hard drive crash help

gearbox · 07-30-2009

well i have some questions. basically my secondary internal HD running off ATA controler card just took a dump. one minute everything was fine, next minute the computer slows to a crawl and freezes which is very rare for me. i restart, nothing. it freezes on a black screen right before windows can load. tried several times but no luck. i unplug the ide cable from the drive and thank goodness everything boots up fine.

anyway onto the questions. first, this incident has made me worried because what if my main drive fails? this is an old comp and the highest HD it will physically operate on is 30GB. im not sure how easy it would be to find one. i also have a disk image program to restore an entire disk worth of programs and settings in case of virus or whatever. so i really need a backup hd in case anything happens. ill be buying a new hd to replace the old one but idk what the max GB is that the ata card supports. sigh, old technology. i thought about another usb drive but it takes hours to backup stuff. and finally, i had some stuff on the broken drive that wasnt backed up yet. most of it is, cause i have stuff on cds and an external drive, but some porn clips were still on it.

is there anyway to somehow access those files? im thinking no...

btw, im guessing but are there new controler cards that i could get to run a larger internal hd? the power supply on this thing is pretty small too so idk. dont wanna cause more issues lol.

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gearbox · 07-30-2009

ebay to the rescue! just bid on a WD 30GB same as my primary drive for $20! btw, the one that failed was a maxtor. piece of junk lol.

sicma99ot · 07-30-2009

my laptop did that to me. nothing to do but get a new hard drive. and what was on the old one is history. as far as i know you wouldnt be able to get the old files off of it. i actually sold my laptop with the good hard drive in it, without wipping it. which i didnt realize until after it was gone that it was a bad move because i had all my passwords for all my sites and even my bank account (and some porn lol) saved on it.

lordhelmet · 07-30-2009

Look into the program Spinrite. It works wonders.

You could do great things if you didn't look at so much porn.

gearbox · 08-03-2009

i got the new drive, plugged in, and same thing happens! windows will not boot up. i tried all three jumper settings and nothing. right before windows starts, the ATA card does detect the drive, but as soon as the windows xp screen comes, it will just freeze. this last time i waited a few minutes and it finally loaded the black screen with win xp logo, but it just sat there forever with the blue bars rotating. so idk wat to do? i guess the old drive was fine afterall, i just need to find another comp to try and hook it to. i dont think the ata card is bad, otherwise it wouldnt be loading the bios and detecting the drive on bootup. if anyone has ideas id love to hear it. otherwise i may end up having to buy an external usb drive and just use that however slow its gonna be.

speedfoos · 08-03-2009

Sounds like you might be having some RAM issues, or some of your system files became corrupted. Try booting into safe mode (tap either F6 or F8 while it's booting) and see what happens. I'm going to guess it's a RAM issue.

Oh and FYI its the OS that limits the size of the hard drive - more specifically the file structure. Since it's running Windows XP, you're good to run drives up to a couple TBs before you start running into problems.

tbohar · 08-03-2009

gearbox this could be a lot of things but I would start here:

How are your jumper settings on your master hard drive?

Check the cable that connects the hard drive to the MOBO.

Go through your BIOS thoroughly and make sure all the settings are correct. With the hard drive plugged in go see if BIOS detects it, and make sure all the numbers are appropriate, such as size.

This could also be a Windows problem. Have you tried reinstalling Windows? It might fix it as well.

Do you have any other operating systems installed on the slave drive? This sometimes does not jive with Windows and causes a crash.

At this point though... it might be worthwhile to get a new computer. If you can build them yourself you can get a really cheap computer from Tigerdirect! It's a fantastic place to get computer stuff.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...0174&CatId=332

The problem with old computers is that parts tend to get expensive when things do tend to go wrong. I will research this issue more see if I can figure it out online. It's hard when it's not in front of me

I could fix it in a jiffy if I was there playing with it.

tbohar · 08-03-2009

I think I figured it out.

First thing you do is set your boot sequence. Then you have to look around for boot settings, there will be a list of hard drives there. Make sure your master drive is selected as the boot drive or something along those lines. Every computer BIOS looks different so it's hard for me to explain exactly what it looks like.

Hope that helps man otherwise I'm out of ideas already!

tbohar · 08-03-2009

foos if it was a RAM issue it would not boot up with any drive connected. It also would never get to the Windows loading stage as Ram fails during the test at the beginning or during the hard drive checks if you have quick boot selected.

gearbox · 08-04-2009

thanks guys all good ideas, speedfoos lol ive been living in the past so much i forgot the HD limit was dependent on the os. but still doesnt solve this problem. it happened out of nowhere so i really have no idea. one minute i was in windows with the drive working, next thing i knew everything slowed to a crawl and froze, then when i restarted windows would not load. i thought it was a virus or something but as soon as i unplugged the drive, everything works perfectly now. i dont think its a setup issue, ive already done all the config settings in the bios when i first installed the drive. it just stopped working. im seriously considering that it may be a software glitch somehow but that doesnt really make sense either because the problem happens right before windows can even start loading... i mean its not serious but id still like to get it working so i have a fast internal backup drive. i have too much important stuff to be risking this. and i need to get some new files off the old drive somehow. just for fun ill go look in the bios to make sure nothing magically changed.

tbohar · 08-04-2009

If a computer crashes BIOS settings can be reset or change... Some computers have safety devices on them that reset BIOS if it thinks incorrect settings caused the crash.

speedfoos · 08-04-2009

Nope. I've had RAM make it past the POST and then have the PC shit out during the OS load. Swapped everything around - board, processor, HDD, disconnected optical drives, everything and it turned out I had either a stick or a RAM slot failing.

A BIOS can also corrupt itself, much like a D17 ECU tunes around a piggyback, although not quite as problematic. Reset the BIOS to default settings, reboot, go back into the BIOS and change all the settings to what you need them to be.

Also, I've had bad optical drives cause issues. Built a computer for a buddy of mine and we could not get the fucker to boot at all, same symptoms as you are describing. Try disconnecting the data cables to any CD/DVD drives and see what happens just to rule that one out.

I assume your jumper setting on the HDD is right because that would not have magically changed. How about the power supply? Check the PC Health section in the BIOS to ensure that your +5V and +12V rails are outputting the right voltage. That can also fuck up a computer. If you don't have that option in your BIOS, it's time to whip out your trusty volt meter.

gearbox · 08-04-2009

the power supply i think is only 200w. so yeah i am really pushing it with 2 cd drives (dvd and cd-r), zip, floppy, and 2 hd. it was only designed for one cd and one hd. i tried swapping the power supply a while back but the comp would not even power on.

Retell · 08-05-2009

Gearbox, I have had a program called Getdataback save my arse at least 15 times. I haven't met a drive it couldn't recover so long as the drive spins. If you know where to look you can get it for free.

tbohar · 08-05-2009

wow foos never heard of ram failure making it to that part but I guess it is possible!!! just tinker with it gearbox. I find that the more i play with it i eventually figure it out. Resetting the bios and then redoing the settings as foos suggests is a great way to start.