Re: [tlug] Clunk, Clunk, the Drive is Dead

["Walter Hansen" <gandalf@example.com>]

Responding to a couple posts here actually:

1. It is possible to screw up a drive from software, but that's mostly
done by overuse. Some viriuses may try to do this.
2. Other than such "use it hard till it burns up" schemes it would be very
difficult to harm the drive from software accidently.
3. A low level format will clean up just about any software issue. I had a
friend change a drive from a 80meg to a 120meg in BIOS becuase he "needed
the space" once. Only a low level format cleared that up, but when I did
it the drive performed fine. That was quite a while a go; 120meg was a
good size.
4. I've had drives fail pretty much out of the box. The first few weeks
are actually critical with most hardware. If it's going to fail early it
will do so then most of the time. This is sometimes called a "burn in"
period. It's also critcal for cars. Try not to stress the engine in the
first 1,000km or so and change the oil frequently.


> Andrew Hamilton wrote:
>
>>On Thu, Dec 08, 2005 at 02:42:19PM +0900, Mark Sargent wrote:
>>
>>
>>>was leaning strongly towards that...curious though, as this drive, even
>>>though 1-2yrs old, has had very little use in that time...what could
>>>have caused it to just go like that?
>>>
>>>
>>
>>Sometimes it's just luck of the draw.  I just replaced a hard drive
>>in a client's laptop -- the laptop was less than 3 months old at the
>>time.  No indication until one day it started clunking and wouldn't
>>boot up.
>>
>> - awh
>>
>>
>>
>>
> Hi All,
>
> ok, just read up on low-level formatting, to get a better understanding
> of ide drives. Seems that ide has a native and a tranlsation mode, with
> controller(manufacturer data) kept in 0 or -1 and translation is used
> for bios/os communication. This is probably a good time to ask questions
> about drives, and learn something outa the negative. Just gotta think of
> the right questions, and how best to ask them. Cheers.
>
> Mark Sargent.
>
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