Path: utzoo!utgpu!cunews!bnrgate!brchh104!brchs1!bnr.ca!rice.edu!sun-spots-request
From: gca!beaulieu@uunet.uu.net (Larry Beaulieu)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.sun
Subject: Re: Incredible rumor about SPARCstation internal disk lossage
Keywords: Hardware
Message-ID: <2843@brchh104.bnr.ca>
Date: 10 May 91 13:03:00 GMT
Sender: news@brchh104.bnr.ca
Organization: Sun-Spots
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Approved: Sun-Spots@rice.edu
X-Original-Date: 1 May 91 16:46:25 GMT
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X-Sun-Spots-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 98, message 14
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>Robert has informed us that there is a known problem that can cause
>internal disks in Sun workstations to die after being turned off!  The
>multimedia/graphics group has been bitten twice by this in one week.
>
>The problem has to due with the internal lubricant in the drive drying
>out.  When the disk is turned off, it can't be started again.  The

We've had this problem with the 104MB internal hard drives.  

When repowering up the system the system waits for the drive to spin up
and then barfs.  The heads are apparently stuck in their home position and
the system times out waiting for the drive to spin up.

You can either:

1) Replace the drive

 	or:

2) Take the drive out of the workstation and rap it once on the *side*
   against the edge of the desk.  This will jar the heads loose and allow the
   drive to spin up again.

Option 2 was relayed to me by one of the local Sun FS engineers as being a
workaround solution given to him and his cohorts at the local office.  

I have done option 2) several times w/o any damage in order to get a
system back on line quickly until the drive can be replaced but I wouldn't
recommend the practice unless you were really stuck.

Larry Beaulieu		The usual disclaimers apply.
beaulieu@gca.com