hard drive woes

[Crazy Fool]

I have a 20gig Maxtor drive that seems to be faulty, I can’t format or install onto it.
I have tried using partition magic as a primary or secondary drive and also a clean install. When I attempted to do a clean install it took about 5 attempts to format and then when it did it took about 3 hours to half install the files from winxp, I left it going when I went to work. The pc spec is high and should only take an hour max to install!

I also herd some clicking during the install and I think it could be on the way out, the drive was given to me, so I don’t know if it’s under warranty. Is there anyway I can tell?

Any advice or info?

[Nomadd]

Apart from sticking it in another PC, just to confirm it really is buggered, I'd say don't waste your time on it. I had the same problems with an IBM "Deathstar" 40GB drive, and although I tested it endlessly with every disk tool I could find (do a search on Download.com, www.ontrack.co.uk, etc) it really only ended up confirming what I already knew. When you considered how important your disk drive is, and how dirt cheap new drives are (even more so second-hand) it just don't think it's worth the risk of sticking with it...

Nomadd

[Jimmy Little]

yeah you should see if you can send it back, but just buy a new one jamie, novatech have them from as little as £25

[Flash]

I believe Maxtor RMA for returns is in Holland you can get an RMA if the drive is still within the warranty period.

Their normal turn around for fixing them is 2-3weeks though

[Jimmy Little]

with the SN number you PM'ed me jamie the model is out of warranty, it ended in Feb 2004, sorry dude bin it!

[Grey M@a]

would you really want to send a 20gig drive back, may aswell fork out the £60 for a 200gig maxtor

[Jimmy Little]

^

yeah it's not worth it

[Flash]

would you really want to send a 20gig drive back, may aswell fork out the £60 for a 200gig maxtor

exactly postage on that would cost an arm and a leg to RMA your better of buying new

[Jiff Lemon]

Before sending it to the bin the only two things I'd say are:

1) Try it in another machine - If it shows the same problems, then bin it.
2) If you can't try it in another machine, try a different IDE cable, and make sure your BIOS settings are correct for the IDE channels.

Hardware is getting to throwaway prices - not really worth spending too much time on.

[Flash]

funnily enough I had a drive with the same probs as this one I just left it in my cupboard for months

I bought one of those external USB 2.o drive cases popped it in and works no probs at all

it was a fujitsu though which are pretty intermittant Im sure it will fail pretty soon