External Firewire/USB HD drive enclosure problem

  • Thread starter Thread starter BillL
  • Start date Start date
B

BillL

Hello all,

I've recently had a serious HD crash using an external caddy via Firewire -
basically the disc cannot be read though the drive and partitions can be
seen by XP and I'm able to format the drive (if I wanted to). The drive is a
Maxtor 120GB and is over 2 years old - unfortunately it also
contained/contains my holiday photos and mp3 collection (it also failed the
night before I was finally going to get round to backing the drive up onto
DVD's!! :o(

Anyhow I put another drive in the enclosure (brand new Seagate 120 GB) but
just used it the internet cache this time to see if the above problem was
repeated - it was last night but this time I formatted the drive and now
using it (via the USB connection).

Have I got a faulty enclosure (my guess); a Firewire (USB would be
*better*?) or a common problem with external enclosures generally?

TIA

BillL

Sys spec/config
AMD A64 3200+ (Winchester)
Gigabyte GA-K8NXP-SLI (F6 BIOS)
1 GB RAM (2 x 512 MB Crucial Ballistix DIMM's) PC4000
Leadtek PX6600GT 'Extreme'
External USB Creative NX2 Sound
Coolermaster 'Wavemaster'Case
OCZ 'Powerstream' 520Watt PSU

DISCS
Maxtor DiamondMax 250 GB SATA150 (On nforce4 controller)

Seagate 120 GB PATA in external Firewire/USB 'ICY BOX' enclosure

Secondary IDE Channel
Samsung 16x DVD
NEC 3500A DVDRW

OtherHW
HP 940C USB Printer
Epson R300 Photo
Cannon LiDE30 USB Scanner
Hauppauge WinTV PCI

OS: WinXP Pro SP2
 
Hello all,

I've recently had a serious HD crash using an external caddy via Firewire -
basically the disc cannot be read though the drive and partitions can be
seen by XP and I'm able to format the drive (if I wanted to). The drive is a
Maxtor 120GB and is over 2 years old - unfortunately it also
contained/contains my holiday photos and mp3 collection (it also failed the
night before I was finally going to get round to backing the drive up onto
DVD's!! :o(

Anyhow I put another drive in the enclosure (brand new Seagate 120 GB) but
just used it the internet cache this time to see if the above problem was
repeated - it was last night but this time I formatted the drive and now
using it (via the USB connection).

Have I got a faulty enclosure (my guess); a Firewire (USB would be
*better*?) or a common problem with external enclosures generally?
Click to expand...
Is it data corruption or phyiscal failure?
 
Justin Case said:
Is it data corruption or phyiscal failure?
Click to expand...

I'm not sure but as the brand new drive had the same problem and is now
working via USB (thus far?) I would think its data corruption. I'm going to
DL a demo of a some data recovery software and see I can pull anything of
the Maxtor drive. Also niether HDD presented any obvious signs of imminent
failure (e.g. they wern't producing any strange noises or getting very
warm).

OTOH it wouldn't be beyond the realms of possibility that both the Maxtor
and Seagate could failures could be hardware related.

BillL
 
BillL said:
Hello all,

I've recently had a serious HD crash using an external caddy via
Firewire - basically the disc cannot be read though the drive and
partitions can be seen by XP and I'm able to format the drive (if I wanted
to). The drive is a Maxtor 120GB and is over 2 years old - unfortunately
it also contained/contains my holiday photos and mp3 collection (it also
failed the night before I was finally going to get round to backing the
drive up onto DVD's!! :o(

Anyhow I put another drive in the enclosure (brand new Seagate 120 GB) but
just used it the internet cache this time to see if the above problem was
repeated - it was last night but this time I formatted the drive and now
using it (via the USB connection).

Have I got a faulty enclosure (my guess); a Firewire (USB would be
*better*?) or a common problem with external enclosures generally?

TIA

BillL
Click to expand...
DISCS
Maxtor DiamondMax 250 GB SATA150 (On nforce4 controller)

Seagate 120 GB PATA in external Firewire/USB 'ICY BOX' enclosure
Click to expand...
OS: WinXP Pro SP2
Click to expand...

And then he adds...
I'm not sure but as the brand new drive had the same problem and is now
working via USB (thus far?) I would think its data corruption. I'm going to
DL a demo of a some data recovery software and see I can pull anything of
the Maxtor drive. Also niether HDD presented any obvious signs of imminent
failure (e.g. they wern't producing any strange noises or getting very
warm).

OTOH it wouldn't be beyond the realms of possibility that both the Maxtor
and Seagate could failures could be hardware related.

BillL


Bill:
While it's not "beyond the realms of possibility" that both drives failed
more-or-less simultaneously, needless to say, it's *highly* unlikely.

Assuming there's no problem with the connection between your USB/Firewire
external hard drive enclosure and your computer's port(s), it certainly
sounds like a defective enclosure, no?

I take it you installed the (apparently) defective drive internally, but you
couldn't access its contents - is that so? If you haven't done that, it
certainly would be advisable to do so. But assuming you have - was the drive
recognized in My Computer/Windows Explorer? What does it show, if anything,
in XP's Disk Management utility?

I haven't seen that Icy Box unit advertised here in the U.S. I take it that
unit is available in the European market. Have you tried to contact the
manuf.? I see they're apparently a German outfit -
http://www.raidsonic.de/e_index.html
([email protected]). Might be useful to see what they have to say.
Anna
 
I'm not sure but as the brand new drive had the same problem and is now
working via USB (thus far?) I would think its data corruption. I'm going to
DL a demo of a some data recovery software and see I can pull anything of
the Maxtor drive. Also niether HDD presented any obvious signs of imminent
failure (e.g. they wern't producing any strange noises or getting very
warm).

OTOH it wouldn't be beyond the realms of possibility that both the Maxtor
and Seagate could failures could be hardware related.
Click to expand...

I seriously doubt you have two bad drives. Does either or both of them
work ok when installed internally?
I would suspect the enclosure first. It's probably a piece of shit
that can't handle the throughput. Does it do it's own caching? Can it
be disabled? Can you turn off caching for it in windows? If so, I
would do that first. It would slow things down of course but it would
give you something to test / experiment with while you have your files
on an internal drive where they're safe.
Did you search the net for reviews or others having the same problems
with the particular model you have? Check the manufaturers website for
firmware/software updates?
Get busy and let us know what you find.
 
Anna said:
And then he adds...
I'm not sure but as the brand new drive had the same problem and is now
working via USB (thus far?) I would think its data corruption. I'm going
to
DL a demo of a some data recovery software and see I can pull anything of
the Maxtor drive. Also niether HDD presented any obvious signs of imminent
failure (e.g. they wern't producing any strange noises or getting very
warm).

OTOH it wouldn't be beyond the realms of possibility that both the Maxtor
and Seagate could failures could be hardware related.

BillL


Bill:
While it's not "beyond the realms of possibility" that both drives failed
more-or-less simultaneously, needless to say, it's *highly* unlikely.

Assuming there's no problem with the connection between your USB/Firewire
external hard drive enclosure and your computer's port(s), it certainly
sounds like a defective enclosure, no?

I take it you installed the (apparently) defective drive internally, but
you couldn't access its contents - is that so? If you haven't done that,
it certainly would be advisable to do so. But assuming you have - was the
drive recognized in My Computer/Windows Explorer? What does it show, if
anything, in XP's Disk Management utility?

I haven't seen that Icy Box unit advertised here in the U.S. I take it
that unit is available in the European market. Have you tried to contact
the manuf.? I see they're apparently a German outfit -
http://www.raidsonic.de/e_index.html
([email protected]). Might be useful to see what they have to say.
Anna
Click to expand...


If I may butt in for a moment, Anna, where is this disk management utility
located? Thanks.

Ed Cregger
 
Have I got a faulty enclosure (my guess); a Firewire (USB would be
*better*?) or a common problem with external enclosures generally?

TIA

BillL
Click to expand...

Bad hardware in the enclosure I'm sure. Out of five USB 2.0 external
USB enclosures I just got this happen with one. Brand new drive worked
great a week or less. Got some data off with Data Unerase.
http://www.octanesoft.com/data_recovery_free_edition.html

Put drive on an IDE cable and it's run perfect for a month.
 
