HDD Crash

[anubisX]

Hello everyone, I'm back with my problem again. Today my Seagate 1TB HDD crashed and it ain't recognized anymore. So, it might get f#!*ed up or it is. Now, what might be the cause of this catastrophe ? Coz it really hurts when you lose a lot of data. I will get another 1TB and do RAID 1 with it but that's a different thing. Now, I want to know what might've caused the problem ? I've noticed before (once in a month or two) that the HDD wasn't recognized which I thought was bcoz of non-availability of power consumed by the 23cm fan on the side of the cabinet and the GPU. After a restart the problem used to disappear. My PC worked pretty fine till date but my friend told me that the performance of my PC is doomed. I popped one 40GB ATA for a temporary solution and it took nearly 20-25 mins to install XP. Today, I also noticed sudden restarts one after another (during booting) which never happened before. When the PC is powered off, it automatically restarted and it kept on restarting, might be bcoz of some setting changes in BIOS. Resetting the BIOS solved this problem. Do I need to change the PSU, is the PSU not enough ? My config is :

Abit IP35-E
Intel E8400
Corsair 800 MHz 1GB x 4
Seagate 1TB (will add another 1TB for RAID 1)
ATi Radeon HD3650 512MB
Samsung DVD-RW
Thermaltake Cabinet with 23cm fan
Will add Creative X-Fi / Auzentech Prelude soundcard

My current PSU is Point Of View 500W, do I need to change it to 650W or 1000W ? Sometimes, I just remove the power cable from the fan so that the DVD drive can work faster and it works all the time. I noticed flickering of LEDs in the fan when DVD drive and fan are connected at the same time. Do you think changing the PSU will improve the performance ? I'm waiting for your suggestions. I still couldn't understand what doomed my HDD !!

[vaibhav_jain]

hey dude these are the real problem exist with seagates todays hdd`s. i lost my data four times contained in a 250gb hdd model is 7200.11. the hdd`s with the model 7200.10, 7200.11 are faulty 90%are having problem.

[anubisX]

Mine is also 7200.11

[The Sorcerer]

Allready mentioned here:
http://thinkdigit.com/forum/showthread.php?t=106610
You can try flashing to the new firmware- I think the link to seagate's knowledge base is mentioned on the link somewhere. Some say it bricks the hard drive, some say it does not. Most probably its due to user's mistake in not flashing it properly or it could be something else- or it could be random. If you flash and if it succeeds, there is a chance you *might* get the data back, if not then you will have to RMA it via accel frontline. OEM hard drives (the ones that come in static bags are OEM, the internal ones from the box are retails) cannot get free data recovery as per seagate's policy. In any case- accel frontline guys are bunch of idiots so even if you have a retail hard drive and even print the policy and give it to them, they just can comprehend something which is written in basic english.

[anubisX]

I guess, it's a big problem then !!! But what about the other issues ???

[The Sorcerer]

Officially unknown. Mine is 7200.10 RPM ones and run 40 degrees plus when on idle whereas my WD is 36 degrees celcius on load. It was replaced 6 times in a row now. By the way- when I touched the hard drive it was really hot.

[anubisX]

Same with mine. But I was talking about the other issues with my computer.

[Ecstasy]

I think a good servicing might help.

[The Sorcerer]

^^ What servicing are you talking about?
The psu should run properly with all components provided its on stock.

[gary4gar]

If its a Firmware lock-up issue and don't worry your data is safe, just reflash it with a newer version of firmware.
http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/cr...p?DocId=207931

but in case of head crash or any other kind of mechanical error, you are doomed

remember to take backup from next time

[anubisX]

Originally Posted by The Sorcerer

^^ What servicing are you talking about?
The psu should run properly with all components provided its on stock.

Are you sure that it's not a problem with my PSU ? Coz when I attached the 40GB PATA for installing XP, either the DVD drive or the HDD was not recognized. I unplugged the cabinet fan and then both of them were recognized.