When Linux hard drives go bad

[Derek Atkins]

Duane Morin <dmorin at lear.morinfamily.com> writes:

> On 27 Jun 2003, Derek Atkins wrote:
> > Well, first, check your kernel logs and see if a HDD is having
> > problems.  If it is, you could just go buy a new HDD.
> 
> Oddly I don't see anything meaningful in the errors log but warnings is 
> full of stuff like this:
> 
> Jun 27 11:28:49 localhost kernel: hda: dma_intr: status=0x51 { Dr
> iveReady SeekComplete Error }
> Jun 27 11:28:49 localhost kernel: hda: dma_intr: error=0x40 { Unc
> orrectableError }, LBAsect=19579678, sector=120168
> Jun 27 11:28:49 localhost kernel: end_request: I/O error, dev 03:
> 08 (hda), sector 120168

Yep, your hard drive is going...

> There is an old Thinkpad600e.  Think I can still find a hard drive for it?  
> I'm not sure it's worth grabbing somebody's used one off ebay and just 
> having the same problem.  Better to save the money toward a new one rather 
> than that.

Eh, a 600E isn't all that old.  But any modern TP hdd should work.
You can probably get a 30-40G drive for about $100-150, and it should work
just fine.

I'd recommend you have a backup ASAP!

> DUane

-derek

> 
>  > 
> > -derek
> > 
> > Duane Morin <dmorin at lear.morinfamily.com> writes:
> > 
> > > I think my laptop is dying.  For some apps (particularly mozilla) it goes 
> > > into this weird hang mode where all I can hear is this rhythmic 
> > > "kachunkachunkachunka" noise for many seconds.   Also some copy operations 
> > > in the file system have failed with weird "IO errors".  Lastly and perhaps 
> > > most importantly, sometimes when rebooting the machine it gives me a 
> > > failure to check the file system.
> > > 
> > > Assuming for the moment that a new laptop is not in my future, is there a 
> > > way that I can somehow detect and flag bad sectors on the drive?  Or at 
> > > least determine which files use those bad areas so that I can work around 
> > > them?  Mozilla is the primary culprit, but not the only one.
> > > 
> > > Duane
> > > 
> > > 
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Discuss mailing list
> > > Discuss at blu.org
> > > http://www.blu.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> > 
> > 
> 

-- 
       Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
       Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board  (SIPB)
       URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/    PP-ASEL-IA     N1NWH
       warlord at MIT.EDU                        PGP key available