A78NX Deluxe + Maxtor 80gb SATA Drive Issues

[Matt]

Ok

Managed to get my system up and running after a few teething troubles
(mainly a dodgy graphics card). Now I seem to have the mother of all
problems.

Basically I'm getting random checkdisks on boot up (usually from cold boot)
on my serial ata drive. This seems to be happening more and more frequently
so I'm reluctant to turn the machine off at the moment. I'm not RAIDing my
disk (as I have only one) so I dont think its the RAID 0 data corruption
issue thats been doing the rounds on this forum.

This morning when I booted, the 'Press F4 for RAID Configuration' bit during
boot failed to detect my HD and windows didn't boot. The second time it
picked it up it got further but windows failed to boot and the 3rd time I
managed to get in.

I also had a BSOD last week which was something to do with NTFS.SYS. This
left me unable to boot, safe mode, recover, ERD Command or anything so I was
left with no choice but to fdisk and start all over again.

I'm thinking dodgy HD... but I wanna know what you guys think.

Matt

Athlon Xp 2600+
Asus A78NX Dx 2.0
Asus Geforce FX 5600 Ultra
Maxtor 80Gb SATA (7200, 8Mb Cache)
512Mb Crucial 2700

Some other stuff

 

[Ixnei]

Ok

Managed to get my system up and running after a few teething troubles
(mainly a dodgy graphics card). Now I seem to have the mother of all
problems.

Basically I'm getting random checkdisks on boot up (usually from cold
boot) on my serial ata drive. This seems to be happening more and more
frequently so I'm reluctant to turn the machine off at the moment. I'm
not RAIDing my disk (as I have only one) so I dont think its the RAID 0
data corruption issue thats been doing the rounds on this forum.

This morning when I booted, the 'Press F4 for RAID Configuration' bit
during boot failed to detect my HD and windows didn't boot. The second
time it picked it up it got further but windows failed to boot and the
3rd time I managed to get in.

I also had a BSOD last week which was something to do with NTFS.SYS.
This left me unable to boot, safe mode, recover, ERD Command or anything
so I was left with no choice but to fdisk and start all over again.

I'm thinking dodgy HD... but I wanna know what you guys think.

Matt

Athlon Xp 2600+
Asus A78NX Dx 2.0
Asus Geforce FX 5600 Ultra
Maxtor 80Gb SATA (7200, 8Mb Cache)
512Mb Crucial 2700

Some other stuff

I'd be suspicious of the cable also.

I've had flaky issues with hard drives and CD Roms related to cables not
quite doing the trick. Particularly if the cable was plugged into one
device, then plugged into a different one (tolerances).

They'd work fine most of the time, but over time flake in and out (maybe
temp flexing).

--
We HAVE been at war with Iraq for 13 years now, bombing their
country on at least a weekly basis.
"U.S.-led sanctions have killed over a million Iraqi citizens,
according to UN studies" - James Jennings
3,000+ innocent Iraqi civilian casualties can't be "wrong"...

 

[Matt]

I'd be suspicious of the cable also.

I've had flaky issues with hard drives and CD Roms related to cables not
quite doing the trick. Particularly if the cable was plugged into one
device, then plugged into a different one (tolerances).

They'd work fine most of the time, but over time flake in and out (maybe
temp flexing).

--

Well I have a spare so I'll give that a try - reluctant to turn off my
machine to do it however...!

 

[Matt]

So far so good... but I've only restarted my pc and not cold booted it yet.

 

[Matt]

3 cold boots and no errors at the moment. The proof will be when I start it
tomorrow.. always seems to happen then..

 

[Nom]

Ok

Managed to get my system up and running after a few teething troubles
(mainly a dodgy graphics card). Now I seem to have the mother of all
problems.

Basically I'm getting random checkdisks on boot up (usually from cold boot)
on my serial ata drive. This seems to be happening more and more frequently
so I'm reluctant to turn the machine off at the moment. I'm not RAIDing my
disk (as I have only one) so I dont think its the RAID 0 data corruption
issue thats been doing the rounds on this forum.

This morning when I booted, the 'Press F4 for RAID Configuration' bit during
boot failed to detect my HD and windows didn't boot. The second time it
picked it up it got further but windows failed to boot and the 3rd time I
managed to get in.

I also had a BSOD last week which was something to do with NTFS.SYS. This
left me unable to boot, safe mode, recover, ERD Command or anything so I was
left with no choice but to fdisk and start all over again.

I'm thinking dodgy HD... but I wanna know what you guys think.

You are experiencing the SATA corruption issue.
It's well documented, and has been fixed. Go and check out some forums.

1. Flash the very latest "SATA Enhanced" UBER BIOS for your board, from
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/michael.mcclay/
2. Reformat all your drives
3. Reinstall WinXP, with the .29 SATA drivers - get em from me at
http://web.newsguy.com/nomnet/silicon_v10029.zip
4. Problem solved

 

[Sam]

You are experiencing the SATA corruption issue.
It's well documented, and has been fixed. Go and check out some forums.

1. Flash the very latest "SATA Enhanced" UBER BIOS for your board, from
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/michael.mcclay/

Just curious... what are the advantages of using the UBER BIOS over the one
from the ASUS site?

Sam

 

[Nom]

Just curious... what are the advantages of using the UBER BIOS over the one
from the ASUS site?

The SATA Enhanced one, comes with a more modern SATA BIOS.