Second HDD freezing and now not showing

[karelo]

Hello!
I have been looking for solutions but there are so many different problems coming up with the keywords "windows 7 freezing" and none of them seems to be helping me.
First of all my specs:
Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit with latest updates
P4 3,0GHz
1,5 GB RAM DDR2
Nvidia 6600GT (Image settings with preview set to auto)
Hard drives:
Prime 160GB (~30GB OS partition + ~120GB)
Slave 500GB ( ~40GB + ~220GB + ~220GB partitions)
Both are sata2 seagate hard drives.

So the problem is that the second hard drive is "rebooting" all the time. I can hear it "gathering up rpm speed" and then stopping over and over again. Usually it happens when i'm listening music with winamp from the second HDD and trying to copy something from the drive to a external drive. Happens sometimes even with just listening to the music. Winamp freezes and so does the whole PC for about 10 seconds, sometimes more. I can move the mouse but all apps stop working.

Yes, i have tryed changing power options to max performance. Didn't help.

So today for the first time the 3 partitions from the second HDD were gone from My Computer.
Event viever critical errors under applications (really noob at EV):
Event ID 257
The volume Esimene (J was not defragmented because an error was encountered: The disk was disconnected from the system. (0x89000011)
So was the other ~220GB Drive
Event viever critical errors under system
Lots of Event ID 7 The device, \Device\Harddisk1\DR1, has a bad block.
Followed by Event ID 15
The device, \Device\Harddisk1\DR1, is not ready for access yet.
Then 11 and 15 againg

PLEASE PLEASE oh PLEASE someone help me. Thinking on going back to XP but that would not be a solution.

 

[MadMaxData]

Hi Karelo,

The first thing I would do in that situation is visit the Seagate website, and download their SeaTools utility. This software is designed to check for, and correct SeaGate Hard Disc errors. You can download SeaTools here: CLICK ME

If your able to run the DOS version, do that one instead of the Windows version. That way you can eliminate the HDD as the source of the problem. If it doesn't find HDD errors in DOS, then it's most likely a software problem. You may want to check at SeaGate as to whether or not the firmware for that specific drive has an update as well. Let us know what you find out, and good luck.


Max

 

[karelo]

Thanks for the really fast reply!
I managed to bring my second HDD to life by replacing the sata cable to another sata port on the mobo. I have tryed to check the HDDs with seatools but they fail on long tests. The prime hard drive seems to have a firmware update but that failed to update aswell. I will try the DOS version later!

 

[MadMaxData]

Glad to hear you had some success. You may want to consider backing up your data, if you haven't already. You may have a drive ready to crash. However, I've had great success in recovering hard drives (SaeGate & Maxtor) with SeaTools. So don't get bummed out just yet. Run SeaTools in DOS, and let it do it's thing. Good luck.

* EDIT *
I'm sorry, I don't recover bad hard drives with SeaTools, only diagnose them. I use Maxtor's "MaxBlast" to recover bad sectors. You can run MaxBlast in DOS by running the Ultimate Boot Disc, which you can download here: CLICK ME

I suggest that you download and burn The Ultimate Boot Disc if you don't have it already, for a number of reasons. It kicks ass for DOS tools!!!


Max

 

[MadMaxData]

Oh, and one last thing. If your primary drive doesn't have any problems, then DO NOT update the firmware. You should only update the firmware as a last resort in trying to save a drive.

Max