Hardware SATA Disk problem playing video-Pl Help

[Sam]

Hi

Bare with me as I got no reply at windowsxp video forum re choppy video
problem - I think it is a hardware issue.

I have choppy audio and to lesser extent video from *one* (of 3) SATA
internal
physical hard disks. If I copy the source clip to another physical hard disc
it plays fine.It seems to only happen with larger more complex avi files-
and simpler smaller files like wmv play ok (The fact that small clips play
ok suggests that the total disk access
is getting slowed down to the point you overrun the buffers??).The
"problem"HD also works fine for text docs
and pics etc.

I tried reinstalling display adapter drivers to no avail.Defragging the disk
did not help.

Is this a failure of the particular hard disk or is there other
possibilities?

Hardware
--------

XP Pro, ATI AIW 9800 Radeon video card, P4 3.2 GigHz, I gig RAM,
Mobo is AsusP4C800 Deluxe which has onboard support for 4 SATA Drives so
shouldn't be a bus issue as in sharing a bus like parallelATA/IDE.Not sure
if
the "controller" itself can be overloaded or something but the other SATA
disks play video fine suggesting its not a problem originating outside this
one hard disk??Also video plays ok from the ParallelATA/IDE fixed disks as
well as from USB connected external disks.

Thanks

Sam

 

[Galen]

In

Is this a failure of the particular hard disk or is there other
possibilities?

I hate to say so but it could very well be a hardware issue related to your
drive. You can download numerous hard drive testing utilities from various
sites, a search for hard drive benchmarking utilities will show you a number
of free ones or ones with trials. Download one and give the drive a good
testing with it. Then compare the results with the manufacturer's
specifications and what you're expecting. You can also compare the test
results against another drive of the same type (which it seems you happen to
have handy) which SHOULD give you good objective results. If it's below spec
than contact the manufacturer as it's a hardware related issue and not an
operating system issue.

Galen
--

"My mind rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me
the most abstruse cryptogram or the most intricate analysis, and I am
in my own proper atmosphere. I can dispense then with artificial
stimulants. But I abhor the dull routine of existence. I crave for
mental exaltation." -- Sherlock Holmes

 

[Sam]

Okay and thanks..

One other thing I noticed which may be relevant....I checked device manager
and event viewer both appear ok AFAIK...but in task manager the CPU
utilization jumps to between 55-65%! only with the suspect drive. Now here's
the weird part - Windows media player only uses 10-11% and "system idle" the
bulk of the rest.IOW there is NO process identified as chewing up all that
CPU usage.When the same clip is played (with no problems) from another drive
and in WMP , the CPU shows WMP as around 10-11% and the total CPU
utilization around 13-14%.

Sam