Maxtor drive causing havoc, any ideas?

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26-09-2006, 05:01 PM
Clunk

Maxtor drive causing havoc, any ideas?

Right, heres a quick history of the drive.
Maxtor 250gb diamondmax10 sata 16meg cache, bought new about ayear ago, first went into an xp system as the main drive for storage, boot, everything. Around 2 months ago, i bought a raptor, so i installed windows on the raptor and formatted the Maxtor.

Yesterday, i put the empty maxtor into a new system with a view to running Vista rc1. now heres the problem..

In either pc, with only the maxtor connected, if i set the bios to boot from cd, i either get a reboot, or the "ntldr is missing" error. its as if the maxtor is overriding the bios and not letting the cd/dvd drive boot. i have tried xp sp2 disc, vista rc1, the newer vista, 64 bit vista rc1, and also the newer one, all of these on different media, just to rule that out, different sata cables, different bioses.

so its got to be the maxtor, that, im pretty sure about, but i cant find anything wrong with it. it passes the windows diagnostics, it formats and partitions fine within windows xp, runs quick enough, isnt any more noisy than normal.

i have downloaded the maxtor diagnostics, but i cant run them, because it wont boot from cd, and ironically, my floppy drive died the other day.

does anyone have any ideas how i can fix this without a hammer?

thanks :)
26-09-2006, 07:05 PM
MadduckUK

Quote:

In either pc, with only the maxtor connected, if i set the bios to boot from cd, i either get a reboot

only the maxtor connected? i presume you mean the only harddrive connected is the maxtor?
26-09-2006, 08:40 PM
Clunk

yes, thanks for the input :lol:
26-09-2006, 10:43 PM
Agent

http://forums.hexus.net/showthread.php?t=69018

Worth checking :)
26-09-2006, 11:04 PM
chuckskull

If the maxtor is IDE and of course the Raptor is SATA, most motherboards will try and boot from the primary IDE drive. Which of course doesn't have windows on it. Causing the Ntdlr message.

I have the opposite problem, if I want to remove my old PATA drive windows wont boot, because it put the ntdlr on there and everything on my raptors :rolleyes:
26-09-2006, 11:26 PM
Clunk

Quote:

Originally Posted by Agent

http://forums.hexus.net/showthread.php?t=69018

Worth checking :)

good thinking, but unfortunately, both of these motherboards are intel 965 chipsets with the jmicron sata/ide controller on them, which i think is what is causing the trouble now. cheers though :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by chuckskull

If the maxtor is IDE and of course the Raptor is SATA, most motherboards will try and boot from the primary IDE drive. Which of course doesn't have windows on it. Causing the Ntdlr message.

I have the opposite problem, if I want to remove my old PATA drive windows wont boot, because it put the ntdlr on there and everything on my raptors :rolleyes:

tha maxtor is sata mate. im even unable to boot from the windows sp2 cd that i originally set up the main pc with.

both of the systems have the same motherboard with the same bios (tried 3 previous ones on each as well).

both of the systems have NEC dvd drives (a 4551 on the main pc and 4570 on htpc)

i have used 3 different kinds of ram in each, so i can rule that out.

3 different psu's so i can rule that out.

different sata cables, different ide cables for the dvd drives as well.

its not often that i cant mend something, but i really am stumped :confused:

if i just put the raptor back in with no other hard drives, in the main pc (the one that was working to begin with), it boots to windows fine. but if i put in the windows sp2 cd and change the boot order to the nec drive, i get a black screen.

its only a couple of weeks since i set this raptor up and it installed fine then...so, what has changed?, the bios has changed, but ive tried the older bioses and the same thing happens.

bugger.
27-09-2006, 02:25 AM
chuckskull

It's a long shot, but try totally wiping the maxtor again. I've had a few times when it didn't 'take'. Make sure you get the boot sector etc.

Does your motherboard allow you to set which hard drive boots? Seems obvious to me, but I've seen people miss easier things.
27-09-2006, 02:53 AM
Clunk

yeah, you just set it in the bios, the boot order etc. i was going to run boot n nuke but the floppy drive wouldnt work either, ive got another floppy drive coming tomorrow just in case. bloody thing.
27-09-2006, 09:52 AM
s_kinton

You really need to get maxblast or somthing like that and zero the drive. I takes a while, but its solved similar problems for me when formatting wasnt working.

Try unplugging the drive, booting from the CD and then plugging in the maxtor as its booting from the CD. You should be fine plugging in a sata drive while the pc is on.
27-09-2006, 09:54 AM
s_kinton

Quote:

Originally Posted by chuckskull

I have the opposite problem, if I want to remove my old PATA drive windows wont boot, because it put the ntdlr on there and everything on my raptors :rolleyes:

You should always unplug all your IDE drives when instyalling windows on a sata drive, that way it has to put the ntldr on the right sata drive. Its a pain but only takes a minute.

Either that or just move to a sata only PC! :)
27-09-2006, 10:12 AM
TamDigital

What motherboard are you using? Possibilities could include having the bios set to use the drive in the wrong mode, does it offer ide, sata, enhanced or both for instance.

I agree with the absolute need for the maxblast floppy. I've had similar problems with exactly the same drive on its own, but I now use two of them in a raid array with no trouble at all.
27-09-2006, 10:16 AM
chuckskull

Quote:

Originally Posted by s_kinton

You should always unplug all your IDE drives when instyalling windows on a sata drive, that way it has to put the ntldr on the right sata drive. Its a pain but only takes a minute.

