FireWire HD crashed running Norton Speed Disk

[y_p_w]

I have a 120GB LaCie d2 FW hard drive that crashed while I
ran Norton Disk Doctor (as part of SystemWorks 2003
Professional). It got to 99% when everything locked up. I was
in denial for a few minutes - now I realize that I'm not
getting my drive back the way it was before. It's permanently
corrupted - it locks up my PC (Windows Millenium) whenever I
try to access it. The drive makes periodic noises, and the
access light flashes and doesn't stop. I tried it on my Apple
iBook running OS X. The drive is recognized by the Apple System
Profiler as a FireWire device, but the partition never mounts
on the desktop like it's supposed to - but the OS doesn't lock
up.

Now - none of the info was really worth that much, and I used up
maybe 3GB tops. Most of it was either pictures or movie trailers
that I backed up on CD or was on my iBook. I also had some backup
program installer downloads (no loss). I also had a tax worksheet
there - only a backup though. Much of the data was saved on my
notebook. I can live without the little data that isn't backed
up somewhere.

So how hard would it be to reformat the hard drive? I tried
Silverlining98 (came with the drive) to have a look at it. The
volume is recognized by the software. I figure I might be able
to delete the partition and repartition the drive. I'd be
willing to reformat the whole drive, but I'm unsure of how to
do that since Windows Millenium doesn't recognize it. I just
want the drive to be usable again.

I'm also going to avoid using Speed Disk. I only ran it because
it was something to do when my internet connection went out for
a few minutes.

 

[Chris Hill]

I have a 120GB LaCie d2 FW hard drive that crashed while I
ran Norton Disk Doctor (as part of SystemWorks 2003
Professional). It got to 99% when everything locked up. I was
in denial for a few minutes - now I realize that I'm not
getting my drive back the way it was before. It's permanently
corrupted - it locks up my PC (Windows Millenium) whenever I
try to access it. The drive makes periodic noises, and the
access light flashes and doesn't stop. I tried it on my Apple
iBook running OS X. The drive is recognized by the Apple System
Profiler as a FireWire device, but the partition never mounts
on the desktop like it's supposed to - but the OS doesn't lock
up.

Now - none of the info was really worth that much, and I used up
maybe 3GB tops. Most of it was either pictures or movie trailers
that I backed up on CD or was on my iBook. I also had some backup
program installer downloads (no loss). I also had a tax worksheet
there - only a backup though. Much of the data was saved on my
notebook. I can live without the little data that isn't backed
up somewhere.

So how hard would it be to reformat the hard drive? I tried
Silverlining98 (came with the drive) to have a look at it. The
volume is recognized by the software. I figure I might be able
to delete the partition and repartition the drive. I'd be
willing to reformat the whole drive, but I'm unsure of how to
do that since Windows Millenium doesn't recognize it. I just
want the drive to be usable again.

I'm also going to avoid using Speed Disk. I only ran it because
it was something to do when my internet connection went out for
a few minutes.

I think you're barking up the wrong tree. I doutt ndd killed your
drive, you just happened to be running ndd when the drive puked.
Software problems don't usually cause drives to make strange noises.
Open up the case, pull the drive and find out what it is. Next,
install the drive in place of your cd-roms and run the manufacturer's
diagnostic to confirm it is dead. After you've done that, go out and
buy a 120gb drive somewhere and put it into your computer. Fdisk and
format it as normal, then stick it in the firewire case.

 

[y_p_w]

I think you're barking up the wrong tree. I doutt ndd killed your
drive, you just happened to be running ndd when the drive puked.
Software problems don't usually cause drives to make strange noises.
Open up the case, pull the drive and find out what it is. Next,
install the drive in place of your cd-roms and run the manufacturer's
diagnostic to confirm it is dead. After you've done that, go out and
buy a 120gb drive somewhere and put it into your computer. Fdisk and
format it as normal, then stick it in the firewire case.

Thanks for the advice. I was able to delete the partition with
LaCie Silverlining98 and reinstall it. I had some difficulty
plugging in the FireWire drive - it locked up the OS a few times
before I could get it stable enough to repartition it. It seems
to work OK - I repartitioned it without reformatting it. I can
successfully transfer data to the disk, although I'm not going to
put any critical info there until I know it's stable.

I looked at Norton Utilities system information right after the
repartition. The total capacity was 114 GB, with 3.82 used.
I couldn't find any actual data other than a "RECYCLED" directory
and "_restore" directory that doesn't show up in Windows. The
only file there is something called "Srdiskid.dat". My guess is
my original data is somewhere on the drive.