[SunRescue] Seagate Hawk misbehavior

[jeff borisch]

Hi Michael,
This is strange, I've had one do exactly the same! Mine came from an ss1
that I rescued and was being tested in an external case on another machine.

I had speculated that the bearings were going bad and when the RPMs went low
out of normal the drive motor would cut out completely--sort of as a self
protective measure. Sometimes it would be able to start back up and other
times not. Sometimes it would complete a format, sometimes it would shut
down as you describe.

Note I could not hear the drive slow down at all before the motor cut out.
This is total speculation I surmised from the one time I was playing with a
crashed drive. I had the top off and was touching the platters. When I
slowed down the rotation of the platters, the heads would park themselves.
The behavior sounds like what is happening with our Hawks.

Like you I have tried messing with the auto spin up jumpers. I wasn't able
to get any good results from it. Mine sure is loud. That was another thing
that lead me to the bearing hypothesis. They might just be loud though.

Other things I could look at:
Trying a different power supply--Marginal current ratings might affect it.
Does the power LED go off when it quits? Mine does.

hope this helps,
jeffrey



Michael Hansen wrote:

> Ok, why would a Segate Hawk 1GB drive make a noise that
> sounds like it is trying to spin up, then spin down, then
> spin back up, constantly, the entire time it's connected
> to power? I just had one shipped (!UPS!) from a supplier
> whose wares have been totally reliable in the past.
> This is the first time I bought a hard disk from them,
> though. Before I decide it's my last, any ideas?
> 
> Anyway, can bad jumper settings do this? Or did UPS
> drop it off the back of a truck? I tried shorting
> the motor start jumper, but the drive's behavior did
> not change.
> 

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