Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!rutgers!ucsd!sdcsvax!ucsdhub!hp-sdd!hplabs!hp-sde!hpdml93!rona
From: rona@hpdml93.HP.COM (ron abramson)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: Insidious Hard Drive Bug!
Message-ID: <480010@hpdml93.HP.COM>
Date: 21 Dec 88 20:42:05 GMT
References: <6888@xanth.cs.odu.edu>
Organization: HP Disk Memory Division - Boise, ID
Lines: 29

Scott R. Chilcote writes:

> BUT, nine times out of ten, when I run ANY program on the hard disk it will
> crash, with between two and seven bombs.  If I enable auto-booting on the hard
> disk, it will perpetually crash with two bombs.  Formatting WITH bad sector   
> mapping enabled will cause the format program to give a "bad field in CDB"
> error before the partitions are installed.  And if I use SUPUTIL to go and 
> map bad sectors later, it gives a "Bad sector in FAT -- Disk unuseable" error.

etc., etc...

I don't know if this will be a big help, but I too have experienced
problems like what you describe.  My solution was to play with cable
lengths and move the host adaptor away from the drive/controller.  At 12
inches, I was okay.  At 4 inches I had trouble.  Also, I tried to route
the cables so that would go directly away from the host adaptor.  The
bottom line is, the system can be highly susceptable to noise.  And what
was really funny was that I never had any trouble with my fairly slow 20
MB drives, but when I put the 300 MB drive on there, I had to get very
careful.

Co-workers of mine have used the exact same drive on their ST's and
haven't had any trouble.  Anyway, I would try moving things around
rather than just shielding.


						GOOD LUCK!!!

						Ron Abramson