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From: scott@cs.hw.ac.uk (Scott Telford)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware
Subject: IDE hard disk problems
Message-ID: <3084@odin.cs.hw.ac.uk>
Date: 24 May 91 11:49:49 GMT
Sender: news@cs.hw.ac.uk
Reply-To: scott@cs.hw.ac.uk (Scott Telford)
Organization: Dept of Computer Science, Heriot-Watt University, UK.
Lines: 29


I've got a 20MHz 386SX clone which originally came with DOS 4.01, an
Acer IDE/floppy/COM/LPT card and an NEC D.... (can't remember) 42-ish Mb
IDE drive.

The drive developed a problem, where occasionally, during
moderate-to-heavy disk activity, the heads would stop moving (ie. the
chirruping noise would stop) for about 15 secs, then, if DOS 3.30 was
running, it would then generate "Not Ready" critical error. Retrying would
continue as normal. If DOS 4.01 was running, no error message would
appear and whatever was running would continue as normal.

I got the drive replaced under warranty with a Microscience 8040 40Mb
drive, and, would you believe, it's happening again! Not so often this
time, and apparently only under DOS 3.30. Since it was shipped with DOS
4.01, I expect the company to be a bit reluctant to change the drive
again, so I'm problably going to try installing 4.01 (been using 3.30
because of all the bug stories) soon.

Has anybody else had problems like this? Does anybody know what the
problem is? It happens at 8 & 20MHz, in & out of Windows 3, and on a
completely clean floppy-booted system.

Please reply by mail & thanx in advance...

 _____________________________________________________________________________
| Scott Telford, Dept of Computer Science,               scott@cs.hw.ac.uk    |
| Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK.                 scott%hwcs@ukc.uucp  |
|_____ "Expect the unexpected." (The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy) ______|