scsi problems...

[zigzag03]

i am having an issue with a scsi drive. it does not always spin up, and when it does spin, it winds down and stops. this, of course, freezes the machine. it rarely gets past bootup. my question is, is there a chance this could be a controller issue rather than a drive issue? this is my first experiance with other than ide drives, so i'm a bit clueless. this is a compaq workstation with a controller card for the drive. thoughts? thanks

 

[bozo1]

Most SCSI drives have a jumper that tells the drive to not spin up until the host adapter queries it. This helps to not put a strain on your powersupply when you have many drives in a system coming on at once. If that jumper is set, your drive shouldn't spin up until your SCSI adapter starts interrogating the chain but the drive should stay spun up at that point. I'd check and see if you have that jumper and remove it - that way the drive should spin up when you turn on the system regardless of whether your host adapter is flaky. If it starts to spin up and then down, I'd say the drive is bad.

 

[zigzag03]

excellent advise, i shall check this out asap and report. thank you

 

[zigzag03]

there is only one jumper, un-"jumped" on this adaptec aha-2940u2b/ibm. i can't find a reference to this exact card on their website, but close. this jumper appears to have something to do with termination issues, and likely not relevant. so i guess i must conclude that the drive is on its last leg. thanks again for the help. zz

 

[zigzag03]

well i "exercised" the reticent drive into working long enough to get some current stuff backed up, now i can replace it and reinstall all. thanks again for your input, zz