Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
From: Peter Tello
If the low level diagnostics fail, I declare it officially dead. At that point, I have nothing to lose,
so I pull it out and over a thin carpet, drop it 6" squarely on all 4 sides, repeating this 2 or 3
times. I have approximately a 50 percent successful boot-up rate, usually enough to copy the
data off and save my behind for not having it backed up in the first place.
From: TDC Tech
This is a one-time fix—long enough to revive HD to get data.
• Take the HD out of the computer and squarely drop it on the closed side of the drive
(to your
bench) with perhaps a little slam.
• This seems to free up the bearings long enough to copy data off of the hard drive. I have
quite a bit of luck, but 90 percent of the time it only works once.
Hit it
From: Karen_Roman
1. Check CMOS settings to make sure the drive setting are what they should be—the CMOS
battery could be dead or the user may have changed the settings. A bad hard drive could
cause the Autodetect to misread settings.
2. Boot from a floppy disk and run fdisk/mbr to restore the backup copy of the master boot
record.
3. Image the drive with drive copy program to a new drive.
4. It's possible the HDD controller is bad. Try the drive in another machine.
5. Boot from a floppy attach to a network drive or have a secondary drive installed and if you
can access the data copy it off to there.
6. The drive could have a stiction problem. Tap it gently on the sides, preferably with a rubber
mallet
From: Alan Gates
As "unscientific" as this sounds, I have found that rapping the drive case a couple of times
sometimes allows the drive to come up. I have had several experiences in the past like this.
Sometimes the drive is having trouble "spinning up." Obviously, the drive is on its last legs but
a rap on the drive case will sometimes free it to spin up. This will allow the system to boot so
the data can be backed up before the drive goes into the trash...
From: Bob Barker
I have found on more than a few occasions that older disks can develop a sticking problem. I
believe it is a combination of weak motor and surface-to-surface tension between the disk and
heads. This problem usually shows up on older disks that have been running a few years
(usually 24 hours a day) and then shut down for service or other reasons.
• When you try to start up again, the disk will not spin and you get disk errors trying to boot.
After checking for the usual problems (power, cables, jumpers, etc.) and finding that the drive
was in fact not spinning, I have had great success jarring the disk with my palm (of my hand,
not my PDA). I some times have to be a little more violent to get it to start but I have never
had to use a hammer.
