third physical

disk. It alone is having trouble writing.

What is your PSU rating? Maybe you need more power with having the extra
HDD? or the PSU is just on it's last legs....I know I had a problem with
hardware once, and it stemed as the PSU not giving enough power...

It might not be that, but it is another avenue to look down....

 

[I.C. Koets]

What is your PSU rating? Maybe you need more power with having the extra
HDD? or the PSU is just on it's last legs....I know I had a problem with
hardware once, and it stemed as the PSU not giving enough power...

It might not be that, but it is another avenue to look down....

PSU is rated 650 W, and that should really suffice very well. It would be
quite odd if the power supply only affected one logical disk. Nonetheless,
I'll monitor the power voltages.

 

[kony]

PSU is rated 650 W, and that should really suffice very well. It would be
quite odd if the power supply only affected one logical disk. Nonetheless,
I'll monitor the power voltages.

If it's a poor generic PSU, claiming it's 650W isn't much to
go on...

Try a different data cable, sometimes they make poor
contact.

 

[GT]

PSU is rated 650 W, and that should really suffice very well. It would be
quite odd if the power supply only affected one logical disk. Nonetheless,
I'll monitor the power voltages.

A total power rating of 650W, whilst it sounds high, is probably a false
figure. Power supplies provide power on several lines/channels (not sure of
the correct term) and it is possible to overload one channel of a power
supply with significantly lower demand than its quoted rating.

I used to use a 230W PSU to happily powers the same setup as you have (minus
1 drive). I now use a (silent) 300W PSU. If power is the problem, the I
would have thought the problem would show itself in other ways, not just 1
partition. So to rule out a power problem, try unplugging 1 hard disk -
leave the system drive and the faulty drive (as you used to run it). If the
faulty drive starts to behave again, then it is either a power related
problem or a controller/configuration problem. If reducing the power load by
1 drive makes no difference, then it is probably not a power problem. You
could then try copying all data from the troublesome partition to another
drive and format the dodgy partition - perhaps the FAT table is in a pickle,
or out of space, or so badly fragmented that it can't cope (unlikely). As it
is not the boot drive, you should be able to do all of this within Windows
without a reboot.

 

[Kyle]

Just a couple of ideas or things to try:
Check your memory for errors (memtest86)
Consider trying another version of the Sata driver, but be careful of
version conflicts causing HD corruption (backups might be advisable
before trying this out)
Sata BIOS update? Again, watch out for HD corruption problems, backup
everything first.
Is there a raid setup for the Sata interface, could this be affecting
HD activity?
Boot from a Knoppix Live CD, then try some large file writes/transfers
to the partition in issue.

HTH
--
Best regards,
Kyle
| I apologize for the crosspost, but I am unsure whether I am having a
| hardware or OS problem.
|
| In my PC are three physical disks. Each of these is chopped up into
a
| primary partition and an extended partition, which is subdivided
further
| into logical disks.
|
| All logical disks behave normally, except for disk K:, which is
located on
| the extended partition of a physical disk I don't boot from.
|
| Disk K: has been operating flawlessly for two years. Never any
problem with
| it. Then trouble started, some weeks after I had added the third
physical
| disk. It alone is having trouble writing. When I write to it, the
write
| proceeds at 3 MB per second for a few seconds, then chops down to
zero. This
| seems to be after about five seconds, totalling 15 MB. The listed
write
| cache of my disk is 16 MB. This could be coincidence. Or not. The
speed this
| SATA disk usually manages in writing is 55 MB/s. It still reads
normally, as
| quick as the other disks can write at the very least.
|
| The other logical disks on the partition (in fact, *all* other
logical
| disks) run normally, merrily writing themselves completely full with
speeds
| ranging from 45 MB/s for my oldest PATA drive to 60 MB/s for my
newest SATA
| drive.
|
| The problem exhibited itself first when trying to defrag. This
caused the
| system to freeze. The HD light is on continuously during the freeze.
The
| same happens when trying to write more than 15 MB to disk per boot
session.
| But if I write less than this amount, the PC freezes on shutdown,
and hard
| rebooting corrupts or destroys the data I wrote.
|
| SMART status is perfect for all disks.
| All disk controllers report using UDMA. UDMA4 is set in BIOS.
| Reinstalling the IDE channels does nothing.
| CHKDSK /r finds nothing wrong.
| Disk Management finds nothing wrong.
| Western Digital Data Lifeguard Diagnostics finds nothing wrong.
| Formatting doesn't help.
| Removing the logical disk and recreating it doesn't help.
| Oddly, the 'write all zeroes to disk' option in Western Digital Data
| Lifeguard Tools reports success, but doesn't help.
|
| My system:
| P4 3.0 GHz
| 2,620,652 KB RAM (PC3200)
| ASUS P5GD1 mobo
| PATA Western Digital 200 GB disk (boot)
| SATA Western Digital 120 GB disk <-- the offending article
| SATA Western Digital 500 GB disk
| PATA NEC 3500A DVD burner
|
| I hope I left nothing out. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

