Bad blocks on an SSD, an HHD and an Optical

[baddogcomputing]

Equipment:
Supermicro Motherboard: X8SIL
Drive 1: 64GB Crucial SSD
Drives 2-4: Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 configured as a RAID 5 (Integrated raid controller)
Drives 5-6: SuperWriteMaster DVD RW

All purchased last summer. Starting in January I started getting bad block errors on the SSD and one of my RAID disks. I just noticed one for an optical drive today, which is rarely used.

The computer takes a long time during AHCI Auto detecting on the Optical Drives, 45+ seconds. Sometimes it only takes a half a second.

Current drivers, flashed bios a few days ago, problem persists.

There has also been performance issues. Ran check disk on the SSD and it keeps fixing errors. I did not on the RAID, I just rebuilt it and it's formatting.

I just cloned the SSD (OS) to a different drive that has about 5 hours of run time. That's when I saw that optical drive error. I've used that same disk many times, it's a boot disk.

Any thoughts? Could it be a motherboard issue?

 

[Wamphryi]

It does seem highly unusual. It would seem the common denominator is the SATA controller but I would also consider if the software you are using is reporting the issue accurately. Check out the optical disk in another PC. If it comes up clean then that narrows down the issue.

 

[sephirothmk]

Also, update your SSD firmware just to be on the safe side.

 

[HugoStiglitz]

Optical drives cannot get bad blocks.

It is a storage device thing only. (an optical does not have storage of it's own, you insert disks)

sounds like it could be a controller issue. or could be 1 bad device on the sata controller causing the issues.

try removing 1 device at a time and see how it performs.

 

[baddogcomputing]

Optical drives cannot get bad blocks.

It is a storage device thing only. (an optical does not have storage of it's own, you insert disks)

sounds like it could be a controller issue. or could be 1 bad device on the sata controller causing the issues.

try removing 1 device at a time and see how it performs.

I was pretty confused on the CD bad block. However it is a DVD Re-writable which can behave like a storage device, so wasn't sure. Other forums with bad blocks on a CD had solutions all over the place.

When I did the exact sector by sector copy, there were no read errors. I'm used to have issues on actual bad blocks when I do those kind of copies.

It only happens about once a day, then 6 people are SOL for a bit. I'll see if I can recreate it and then start using one device at a time, and move hardware to other computers.

 

[HugoStiglitz]

so what exactly is the error message, can you post a picture of the error?

 

[baddogcomputing]

so what exactly is the error message, can you post a picture of the error?

Maybe solved. Tight SATA Cable.

I'm not at the location anymore, so can't post the error verbatim. It says Device/HardDisk3 has a bad block. Also had that for HardDisk4 and cdrom0.

I ended up getting an error that said the driver found an error with the controller for HardDisk3, which is one of the RAID disks. #4 is the disk I replaced.

I found that one of the DVD drive SATA cables was very tight, the builder did not leave enough slack. The angle it was pulling would have decreased the pressure and probably surface area of the SATA connections.

I gave it some more slack and have rebooted 4 times and ran Burnit Tests on the HDDs and Optical drives without error. All 6 drives are connected. I'll call it resolved after two days since this has been an intermittent problem.

 

[baddogcomputing]

Best answer selected by baddogcomputing.

 

[baddogcomputing]

Ended up having issues again. The mobo was sent overnight by the manufacturer, since the controller is integrated. Should receive it shortly. Their tech thought it could also be the optical drive causing it. But with it disconnected the issue returned.