I fear a dead drive.

[ddrueding]

Samsung SP2504C (SATA/250GB/7200RPM/8M) - about 6 months old.

It's been in a machine I built with the following components:

Gigabyte NF4-SLI board
AMD 3800+ X2
2GB Buffallo Select PC3200 RAM
nVidia 6200TC PCI-E Video
Antec Neo-HE 380W PS
Antec P180 Chassis

This system has been working fine for the duration. Recently the user complained that some network activities were a little slow. I could find nothing wrong, but to satisfy the user, I purchased and installed a Netgear PCI GbE adapter (GA311) in the bottom PCI slot.

From this point forward the drive is not being detected by the BIOS at all. Not as the only drive, not as a secondary, nothing. It spins up fine, but makes no access sounds, and is never detected. Other drives (WD360GD, WD2000JD) are detected and work fine.

Of course, there is unbacked-up data on this drive and the client is an accountant.

Any advice whatsoever would be greatly appreciated.

 

[time]

I fear you're right. I'm especially fearful because I'm typing this on a SP2504C with SMART error rates that look a little out of place.

Anyway, it's obviously worth buying another one and trying a board swap.

It would also be good if you could give us some feedback on what happens ...

 

[Howell]

Any advice whatsoever would be greatly appreciated.

Start quoting data recovery fees. Quote a backup system too.

 

[LiamC]

I built a K8NF-9 based machine (X2 3800+, 6200TC PCI-E Video) for a friend. A Maxtor DM10 went into it it and it came back after three months with a dead drive.

 

[LiamC]

Forgot to mention, a few of the Brotherhood of Storage Gurus :lol: on this board have recommended GetDataBack. I think there is a link in the Tools forum.

 

[Sol]

The price of hard drives these days and the proliferation of onboard RAID controllers suggests to me that these small buisness with critical data could really benifit from a simple RAID1 setup. A bit late to help now I know but RAID1 along with a neat nightly backup solution would be great for an accountant or similar.

 

[ddrueding]

I have GetDataBack, but one of the requirements is that the drive can be detected at all.

This is a normally intelligent user. He has a company fileserver that I have built (RAID 10) and he makes regular backups to a series of USB harddrives that he keeps off-site. He uses thumbdrives to move data to his clients, this system has TWO DVD BURNERS! He was a little embarrased to admit to having unbackedup data on the drive, but it is there nonetheless.

 

[Mercutio]

You need to try a board swap.

RAID1 is a bare minimum for important data these days. It's not like a 250GB drive is expensive any more.
I'd also quote something like one or two 250 or 400GB USB drives that can be removed from the site and used in an alternating fashion to store backups. That's cheaper than tapes and gives some flexibility in data recovery.

Oddly enough I just sent off some Samsung drives for no other reason than they were making unusual noises.

 

[CougTek]

I don't know about you, but around here, SATA drives have a death rate much higher than PATA drives. I still recommend PATA drives most of the time because of this.

The only Samsung 250GB that we've tried lasted three weeks before dying, but it might have been because some other technicians weren't very careful with grounding proceedures. Oh and before I worked there, unplugging the power cord or simply turning off the power supply switch seemed like an optional measure prior to plugging/unplugging devices. I took care of this issue and made sure that it no longer happens

 

[LiamC]

Oh and before I worked there, unplugging the power cord or simply turning off the power supply switch seemed like an optional measure prior to plugging/unplugging devices. I took care of this issue and made sure that it no longer happens

:eekers: A little percussive persuasion?

:mrgrn: