Solved What is blue sine wave on disk activity

[SamBrowne]

I'm looking at the Resource Monitor, accessed from Task Manager, Win7. I am watching disk activity. I see mostly green sine waves, but one drive also has a blue sine wave. I can't find a key to tell me what the blue wave means.

Blue wave at top of graph, often spiking down to near bottom. Is this i/o errors? Don't seem to see it on other drives.

I am trying to use this device (WD Elements 107C, 1.73tb partition) for my System Image backups, but back up is dog slow. Ran 4 hours over night and only got <100mb of 400+mb. Stopped backup. Ran virus scan and AVG found/fixed multiple occurrences of Tracking Cookie Serving-sys.

I am running SlimCleaner Shred to remove the incomplete backup. It's also running dog slow and seems it will take another 4 hours to complete the wipe. Blue sine wave going nuts.

Thanks!

PS shred done; about 4 hours. