Problems with maxtor HD (what a surprise)

[MadScot]

System Specs:

Asus P2B-LS, Pentium II 400Mhz, 256Mb PC100 CAS 2, Matrox Millenium G400 DualHead AGP, RainbowRunner G-series, Creative PC-DVD Dxr2, HP CD-RW 9200i, Quantum 9Gb SCSI HD, Maxtor 20Gb Ultra-66 HD (52049U4), Soundblaster 128, ViewSonic PS790 19", Win98/Win2k dual boot (Win98 primary OS)


I installed the Maxtor drive a few months ago and began to notice problems recently as I began to use it for more than just temporary data storage. When playing media (mp3, avi, etc.) off the Maxtor drive, every ten to thirty seconds the playback pasues for five to ten seconds as the harddisk light is on, leading me to suspect that there is some I/O conflict between the different devices on the computer. There is no problem when playing things off either the SCSI drive, the SCSI CD-RW drive, or the IDE DVD drive. Lately I've noticed problems launching or running programs off the Maxtor drive, even Win2k has problems. When the slowdowns occour, my CPU usage is 100%, even when it is 0% before and after. My mobo only supports Ultra-33 (UDMA mode 2), but I don't think that is the problem. Any ideas as to the problem, or to a solution?

Thanks a lot,
MadScot

[SCompRacer]

Hiya MadScot,

You sure got that board stuffed full. I used to have an LS, and it was primarily SCSI with a (surprise) Maxtor DiamondMax IDE HD and Hitachi DVD CD ROM on Primary.

Is your Maxtor on seperate IDE or on same channel with the DVD drive? Is DMA enabled in Device Manager?


[This message has been edited by SCompRacer (edited 04 March 2001).]

[MadScot]

The DVD is on Primary master, and the Maxtor is Secondary master. DMA is checked in the Device Manager in Win98, didn't check Win2k, but I don't see any reason it should be different. I wonder if it could be a mechanical problem, as every now and then (few days) the drive will click when spinning up. Of course, next to the Quantum, it's nothing. I've heard of reliability problems with the Maxtors, though. It could be a power problem. I only have a 235 watt power supply, but I'd think there would be other symtoms if that were a problem. If I had another system, I'd swap the Maxtor over.

Any thoughts?

MadScot

[xortam]

Howdy neighbor! Why don't you pull the power on your optical drives temporarily and see if that helps?

[SteveC]

does the drive make any odd noises when it pauses?

Have you tried formatting it (in DOS!) and see if you get any nice 'trying to recover allocation unit xxx' messages?

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Cheers,
Steve

"Life is what we make of it, yet most of us just fake"

[MadScot]

Thanks for the sugguestions. I'll give them a try when I get a chance.

SteveC: the drive will make a weird clicking noise when pausing the first time on a load. It's always made the noise.

MasDcot

[rylan]

Sounds like you may have a drive thats got some bad sectors or a servo problem.

[The PIT]

Look under the event viewer in win2k. If theres problem with the drive it may tell you there.

[PowerHungry]

I have several Maxtor drives, and used them since their 540MB was their largest. I got that clicking on only 1 drive out of 6 I've owned, and it ended up being a bad drive. Go to their website and download the test utility. Run it and if there is an error code, call them and you shoud be able to get a new drive within 3 business days. http://www.maxtor.com/products/Diamo...ures/20014.htm

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P=I^2*R

[LuckyG]

Try replacing your AC pigtail. I had a short in one once that manifested itself like that. Bought a new HD before I discovered I coulda fixed it for 99 cents.

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=========================
ABIT BP6, Dual Celeron 533's
single stick of Kingston ECC registered PC100 256MB RAM
Dual IBM C-71 17" monitors
Matrox G400Max
Seagate Cheetah 10k 9.1gb SCSI U2W drive
Adaptec 2940U2W SCSI Controller
Maxtor 20 GB 7.2k UDMA66 and 60 GB 7.2k UDMA100 IDE drives
Plextor Ultraplex 40max SCSI CD player
Seagate Scorpion SCSI DAT drive
Creative SB AWE32 / LinkSys NIC / 300 watt power supply
12 fans (including three stacked Nidek Blowers) / assorted external SCSI stuff.........
Win2K w latest SP/WIN98SE/DOS 6.22

[Greebe]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Try replacing your AC pigtail.</font>

What are you refering to?

[LuckyG]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by Greebe:
What are you refering to?

</font>

The AC "Y" connector to the hard drive. A hairline break can cause the symptoms he outlined.

[Greebe]

"AC" is an aconym for...?

[Wombat]

No AC there fella. It's all DC. +/- 5 and 12.

But yes, a bad connection there has caused me HD problems too.

[LuckyG]

Oops. DC it is of course. In this case, an acronym for "Didn't Connect".