WD 120GB Drive pausing when copying/moving files

[biosol]

Hi,
I had WD 80GB and 120GB drives in an old tall server case and assembled a new machine with a new faster cpu/motherboard. Those two drives had been working fine, no issues at all. I added one more WD 120GB drive from another system which had also been working fine. The second 120 drive was recognized and activated into Windows 2003 Server without problem, however the 120 that was paired with the 80 in my old server needed to be 'reactivated' twice before it was really recognized and now when I try to copy or move files to/from it, the whole system pauses every 3-5 seconds. I moved all 110GB of data off of it and on to the other 120GB, it moved fine, it just took a while and I've deleted and recreated the dynamic volume, but it still displays the same behavior. I've also run the Windows disk scan and it didn't help. I ran the WD diagnostics and so far the quick test didn't report errors.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

Configuration:
cpu - Celeron 2.66Ghz
RAM - 1GB
80 GB WD drive connected to the MB IDE 1
DVD Rom connected to the MB IDE 2
both 120GB drive connected to a SIIG pci ata/100 controller card

Thanks

 

[rvnguy]

biosol,

I know this is basic, but many times the problems are just that; some simple thing that got over looked.

I would attempt to trouble shoot this by;

1. Connecting all four drives to the MB IDE channels.

2. When doing this, take care to insure correct jumpering i.e. mstr/slav and correct placement on the IDE cable.

3. If you are using the 40pin/80 conductor connectors; insure that the end with the longer distance to a connector is what you plug into the MB; Mstr jumpered device is at the other end and slav is in the middle for both channels. If you are not, consider upgrading these even though this is not specifically your problem. These (80 condictor) cables are needed to access at the higher rates of todays drives.

4. Check recognition in BIOS and then in windows server(boot drive should not have changed position others ??)

5. Evaluate access times with this setup

6. Short way; Insure correct jumpering and cable positions. with the currrent setup. Also, with new MOBO and processor, insure that you have latest driver for the controller card as you did not state what your old sys was.

Hope this helps

rvnguy

"I know everything..I just can't remember it all

 

[micker377]

Does your system have "indexing" which could be disabled to test?

 

[biosol]

Thanks for the suggestions. I first switched the cables of the two WD 120s on the pci card connectors and that didn't change anything. Then I connected the drive to the MB in place of the DVD/CD drive. That did fix it. So it seems to be the pci controller card. I don't think I installed the drivers off the MB CD nor the drivers off the pci card floppy, which say for Win 95-98SE and NT4-2000) as I figured the Windows 2003 Server install would have those drivers.

But do you think I should try installing either/both the MB and pci drivers?

Thanks

 

[biosol]

I thought I might have a work around by putting the DVD/CD on the pci controller and connecting the problematic drive to the second IDE MB controller like I did before and it worked, but the BIOS said the boot order or something changed and I couldn't get it to boot this time. After trying several things I loaded the 'fail safe' option and now the BIOS either won't come up or if I open the DVD/CD drawer and reset then the BIOS starts but hangs before allowing me back in (with the DEL key).

Should I 'clear' the CMOS? If so I just switch the jumper for 10 seconds and then replace it correct?

MB = ECS PT800CE-A

Thanks

 

[biosol]

Ok, I cleard the CMOS and got the BIOS back. The system booted up with the system drive on the MB IDE primary and the DVD/CD on the MB IDE secondary. I thought I could work around the issue by running the DVD/CD off the pci card and connecting the problem hard drive to the MB IDE secondary since it worked on that connector.

However, the system only seems to want to boot with the DVD/CD on the MB connector, if I try my work around I get a boot disk error, please insert a bootable disk and press enter.

Any suggestions for getting it to boot with the DVD/CD on the pci card?

Thanks.

 

[biosol]

Well, finally got my work around working, sort of. The system gives that boot disk error when the DVD/CD's been connected, but it runs normally with all 3 drives without the DVD/CD. So I might just go with that.

I might reinstall the system if I can get the DVD/CD to load the setup program, or I might just run it this way. Don't really need/use the DVD/CD drive anyway.

Thanks for the suggestions.

 

[rvnguy]

biosol,

You say that you tried what I had suggested. But it seems from your post that you are connecting only one drive on a MB channel. The IDE on most MOBO's have two separate channels. Each channel will support two drives. You have three HD's and one CD/DVD for a total of four.
From your quote:

"Then I connected the drive to the MB in place of the DVD/CD drive. That did fix it."

Why in place of the DVD/CD? Why not in addition to?

What I suggeated is that you connect all four drives to the MB IDE channels. If you do not have cables that have a total of three connectors on them please get a couple. They are fairly inexpensive. and move all you drives to the MOBO IDE. This as you found solves your problem.

rvnguy

"I know everything..I just can't remember it all

 

[biosol]

Yes runguy,
Sorry for not making that clearer. I didn't hook all the drives to the MB. I guess I've always just avoided the master/slave in favor of each drive on it's own channel. I may try your suggestion but I'd need to get another cable or move the DVD/CD down to the lowest slot, as they are they're too far apart to work with my current cables.

As I mentioned it does work with the 3 drives and really that's all I need. After installing the OS, the DVD/CD drive rarely gets used so it's not to much of a loss.

Thanks again for your help.

 

[biosol]

UPDATE:
------------
I think the pci/ATA controller might not be as compatible with Windows 2003 Server as the company says it is. SIIG says Windows 2003 server has the correct drivers and will install them automatically, however I've notice that drive on the card is only operating in PIO mode and the file transfers are much slower than the other drives connected to the MB. So that may have been the issue with the DVD/CD player as well. I guess getting a new controller would fix the issue.