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Hard disc drive problem


sanjoa

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Hi, guys! Well, I have a little big problem: sometimes after I start my computer I got the message "Hard disc drive not found" "Hard disc drive unable to read". Today I opened the case to check everything was OK and after that it started (all cords were plugged OK). I'm using a Western Digital 250 GB SATAII hard disc drive.

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As far as I can see, it's the SATA wire, cord, cable, whatever you can say problem. Even I had this problem before but it's gets cleared when I change/switch the side of SATA cable.

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Next time this happens to you open the case and touch the drive to check if it is spinning.if it doesn't,shake the power cable and listen closely.the hard drive makes a little tick when it spins up.also try connecting the data cable to a different SATA socket.

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dead hardisk i think....but check the plugs again,take the harddrive out and then plug it in again....use a blow dyryer or somthin to clean of the dust and stuff....

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See what SokraT wrote. That may can also the be the problem.

ANW See the red cable connected to your HDD. Switch it's side, remove it and replug it. Etc.

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I always clean it with my friend's air compressor. I was thinking to replace the disc because I'm going to buy one bigger.

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Hello,

I figured since I'm new the best thing I could do is to offer help since I do this for a living.

If you have Important DATA read the following if not just buy a new drive.

Like they said see if the drive is spinning.

try a different SATA cable, a different port and power cable.

If it's not spinning still after you have tried differnt power cables more than likely the drive's board crapped out.

You can try to find a replacement board if you have data on the drive that you need to get off here... http://www.hdd-parts.com/index.html

If the drive is spinning and you get that message, either the partiton table on the drive is screwed or you still got something wrong with the drives board or platter.

I would say if you got access to another machine hook it up to that machine and see if that Bios & OS see's the drive.

If the OS see's the drive you can run a DOS based check disk from Windows....

Once in Windows Open a DOS command prompt and type

chkdsk E: /f /r

Replace the E with what ever the correct drive letter is...

If it fixes anything and lets you access the drive I would recommend getting data off asap or try a backup software to make an image of the drive.

Try arcronis true image to make a back up I would not recommend Ghost because once you reboot it could mess up the drive again.

If there's no data on it just RMA it and save yourself the headache if it still has warranty or buy a new drive.

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The disc is spinning. The BIOS setup always read the disc. It has two partitions, one of 40 GB (the system drive) and the other is 200 gb aproximately (where I store files and do backups). May the mainboard driver cause this problem? (I have a nForce driver on a diskette that I have to use if I don't have MS Windows drivers and those nForce drivers are from the motherboard driver CD)

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The disc is spinning. The BIOS setup always read the disc. It has two partitions, one of 40 GB (the system drive) and the other is 200 gb aproximately (where I store files and do backups). May the mainboard driver cause this problem? (I have a nForce driver on a diskette that I have to use if I don't have MS Windows drivers and those nForce drivers are from the motherboard driver CD)

Yep your chipset "SATA controller" and or Bios can have issues as well.

I would still point my finger at the drive frist unless you run some tests on it.

I guess another thing to do is disable booting to anyting else in the bios.

Turn off boot network & usb drives

Set the HDD to the first boot device.

Make sure raid isn't enabled.

If none of those things work slaving it to another computer with an OS already avaible can eliminate drive problems.

Since you can run diagnostics on it and determine if it’s the dive that has issues.

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Well if you have SATA HDD and Raid is disabled when the problems occurs then I recommend you to enable it for a try. ;)

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this is rare. I've restarted my computer twice and nothing happened. And the electric power went out a moment ago and nothing happened. (There is so much wind and cables with electricity are working bad)

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Well, then you need to get yourself a UPS. Often loosing electric power can and will for sure reduce life of your hard disks and other components. I think that HDD is the most sensitive on electrical changes. UPS also gives you constant voltage, so no variations in voltage which is even better for computer. Beside UPS, I would suggest that you get yourself a power surge protection cable.

For the HDD problem, download from WD site diagnostic tool, and run extended test to see if there is a problem.

Cheers ;)

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Well mara- is right. If there's a power problem, earthin problem and similar electric problems, HDD is the part in the computer that gets hurt the most. My experience. Once I lost my whole HDD because of electric problem.

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Just a note. Get UPS with surge protector built in. Most come with it already. Don't plug a UPS into a surge protector. Plug a UPS directly into a wall electrical socket.

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"Hard disc drive not found"

The first thing I should do in this case is to save my data when I am able to do it :"Hard disc drive found" :P

This type of Event has always a very sad END. :angry:

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Well if the data is really important, I have heard about HDD recovery agents but are really expensive, about $300. That way you can buy about 12-14 HDDs. :blink:

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Well if the data is really important, I have heard about HDD recovery agents but are really expensive, about $300. That way you can buy about 12-14 HDDs.  :blink:

Yes they need to open the drive case in a clean room (class 100) like semiconductor fab rooms. 

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Oh! I see. Well I wasn't knowin that.

Hard disks are hermetically sealed in a clean room.

the tiniest speck of dust and your drive is knacked.

To give you an example. The drive heads float about 2-3 microns above the platter. A human hair is about 10 microns thick.

A speck of tobacco smoke about 20 microns. Get one of those under the heads and  goodbye hard disk.

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Great to get some knowledge. :)

I thought you are a great software cracker but you are also knowin some important things about hardware. ;)

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Great to get some knowledge. :)

I thought you are a great software cracker but you are also knowin some important things about hardware. ;)

Hi DKT27,

I love hardware, all my PCs  are mounted piece by piece by myself. From an ASUS motherboard and up.

I just changed yesterday an Antec 450w bad quality power supply by a Corsair HX1000W. Please have a look on the video proposed

by Corsair web site 

http://www.corsair.com/products/hx1000/default.aspx

(click on "Watch Videos" )

You will see what really happen to my power supply.

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