[AblueXKRS]

And some advice.

Okay, I had some issue with my computer over the last couple of days that turn out to have been the death of my brand-new 2Tb WD green. It arrived on Tuesday, went straight into my machine, and had 600Gb of stuff dropped on it.

Last night, something in my machine caused a DRIVER_IRQ 0x01 0x00 BSOD.

Earlier today I was attempting to recover from that, and after reinstalling Windows and all my drives (1 Dvd drive, 1 SSD, and 7 mechanical HDDs), I was relettering the drives to my preferences (some system stuff I keep off the OS drive, like My Docs), and while attempting to reletter my new 2Tb as I:, the computer locked up. I waited for an hour, but no change. With the letter change incomplete, I had to hard reset. After that, the computer would no longer boot into Window with the said drive attached. Only when it was not present did the computer start normally.

Initially I had no idea why, but then during the umpteenth system rebuild, I got a pre-BIOS SMART Health warning that said the drive was bad and needed replacement. (Note: this never appeared again, even through 4 more restarts.)

(Additional note: the hard drive is still visible and recognized by the BIOS, it just prevents Windows form loading.)

Now for my questions:

1) Is there any way I can 'complete', for lack of a better term, the drive letter change and make my disc readable again? I'm assuming the bad health warning was a result of the failed letter change, and if it can just have a new letter forced on it, things might clear up. Even if I have to reformat, that would be alright, because I could recover some of my data with some program or other.

2) If that is not possible under ANY home circumstances, who do I got to to have the drive's data recovered?

 

[XAslanX]

You could try freezing the drive in hopes of getting 20 minutes to pull data off of it. Be sure to use at least 4 freezer bags to prevent condensation. See here http://geeksaresexy.blogspot.com/200...over-data.html

 

[AblueXKRS]

One thing is for sure, this drive is going nowhere near my sigrig. I've spent far too long this weekend pulling it apart for this reason.

Can I stick the drive in an old XP machine?

 

[XAslanX]

Yes you can put it in another machine to pull data off it as long as it wasn't part of a raid setup. I suggest 24-48 hours of freeze time to get the most time to recover data.

 

[AblueXKRS]

Now you say if it wasn't part of a RAID setup.

It wasn't, but I did have it running through a PCIe RAID adapter (again, not RAIDed), having not enough ports on the motherboard to connect it directly. Will that have an effect?

 

[AblueXKRS]

Another thing I've just realized is relevant.

The BIOS can see the drive, so hopefully it's mechanically sound.

 

[beers]

Boot Windows, then connect the drive to SATA and see what happens.

In all honesty you should be able to boot with it attached anyway.
If your BIOS simply hangs then it's dead, Jim.

 

[AblueXKRS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by beers Boot Windows, then connect the drive to SATA and see what happens. In all honesty you should be able to boot with it attached anyway. If your BIOS simply hangs then it's dead, Jim.

I do have a hot-swap port that I removed from my FT02. Would it be safer to use that rather than straight out plugging the the drive into the mobo?

 

[PapaSmurf]

You can connect it to any SATA port that has AHCI enabled. It doesn't have to be a specific hot swap port, but that can sometimes make it more convenient. The hot swap ports that come with motherboards and cases are nothing more than extensions anyway.

In the future when you get a new drive run a complete full SMART and Diagnostic scan on it first, then zero fill it a couple of times, then run the diagnostics again and compare the results. Now let it run with only some COPIES of files on it for a couple of days to see how it runs then run the diagnostics on it again and compare the SMART readouts.

Also, make sure you do a FULL or LONG format, not a quick one. Quick formats are a joke and should never be used. You'll have some people chime in that they always use the quick format and never have a problem, but that doesn't mean that everyone will. There are people using DiabloTek and other absolute junk psus and aren't haveing any problems, but that doesn't mean that everyone will be so lucky. Do the long format. You'll be glad you did.

 

[AblueXKRS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PapaSmurf You can connect it to any SATA port that has AHCI enabled. It doesn't have to be a specific hot swap port, but that can sometimes make it more convenient. The hot swap ports that come with motherboards and cases are nothing more than extensions anyway.

Is AHCI hardware-based or software-based? I'm not too keen on sticking this drive in my sigrig again; I'd much rather stick it in my emergency backup machine, which is about 10 years old.

 

[PapaSmurf]

AHCI is in the bios. Advanced Host Controller Interface. It's what enables hot swappability among other things.

 

[AblueXKRS]

Drat. Safe to assume my old clunker won't have such a feature?

(If I could even reach it... it's a Sony prebuilt)

 

[PapaSmurf]

It should. I haven't seen any Intel based chipset board with SATA that doesn't.

 

[AblueXKRS]

Oh cool. I thought it was a recent development.

Well cool, as soon as I get some more RAM for that machine, I'll give it a go.

 

[beers]

Keep in mind SATA 1.5 was just an extension of the IDE interface and may not support hot swapping.

 

[error10]

Quote:

Originally Posted by beers;13005392
Keep in mind SATA 1.5 was just an extension of the IDE interface and may not support hot swapping.

Hotswap has been in SATA/AHCI from the beginning. However, some of the first southbridges didn't implement it properly (mostly NVIDIA 5x0/6x0).

 

[AblueXKRS]

Can anyone comment on possibility of hotswapping in a Sony Vaio PCVRS720G?

 

[PapaSmurf]

That should have the Intel 915G chipset which should use the ICH6 controller so it would be SATA 1. Only the ICH6M (mobile) or ICH6R (Raid) controller has AHCI while the plain Jane ICH6 doesn't support AHCI. It wouldn't have the ICH6M and I don't see it listing Raid as an option so it's doubtful that it has AHCI so hot swapping would NOT be possible on it.

 

[AblueXKRS]

Sadface.

Well, I'll try the non-hotswap method ASAP. I'll have to find someone to lend me one of their machines for a hotswap op.

Thanks.

 

[SpammisT]

There's a program called EASEUS Data Recovery Wizard..
Friend dumped about 900gb on his drive and.. well. Troublesome part was I had to move every byte of space I could to make room for a full recovery.

What's even more funnier. He got a 500GB to help his recovery in the process that I'd use with it, then he drops it.
What I meant by drop, he trips the USB cable to my dock and -splat- drive "dies"

If you could.. well, reinstall real quick. It wouldn't hurt to dual boot (unless you already have) and recover all your files, put em' back in..?