BillL said:
I'm not sure but as the brand new drive had the same problem and is now
working via USB (thus far?) I would think its data corruption. I'm going to
DL a demo of a some data recovery software and see I can pull anything of
the Maxtor drive.
Click to expand...

Create a drive image before you play around. That way, at least you
still have the data in some form for further recovery trials.

Also niether HDD presented any obvious signs of imminent
failure (e.g. they wern't producing any strange noises or getting very
warm).

OTOH it wouldn't be beyond the realms of possibility that both the Maxtor
and Seagate could failures could be hardware related.

BillL
Click to expand...


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transplant, too. Please volunteer to be a marrow donor:
http://www.abmdr.org.au/
http://www.marrow.org/
 
Ed Cregger said:
If I may butt in for a moment, Anna, where is this disk management utility
located? Thanks.

Ed Cregger
Click to expand...


Ed:
Start > right-click My Computer > Manage > Computer Management > Disk
Management.
Anna
 
AndrewJ said:
Bad hardware in the enclosure I'm sure. Out of five USB 2.0 external
USB enclosures I just got this happen with one. Brand new drive worked
great a week or less. Got some data off with Data Unerase.
http://www.octanesoft.com/data_recovery_free_edition.html

Put drive on an IDE cable and it's run perfect for a month.
Click to expand...

Thanks for all the replies.

The first thing I did was to put the drive back in the PC on the primary IDE
port - no difference as I still couldn't access the drive. I've been to the
German manufactures site (poorly translated into English) and there doesn't
appear to be any drivers/firmware available (WinXP didn't blink when I
installed the enclosure and drive).

I'll do some more research and also see how it goes with USB - could be that
the Gigabyte has problems with Firewire??

BillL
 
Thanks for all the replies.

The first thing I did was to put the drive back in the PC on the primary IDE
port - no difference as I still couldn't access the drive. I've been to the
German manufactures site (poorly translated into English) and there doesn't
appear to be any drivers/firmware available (WinXP didn't blink when I
installed the enclosure and drive).

I'll do some more research and also see how it goes with USB - could be that
the Gigabyte has problems with Firewire??

BillL
Click to expand...

In my experiences with enclosures I'd suggest making sure the drive is
not running too hot as very few have a decent fan to expel the heat
build up. I've got to the point that the cover is left off a few of
mine or I don't run them long. Heat will shorten a drives life
expectancy a lot.
 
Start -> Run diskmgmgt.msc


--
Tumppi
Reply to group
=================================================
Most learned on nntp://news.mircosoft.com
Helsinki, Finland (remove _NOSPAM)
(translations from FI/SE not always accurate)
=================================================
 
BillL said:
Hello all,

I've recently had a serious HD crash using an external caddy via
Firewire - basically the disc cannot be read though the drive and
partitions can be seen by XP and I'm able to format the drive (if I
wanted to). The drive is a Maxtor 120GB and is over 2 years old -
unfortunately it also contained/contains my holiday photos and mp3
collection (it also failed the night before I was finally going to
get round to backing the drive up onto DVD's!! :o(

Anyhow I put another drive in the enclosure (brand new Seagate 120
GB) but just used it the internet cache this time to see if the above
problem was repeated - it was last night but this time I formatted
the drive and now using it (via the USB connection).

Have I got a faulty enclosure (my guess); a Firewire (USB would be
*better*?) or a common problem with external enclosures generally?

TIA

BillL

Sys spec/config
AMD A64 3200+ (Winchester)
Gigabyte GA-K8NXP-SLI (F6 BIOS)
1 GB RAM (2 x 512 MB Crucial Ballistix DIMM's) PC4000
Leadtek PX6600GT 'Extreme'
External USB Creative NX2 Sound
Coolermaster 'Wavemaster'Case
OCZ 'Powerstream' 520Watt PSU

DISCS
Maxtor DiamondMax 250 GB SATA150 (On nforce4 controller)

Seagate 120 GB PATA in external Firewire/USB 'ICY BOX' enclosure

Secondary IDE Channel
Samsung 16x DVD
NEC 3500A DVDRW

OtherHW
HP 940C USB Printer
Epson R300 Photo
Cannon LiDE30 USB Scanner
Hauppauge WinTV PCI

OS: WinXP Pro SP2
Click to expand...

How is the enclosure powered?

Q
 
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