Is this a HDD or Controller problem?

bunson

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My computer has been crashing lately - either a bluescreen with ambiguous error, or INPAGE_KERNEL_ERROR (don't remember exact string), OR just total mouse freeze and have to hard-reset (the latter seems more frequent).


I have an nForce 2 ASUS A7N8X-X motherboard (few years old)

I have ATA133 and ATA100 HDDs on it, 1 master 1 slave. on primary IDE channel. Using 5.10 nforce drivers.

The best way to reproduce the error is to run CHKDSK /f and /r on one of the slave HDD partitions. Will almost always result in a mouse freeze, with NO BSOD.

The most recent hardware change was replacing old RAM with 2 new sticks of Buffalo Select ram. Ran MS Memory Diagnostic (all 11 tests) and now running MemTest - doesn't look like it's a ram issue. CPU Burn in also seems to not be the issue. I have an Athlon XP-M 2500+ running at 200mHz x 9.5 multiplier, ram set to same frequency 8,3,3,3 timing (the CPU seems to not want to actually run at 133mHzx14 multiplier, which is really weird because that's the stock frequency!)

In any case, I don't think its a CPU/ram issue - I think it seems more like a HDD or IDE controller issue, but what is the best way to find out what's going on?

I am currently running with the slave HDD unplugged, and running CHKDSK on c: without automatic fixing hasn't crashed the computer. Could the slave drive be faulty?
 
Solution
Is that drive S.MA.R.T. capable? If so enable smart monitoring in the bios and then run the boot utility from the manufacturer and do the non-destructive tests and it will pull the smart log. Other programs can read the smart log in windows. OF COURSE WITHOUT SAYING, IT IS A GIVEN, TO BACKUP DATA BEFORE TRYING ANYTHING.

Ignatowski

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couple things to try.
hook the current slave drive up to a different ide controller and see if its runs a chkdisk there
if you dont care about the data. you can try a shred app ( something that writes 0's and 1s to all sectors on the HD) and see if that works

inpage kernel error doesnt google. so the stop code and hex addresses will help
it could also be an irq conflict altho if you havent made hardware changes ( besides the ram) recently that would be unlikely.

turn off power saving features like ( spin down the hard drive) and see if that helps.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/330100/en-us
 

bunson

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The computer has now been running without crashes with that slave HDD removed all day - in the last couple of days it would have crashed by now! Is this indicative about the slave HDD being a cause of error?

Ignatowsky: When I tried to CHKDSK the slave HDD on a second computer in an external enclosure, it was not be able to complete one of the partitions (fails at PHASE 3 of CHKDSK), and all of a sudden all the partitions on the HDD would disappear from Windows.
 

DiscoDuck

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Is that drive S.MA.R.T. capable? If so enable smart monitoring in the bios and then run the boot utility from the manufacturer and do the non-destructive tests and it will pull the smart log. Other programs can read the smart log in windows. OF COURSE WITHOUT SAYING, IT IS A GIVEN, TO BACKUP DATA BEFORE TRYING ANYTHING.
 
Solution

bunson

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UPDATE: put in a different drive as a slave into the rig, and it did CHKDSK without any problems on the whole thing.

Going to try the seemingly faulty original SLAVE in a second external enclosure to see if it fails there as well when doing CHKDSK. (So far it crashes the original rig, and makes the enclosure disappear when running chkdsk.)

DiscoDuck: yes it is SMART capable - going to try that, thanks!
 

bunson

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AAH omg you were right - I looked at the SMART tab for the drive using SpeedFan yesterday, but I didn't realize that the little OK icons meant nothing of the fittnes bar was EMPTY! LOL - i clicked to do an online analysis and it said the drive has to be replaced immediately! Thank you for reminding me to give the SMART monitor another go, I think you probably just saved me a bunch of data loss - backing up as we speak. very 's.m.a.r.t.' suggestion of you!! thanks again