Windows 7: Hard disk error

Every now and then my system my locks up and I have to close it down and re-start and I'm away again. Hard disk 2 in a USB backup drive

I found this error in the event viewer



Log Name: System
Source: Disk
Date: 17/10/2010 23:13:28
Event ID: 11
Task Category: None
Level: Error
Keywords: Classic
User: N/A
Computer: Fred
Description:
The driver detected a controller error on \Device\Harddisk2\DR2.
Event Xml:
<Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
<System>
<Provider Name="Disk" />
<EventID Qualifiers="49156">11</EventID>
<Level>2</Level>
<Task>0</Task>
<Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
<TimeCreated SystemTime="2010-10-17T22:13:28.266289000Z" />
<EventRecordID>13137</EventRecordID>
<Channel>System</Channel>
<Computer>Fred</Computer>
<Security />
</System>
<EventData>
<Data>\Device\Harddisk2\DR2</Data>
<Binary>0E01680001000000000000000B0004C003010000000000000000000000082D00000000000000000017DE1C000000 0000FFFFFFFF0600000040000000000000000000061208000010000000003C0000000000000080E42A860000000008A03885 000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000</Binary>
</EventData>
</Event>

Any ideas what this is and what I can do about it?

The first thing that I would do is make sure that the HD is not ready to fail

Backup your stuff, first.

Test Hard Drive www.carrona.org/hddiag.html or this test http://www.tacktech.com/display.cfm?ttid=287

It's a Seagate USB freeAgent Desktop back up drive and I've run the test software that came with it and it comes up error free

This drive is for my backups!

Interesting! I'm troubleshooting a client's system. Exact same error (The driver detected a controller error on \Device\Harddisk2\DR2.) It started immediately after upgrade to Windows 7. Having trouble with backups and found that error in the logs.

The problem with the backups is the 0X81000037 "Windows Backup failed while trying to read from the shadow copy on one of the volumes being backed up."

OK, the interesting part is that his external drive is also a Seagate FreeAgent USB drive.

Now that is interesting! All we need now is the fix