Harddrive causes various errors

timf79 · Apr 8, 2014

I have a Asus G73 in which I have been running a SSD and the stock WD 500GB HDD.
Lately the WD has made some sounds (off/on switching) and the Intel rapid Storage Manager found and lost a device over and over.
However the HDD was working.
Today then the HDD did show up in the BIOS and shortly in Windows, then however disappeared.
I removed the HDD and connected it with a SATA/USB adapter externally and it worked perfectly fine.
Then I installed the HDD internally again, which now caused the screen post BIOS to be in the first row only.
Removed HDD and PC boots up fine.
Installed HDD and same issue (keep in mind that in the BIOS everything is fine).

Any ideas on what the issue can be and how to fix it?

Nathan Willis · Apr 9, 2014

Most likely the BIOS is running a SMART. It is finding a hard drive error and not booting.
The hard drive is not working right. I would replace it.
Scan it via the USB.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-vista/check-your-hard-disk-for-errors

http://knowledge.seagate.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/184611en

That should help.

I would not get a WD again.
I have had nothing but problem with them.
All of my friends WD HDDs have failed to.

nukemaster · Apr 9, 2014

I would try new cables in case that is the issue.

Use the USB to SATA adapter to check the SMART status of the drive with something like CrystalDiskInfo(it supports most USB - > SATA and IDE controllers).
http://crystalmark.info/download/index-e.html

timf79 · Apr 9, 2014

I think it boots up, but the screen is not showing right.
Cant be a cable issue as it is in a tray hard plug in the laptop.
will run smart once it is connected via USB

nukemaster · Apr 9, 2014

Let us know what you find.

I personally have had about the same luck with WDC as other brands(they all have a failure at one point or another. Just another reason to backup often.) I have used. Old maxtors seemed to fail quite a bit more than average.

timf79 · Apr 9, 2014

OK, I let chkdsk on the command line run through and there have been 0 errors.
SMART status is a PASS as well.
Now running WD LifeGuard Diagnostics... However I think the HDD is not the issue.
Any ideas what the issue might be?

Nathan Willis · Apr 9, 2014

The controller may be dying. The hard drive will not show errors in that situation.
It will be intermittent and hard to track.

timf79 · Apr 9, 2014

Yeah, I am thinking to take the SSD and move into the other "bad" bay and see what happens...
Maybe it's an issue with that bay.
However I am thinking it might be a software issue and a clean Win install is in order...

nukemaster · Apr 9, 2014

Moving the SSD would be a good check for sure.

While no smart attributes have been tripped did any look out of place(pending sector or remapped)?

timf79 · Apr 9, 2014

So, while CHKDSK did not find anything the WD tool did find some broken sectors. I used the repair function and at the same time the Windows update installed 23 updates.
After a reboot it now works like a charm again.
So either the bad sectors caused a boot up crash or the windows update fixed it...

nukemaster · Apr 9, 2014

I would be very interested in seeing a SMART report from the drive if you do not mind.

Sample Image with CDI.

If you have started to remap sectors, It may be ok or it may come back fast(the nature of these things).

timf79 · Apr 9, 2014

Sure no problem, if you help me understand it.

Nathan Willis · Apr 9, 2014

The controller may be failing.

nukemaster · Apr 9, 2014

You have a single reallocated sector(most likely reallocated by the WDC software). So if it was in a critical spot it could have caused all kinds of things.

Keep an eye on the pending and that number over time to ensure it does not start to grow.

Nathan Willis · Apr 9, 2014

Just keep an eye on the hard drive and you should be fine.

timf79 · Jun 17, 2014

So things had been going well for now 2 month.
The other day the BIOS did not find the SSD anymore.
So I removed the HDD and swapped the bay of the SSD, everything is back to working now (HDD is no longer in the system).

Nathan Willis · Jun 17, 2014

Good idea! SSDs are much faster!!

timf79 · Jun 17, 2014

Nathan Willis :

The SSD was in there for years as my main drive, the HDD was holding all my documents.
Those I moved onto the HTPC, which serves as a file server in my home network.

Nathan Willis · Jun 17, 2014

I know that.

I was just saying it is not really a loss because SSDs are faster.
Because hard drives are so cheap I would just get another one and test if the problem is gone.
With a new hard drive and the problem is still there the MOB's SATA controller may be dying.
A new CMOS battery may fix it too.
If the CMOS battery is week it will have trouble keeping BIOS settings and cause strange problems.
It really does depend on the MOB though.

Harddrive causes various errors

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