VERY Slow HDD and Boot

[bobsdad2005]

A few weeks ago my 3 year old stuck a screw driver in the front USB port and blew the motherboard and PSU.
I've had them replaced but I've lost some data of my drives.
I've replaced a 10G drive that I was using for the OS with a 30G and kept my 160G data drive.
I've reinstalled XP on the 30G and since then it's taking 20 mins to boot up.
The 160G data drive isn't showing up in XP (it's there in the BIOS and shows in Device Manager)
I've replaced the cables and tried changing from PIO mode to UDMA on the IDE properties.
Tried uninstalling the Primary IDE and rebooting, but still the same problem.
Is this down to the 160G drive being shafted (using data recovery on it), or something else.
I've run Hitachi's disk tests and checked the settings on the drive and the BIOS and they are all fine and as far as I can see as they should be.

New motherboard is a Foxconn 661MXPro.
P4 3.0Ghz
1G RAM
30G IBM-DTLA (Deskstar)
160G Hitachi Deskstar

Any help appreciated as I'm out of ideas.

 

[firewolfrl]

it almost sounds like a MFT or bootsector on the 160 drive.
how does it boot without the 160 connected???

 

[bobsdad2005]

The same without the 160 drive.
Gets to "Verifying DMI Pool Data" on boot and then takes forever.

 

[firewolfrl]

Bbefore you can deal with the 160 drive you have to deal with the 30 gig slow boot.
goto

http://www.winkeyfinder.com/

and download Winkeyfinder and then use it to backup your activation. then back up your data (including activation) you want to save using your (I assume you have one?) CDRW or DVDRW Burner

try unplugging the CD or DVD drives and booting just the 30 gig by itself (lot of people ignore those drives in troubleshooting. you had a short to the system and may have fried them)

is the 160 gig a Serial ATA or IDE?
load the chipset drivers for the motherboard

leave the 160 gig totally unplugged with no cables to it then using the HD manufacturer's software...zero out the 30 gig drive
then reinstall windows and see if if the boot time changes
and reload the mb software

you may be looking at recovery of the 160 gig

 

[bobsdad2005]

Thanks.
The 30gig was zero'd before I installed XP again a few days ago.
I have nothing to backup on the 30 gig other than the basics of XP and drivers.
The 160gig is IDE.
Was thinking of doing a clean install on the zero'd drive anyway. Never come across Winkeyfinder before. Presumably if I'm doing just a bare bones install like I have at the moment then I don't need to bother with it. Do I?
I'll try without the DVD drive cabled up.
If all else fails I've another 30gig I can use once I back it up somewhere.

 

[firewolfrl]

sounds like a good plan
and it doesn't hurt to backup the activation so you don't have to activate again

 

[bobsdad2005]

Tried it without the DVD drive connected. No change.
Tried with just the 30 gig. No change.
This time I'm getting NTLDR is missing error.
The drive was zero'd and formatted before I installed XP and I've changed the cables.
I'm wondering if it's stuck in PIO mode and getting this error maybe because of a faulty pin on the HD connector.
Possible?
Think it's best just do zero another drive and start from scratch.

 

[firewolfrl]

hey good luck and let me know how it works out

 

[bobsdad2005]

I think I may have found the problem.
I checked the pins on the 30 gig and instead of just the one missing key pin (20), another is missing.
So I took the other 30 gig that I have and installed XP on that. SAME PROBLEM!!!!
Double checked the pins and that also has the same pin missing.
The two 30 gig drives I have used have both come from a fully working IBM Intellistation M Pro that used to run Avid on NT, so I'm guessing that it must have something to do with the configuration of that machine.
Haven't searched as to why yet, but I'll certainly be looking as soon as I reinstall on my trusty 10gig OS drive.
Many thanks for all your help firewolfrl and fingers crossed everything should soon be back to normal.

 

[micker377]

If that doesn't work, try booting off just a boot floppy (no other drive cables connected to motherboard).

 

[garebo]

Avid on NT"
Mind if i ask? I know what NT is but what is Avid? I havent heard of a different ide pin config? I certainly dont doubt you, what i dont know will fill a room, lol.
As much as i try to help here, i probably do at least as much learning!


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[bobsdad2005]

http://www.avid.com

"The industry standard" Non linear Editing system.
Outrageously expensive, used in film and TV for donkeys years and always used to run on Macs until they had a falling out. From there Apple devised Final Cut Pro and Avid got into bed with Microsoft. I think they've kissed and made up now. Free version now available on website. Think Windows Moviemaker with bells on.
I inherited two.
One was screwed (where I took the 30gig drives from).
The other has the "dongle" but no NT disk or Avid disk. When that goes wrong I'm left with another 5 or 6 year old IBM system.
It is rather intriguing about the pins on the drives though. It's caused me a week of confusion.

 

[garebo]

So the hard drives used in these systems are proprietary?


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[bobsdad2005]

Not that I've been aware of to date.
I used to work on a sytem that was used every day for about 10 years. The drives were external fast and wide SCSI 9gig (in the days when that was a lot). One of them broke down and as the warranty had ended I decided to open it up to see what was so mystical about it.
Turned out it was just a regular 7200rpm 9 gig drive. Avid however said just replacing it would put my media in jeopardy and I should get hold of a new one of theirs at several hundred pounds.
Still don't know about these 30gigs though.
I'm wondering if it was to cap the speed, as these were where the digitized media went.
As the system was Avid Xpress DV and not a high end uncompressed analogue version maybe this coupled with the dongle kept it in it's place. Just a theory

 

[garebo]

You said:

"I checked the pins on the 30 gig and instead of just the one missing key pin (20), another is missing.
So I took the other 30 gig that I have and installed XP on that. SAME PROBLEM!!!!
Double checked the pins and that also has the same pin missing."
Sounds proprietary to me? Sorry, i just dont understand. Wondering so that if i ever run into this i will know what to do.



Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[bobsdad2005]

http://images.soliton.net/ibm/Dead Drives 03 Laptop Close.jpg

Basically, see the empty space as it should be...
if you go up one pin and to the left one... that's missing.
Both the drives are the same, but on one the pin is either push all the way in (or snipped off, can't tell) and on the other about half the pin is still exposed (though not long enough to make the connection).
That's the best I can do and I really can't explain it.
All I know is that from all the Avid systems I've worked on, they all have idiosynchrocies that make them work.
The drives are just a bog standard DTLA-307030 (30.7 GB).
Other than the slow speed and not being able to make it work in DMA mode it seemed fine.
And I've rebuilt the old Avid/Intellistation and it seems okay in that still in PIO mode though.

 

[garebo]

So the h drive with the pin altered does work then?
Im just trying to understand here, sorry to bother you.


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[firewolfrl]

hard drives are so cheap these days. you ought th look into buying a cheao new drive. and just play around with those 30 gig drives
good luck

 

[bobsdad2005]

garebo, yes they both worked but very slowly in PIO mode.
I have ditched them completely now and gone back to my 10gig.
That was working fine until just now when I got the message "no 80 conductor channel on primary ide" or words to that effect.
More new cables?
It never rains...

 

[garebo]

Lol, it means you need an 80 conductor ide cable, which is different from the 40 pin. Usually the 80 pin is darker grey, the wires are much thinner than the 40 pin and the 40 pin is lighter grey. The 80 pin has a blue end that goes to the motherboard. The far end takes the master drive and the middle one takes the slave. With a 40 pin you can put the drive whereever you want but you cant with 80 pin.


Good advice + great people = tek-tips