SATA 160GB > Hardware or NTFS File System Failure?

[rkr1958]

I have a 160-GB Seagate SATA drive that I use for video (DVD authoring, encoding, etc.) This morning I went to copy an authored DVD from that drive to my external Firewire Drive (for Backup / safe keeping purposes) and I get a Windows file error (I can't remember the exact message). Anyway, I tried some other files and got the same error. I then tried to play some MPEG-2 files and got an error. So I rebooted. Before problems / reboot the drive contained about 120-GB of files, after the reboot the drive contained about 20-GB or so of files and a folder "found.000" contains 6-GB of so of misc files. I raw Windows (W2k) check disk and found no errors. I also ran a Norton Virus scan and it found nothing. I'm planning to run some other tools. My question is am I looking at a harware failure or is this something with the NTFS file system getting corrupted? This drive is only 2-months old! What would be a really good tool to check it for hardware problems? Freeware or trail preferred.

[proggy]

Try seagates utilities?
http://www.seagate.com/support/seatools/index.html

[gmatov]

If you have Norton's Utility Suite, try running Disk Doctor. It may find the drive has a boot record problem and try to revive it for you.

I had a similar problem, lost 150 gig from a 160 drive, Disk Doctor found, fixed it, drive is whole now.

The "found.0000" files are corrupt files that Chec Disk/ Scan Disk are saving for you to try to read. Usually they are totally useless, as parts of files, but if they were text files, you might be able to salvage something.. My case, "Pirates" rip, some 7 gigs, was all "found", saved outside the folder it was ripped to, useless to me now, had to rerip.

Cheers,

George

[rkr1958]

Try seagates utilities?
http://www.seagate.com/support/seatools/index.html

Thanks guys. I did download and run the seagate utilities both the quick (90-seconds) and long (2-hours+) diagnosis for Seagate drives. The drive checked out o.k. and I'm using just fine.

I also ran the Sandra PC benchmarking utilties and the drive scored just fine and compare well to previous benchmark runs. Here are the results:
Index (kB/s): 34078 Buffered Read (MB/s): 86 Sequential Read: 50
Random Read: 8 Buffered Write: 97 Sequential Write: 50
Random Write: 10 Disk Access Speed (msec): 7

Even though I'm not using this disk for critial data I'd still concern over why most of the data got corrupted. I'll keep using it and see what happens.

[proggy]

Make sure you have the latest bios and SATA drivers installed. I've had errors with old maxtor harddrives complaining they couldn't write fast enough to keep up with the controllers. They got corrupted also, but they were ata/33 drives, so I don't see this being the problem for you.

Just a thought.

[zanos]

You can restore the data just download one of those hard drive restoring programs. I have no idea what they're called. You'll get back most if not all files back. They're still there you just can't see them or have access to them. You'll have to have another hard drive attached for this to work though. If you only have one hard drive you're out of luck.

[Ripper2860]

If it is the "Delayed Write Error" see this post ...

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=216302

[gmatov]

Proggy,

Where in the hell did you come up with "I've had hard drives complaining they couldn't keep up"?

25 years of this stuff, and never heard a drive say, Oh, massa, massa, I can't do it. Please slow down.

A drtive will, WILL, mind you, write at their max speed, and 99.9999, 6 Sigma, to the geeks, will almost always wait for more data to come to it..

I, personally, do not know of a program that requires SATA, or SCSI 360, or whatever the latest is, Ultra Fat, Ultra Wide. Video is such relatively slow speed, an ATA 33 will handle it.

Jeez, what do you guys do for fun, compare HDD speeds? Show Sandra printouts?

Cheers,

George

[proggy]

gmatov,

I was referring to the "Delayed Write Error". I couldn't remember which error it was when I typed my response. I had a 5400rpm maxtor that would constantly give this error in my pentium3 550, but worked without a problem on my p1-166mmx. I thought it was the controller or operating system trying to write too fast to the harddrive. I do not have ATI cards because I hate their drivers, but looking at Ripper2860's link, it may have been something simular...i don't know. The harddrive is long gone in the trash and I never had a problem with any of the other hard drives.

So for me "Oh, massa, massa, I can't do it" equals "Delayed Write Error".

[rkr1958]

UPDATE:

I reformatted the drive twice using NTFS. Each time it lasted about 2 or 3 days before the file system became corrupt again. I ran, and re-ran the Seagate Utilities and the drive always checked out.

I did some research on the web and found some posts about problems with NTFS file system corruption. There seemed to be a high correlation (about 50%) with SATA drives but not completely. One major problem I kept seeing was that Windows wasn't able to write the registry before the drive shut down on shut down. However, this wasn't my problem.

One solution I saw was to reformat to FAT32. Since this a video drive that I use for encoding and authoring (but now not capturing) I decided I would give it a try and live with the 4-GB file size limit. I reformatted by 160-GB SATA drive to FAT32 almost two weeks ago and it's been working fine since then.

I used PartitionMagic 8.0 to format and perodicially check that drive for errors. Ebay's great. I got PartitionMagic 8.0 for $20.00. By the way, I also got RestoreIT 3.0 and VirtualDrive 7.0 for around the same price off of ebay.

[Ripper2860]

BTW -- Marvell's RAID SATA chipset has had some documented probelms. If you are using a SATA RAID controller, it may be worth checking out the mobo to see who's SATA chipset is used. If it is one of the probelm Marvell chips, you need to replace the mobo or add-on SATA controller.

[rkr1958]

My motherboard and chipset are Intel (D875PBZLK). The SATA controller is Intel. I sent Intel Tech support an email about this and one other problem I was having (see https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=203849&highlight= ). Their response was to stip everthing down to a bare minimum (PCI cards, etc.), flash to the latest bios and update controllers to the latest. Run for a while then add cards, etc. one at a time and so on and so on.

It seems to be working and it's stable now so I'm not messing with it unless I have to. I had a three-year 45-GB harddrive crash on Feb 14 (of all days). I already had a 120-GB internal and 60-GB firewire external. I made the 120-GB my system and data drive (partitioned for 15-GB for system, 90+ for data and 5-GB for RestoreIT). I chunked my 45-GB and bought a 250-GB EIDE and a 160-GB SATA and added those. It's pain to reload O/S and applications and get everything back working again.

Building your own system (which I did) and being your own integrator is fun and is a chance to learn a lot but you are mostly on your own. But even if I have purchased a system from Dell, Gateway or someother PC company I doubt that their tech support would have been able to help me. So in the end I like trouble shooting my own problems especially when I find a solution.

[gmatov]

RKR,

It IS satisfying, dealing with a problem, isn't it, especially when you finally do hit on the solution?

I've built all but my first PC, have built at least 75 since, constantly upgrading my own, my kids, and my grandkids, migrating them downwards, so they are always just a step behind the old man, their castoffs go to people who might not be able to afford, or to justify, buying one of their own, and they are pleased to have ANY computer, even if it is behind the times.

Dig in, the next prob you have will most likely be easier to overcome, as you are learning all the time.

Cheers,

George

PS: Terrible to learn that SATA and NTFS are not ready for prime time, what with all the acolytes, here.