Hard Drive Problems

[benbrown]

I've been using Windows 98SE for the longest time... and the other day I finally updated to Windows XP Pro. My main hard drive for about four years has been an IBM DeskStar DTLA-307030 aka 75GXP 30GB. I know the drive has some bad sectors but, in general, it works fine. I put a new Western Digital WD1200JB 120GB drive in a couple months ago.

Previously, the IBM drive was the master drive with the OS. Right now the WD drive is the master drive with the new OS and the IBM is the slave.

The problem? After upgrading to Windows XP, the IBM is only recognized as a 2 GB drive. At first I couldn't format it (option wasn't available) - I'd deleted the partition but never repartitioned. After running fdisk on the IBM and setting up the 2GB of recognized capacity as a partition, the option to format appeared. Second problem is that while formatting, during the "drive check" phase of the operation I presume, the process will hang and the drive will make scratchy head searching type sounds.

What's going on?!?

 

[PinchyCM]

sounds like the scratches and clicking of death.

 

[wfbberzerker]

yep, pinchy is right, it sounds like your deskstar is dying.

 

[benbrown]

So just cut my losses and toss the drive? I already backed up all my data before the OS switch because I planned on migrating to the new drive as the master anyway.

 

[Steve]

Deathstar firmware fix.

 

[benbrown]

Sm8000 - thanks for the pointer but I already updated my firmware day before yesterday to either version OA5AA or OA6AA, I can't remember, but it was using that utility.

Wasn't there a recall for these DeathStar drives?