 

[I.C. Koets]

Just a couple of ideas or things to try:
Check your memory for errors (memtest86)

Done. 50 hours without errors.

Consider trying another version of the Sata driver, but be careful of
version conflicts causing HD corruption (backups might be advisable
before trying this out)

My mobo uses the disks in compatibility mode, i.e. fakes them to be PATA
drives. SATA drivers are therefore not used.

Sata BIOS update? Again, watch out for HD corruption problems, backup
everything first.

BIOS is the most recent version.

Is there a raid setup for the Sata interface, could this be affecting
HD activity?

RAID has been disabled in the BIOS and is not active in the OS.

Boot from a Knoppix Live CD, then try some large file writes/transfers
to the partition in issue.

That might be an option.
I'll get back on that.

 

[I.C. Koets]

If it's a poor generic PSU, claiming it's 650W isn't much to
go on...

Try a different data cable, sometimes they make poor
contact.

I will, although I find it hard to see how this specific problem could be
cable related. With PCs, anything can cause anything...

 

[I.C. Koets]

A total power rating of 650W, whilst it sounds high, is probably a false
figure. Power supplies provide power on several lines/channels (not sure of
the correct term) and it is possible to overload one channel of a power
supply with significantly lower demand than its quoted rating.

I used to use a 230W PSU to happily powers the same setup as you have (minus
1 drive). I now use a (silent) 300W PSU. If power is the problem, the I
would have thought the problem would show itself in other ways, not just 1
partition. So to rule out a power problem, try unplugging 1 hard disk -
leave the system drive and the faulty drive (as you used to run it). If the
faulty drive starts to behave again, then it is either a power related
problem or a controller/configuration problem. If reducing the power load by
1 drive makes no difference, then it is probably not a power problem. You
could then try copying all data from the troublesome partition to another
drive and format the dodgy partition - perhaps the FAT table is in a pickle,
or out of space, or so badly fragmented that it can't cope (unlikely). As it
is not the boot drive, you should be able to do all of this within Windows
without a reboot.

Hooking up the other drives to an external power supply did nothing to the
problem. Power supply does not seem to be the cause.

 

[kony]

I will, although I find it hard to see how this specific problem could be
cable related. With PCs, anything can cause anything...

In my prior reply I was not considering that your problem
might only occur on one partition out of several on the same
drive? If this is true then I suspect the partition table
or filesystem is corrupt and advise moving the data off the
partition and trying to reformat it... even though checkdisk
found no problem.

Ultimately if everything you try does not work then it is
time to try the drive in another system and if it still has
problems, RMA to the manufacturer if still under warranty.

 

[I.C. Koets]

In my prior reply I was not considering that your problem
might only occur on one partition out of several on the same
drive?

That is correct, the other logical disks on the same partition work
flawlessly.

If this is true then I suspect the partition table
or filesystem is corrupt and advise moving the data off the
partition and trying to reformat it... even though checkdisk
found no problem.

Formatting using DOS format, via W2k disk management and via Western
Digitals utility all report success and fail to do anything about the
problem.

Ultimately if everything you try does not work then it is
time to try the drive in another system and if it still has
problems, RMA to the manufacturer if still under warranty.

I'll do so when I can power down, the PC is doing some work I can't
interrupt.