Solved General system instability when accessing hard drive

[Tomha]

This December just been I got a 2Tb hard drive, a stock standard Seagate Barracuda 7200rpm. I have noticed in recent weeks, that when I access this drive, perhaps to copy files, read them, rename them, import files to it, download files to it, etc, etc etc, it causes some pretty shocking instability in my opinion. Programs at random will stop responding, as I type this, skype randomly froze while I was chatting to a friend, and it took 5 minutes to get it to close and restart. On top of this, windows explorer just loses it, it will hang to the point I cant even access task manager, file transfers will crawl along, and random explorer windows will briefly freeze.

I am clueless as to why this may be so, perhaps the actual drive is faulty? A corrupted windows install? Corrupted files? Any ideas? I will re-install windows if absolutely necessary, however if its a matter of corrupted files, the files are almost entirely irreplaceable, I would need a way to single out the problematic files and remove them, so I need a method to do this?

Thanks for the help,
Tom

 

[azasadny]

Whenever I've seen this is been caused by a bad data cable to the hard drive, or a bad hard drive. Back up your data immediately, run some diags (SeaTools from the Seagate website) and RMA the drivce if it is bad...

 

[essenbe]

I agree with the above post by azasadny, I would run SeaTools and check disk and RMA it if it failed either one. To check system files open an elevated command prompt and run scannow. http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/1538-sfc-scannow-command-system-file-checker.html

 

[azasadny]

essenbe, Thanks!

BTW, I had a 2TB Seagate hard drive fail back last October and Seagate made me run the SeaTools utility (from their website) and provide the specific error message when I submitted my RMA. I had a replacement drive in 4 days...

 

[azasadny]

Tomha, Remember that if you are really dealing with "irreplaceable data", you need to backup or store the files in a redundant storage setup. I personally have a windows Home Server at home with 10TB (2TB x 5 drives). all data is stored on the server and is stored on two separate hard drives. When the Seagate 2TB drive failed, I simply removed it from the server, replaced it with the new one and didn't lose any data! If your data is important (and whose isn't?) NEVER depend upon a single drive! These are consumer grade hard drives and should not be trusted for critical data... Just my .02 worth...

 

[Tomha]

I completely agree with you, unfortunately though I am dealing with large files such as videos, and as a student, I can't really afford to have extra drives like that, as it is, its inconvenient that I have to buy new drives to keep up with my ever expanding data needs. I do however have a spare drive 1Tb drive (for the time being) somewhere, I'll dig that up and put the more important things on there.

It came to my attention that the way I had installed the hard drive, the Sata cable was bent back on itself quite a bit, so perhaps this had become damaged? I swapped it out with a new one and have begun running the tests. The windows test only took a matter of seconds...I'm not sure if it should have, given it had about 1.6Tb of data to go through, but it came out with no errors anyhow. I am currently running the Seagate tests, and so far no errors either. I believe it may have been the cable. I will keep testing and post back final results.

Thanks for the help guys

 

[Tomha]

All passes, I'm thinking it was the cable. I wont mark this as solved just yet, but ill go through some normal usage for a day or two, see if the problem is fixed. Note to self: don't thrash SATA cables

 

[azasadny]

SATA cables are not as strong as people seem to think they are, especially the connectors at the ends. While trying to get the cables cleaned up and out of sight, it's common to pinch them or actually bend them to the point where they fail. I try to only use the cables that have the metal catch on each end...