Either that or just move to a sata only PC! :)

Yeah I know that now :P
27-09-2006, 11:37 AM
Clunk

Quote:

Originally Posted by s_kinton

You really need to get maxblast or somthing like that and zero the drive. I takes a while, but its solved similar problems for me when formatting wasnt working.

Try unplugging the drive, booting from the CD and then plugging in the maxtor as its booting from the CD. You should be fine plugging in a sata drive while the pc is on.

I grabbed maxblast the other day, but all that does is repartition and format the drive, which it does no problem. as i said, i cant use the floppy drive, because, either the floppy drive has died (coincidentally), or the controller is playing up, on both boards. i have a new floppy drive coming today.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TamDigital

What motherboard are you using? Possibilities could include having the bios set to use the drive in the wrong mode, does it offer ide, sata, enhanced or both for instance.

I agree with the absolute need for the maxblast floppy. I've had similar problems with exactly the same drive on its own, but I now use two of them in a raid array with no trouble at all.

motherboard is the asus p5b deluxe in both of them. hopefully, when this new floppy drive gets here, ill be able to run some utils to see what is up with it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by chuckskull

Yeah I know

I want that one :D
27-09-2006, 11:43 AM
TamDigital

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clunk

I want that one :D

Yeah but no, but yeah, but no, but ... :D

My maxblast does more, removes DDO, zeros, write MBR, etc, etc.

Its true about unpluigging all IDEs before installing the SATA with an OS. Then plugging the IDEs back in after and setting boot order with the SATA first worked for me too.
27-09-2006, 12:16 PM
Clunk

the dvd drive and the maxtor are shown in the bios, and they work in windows (the maxtor as a storage drive), but i cant boot from the dvd now on either pc, with or without the maxtor attatched, and its only since it has been playing up that this has happened. weird.
27-09-2006, 12:57 PM
Agent

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clunk

the dvd drive and the maxtor are shown in the bios, and they work in windows (the maxtor as a storage drive), but i cant boot from the dvd now on either pc, with or without the maxtor attatched, and its only since it has been playing up that this has happened. weird.

Mate, your getting the *exact* same problem im having with a DM10 200gb. On an intel 945 !
27-09-2006, 01:04 PM
Clunk

ive got a samsung on the way, so hopefully that will help, but im a bit worries that the maxtor might have permanently damaged something on the motherboard, because even a cmos clear doesnt make it boot from dvd, even with just the raptor atatched and not the maxtor.

its good to know that other people are suffering too :)
27-09-2006, 01:13 PM
Agent

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clunk

ive got a samsung on the way, so hopefully that will help, but im a bit worries that the maxtor might have permanently damaged something on the motherboard, because even a cmos clear doesnt make it boot from dvd, even with just the raptor atatched and not the maxtor.

its good to know that other people are suffering too :)

Im using a seagate 320gb on the board now and it works fine.
27-09-2006, 01:19 PM
Clunk

Quote:

Originally Posted by Agent

Im using a seagate 320gb on the board now and it works fine.

Brilliant :)

i wonder if it is worth getting on to maxtor about it. It took them a long while to sort out the NF4 issues, so i wont hold my breath!
27-09-2006, 01:26 PM
Agent

http://maxtor.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/m...i=&p_topview=1

I have one of the listed drives -do you ?
27-09-2006, 01:51 PM
Clunk

Quote:

Originally Posted by Agent

http://maxtor.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/m...i=&p_topview=1

I have one of the listed drives -do you ?

according to that page, no, but very close.

mine is 6L250S0

Code BACE1G10

according to that page, affected models are 6L or 7L (6L250S0 mine) with codes BANC1G00, BANC1G10, BANC1G20 (BACE1G10 mine)

so i dunno. i know this drive had a problem with my some nf4 boards, but it wasnt the not detecting thing, it used to cause a strange conflict with the pci-e bus, take it out and the conflict had gone!
27-09-2006, 02:41 PM
s_kinton

Quote:

Originally Posted by TamDigital

My maxblast does more, removes DDO, zeros, write MBR, etc, etc.

Mine does too. Have you got the right version Clunk? It does alot more than just format. I would take the time to zero the drive if you can. Its helped me out in the past
27-09-2006, 03:40 PM
Clunk

Quote:

Originally Posted by s_kinton

Mine does too. Have you got the right version Clunk? It does alot more than just format. I would take the time to zero the drive if you can. Its helped me out in the past

Maybe its because its the maxblast 4 for windows? its just a basic version, setup, couple of utils (but not zeroing). anyway, floppy drive has arrived, ill see what i can do, if anything :)
27-09-2006, 03:45 PM
Agent

There is an ISO CD/DVD version too mate :)
I have done the zero'ing thing already (via maxblast) and didnt help me :(
27-09-2006, 05:33 PM
Clunk

Quote:

Originally Posted by Agent

There is an ISO CD/DVD version too mate :)
I have done the zero'ing thing already (via maxblast) and didnt help me :(

ive got the iso thanks :) , but i cant boot from it, or anything else on cd, i think im gonna have to wait until tomorrow when the samsung drive comes. what a very annoying little problem :lol:
28-09-2006, 06:36 PM
Clunk

quick update. put a samsung sata 2 drive in there, still wouldnt boot, but this time the problem was ahci, so, set to ahci, booted ok using the UBCD or xp sp2, but wont boot with any of the vista discs i have, so thats something else to suss out.

edit: the maxtor has finally dropped dead. i finally got the floppy working and the cd working and loaded up dban to wipe it and it made a cracking sound and died. only snag is, its under warranty from Aria, so might have a replacement by the time vista is out.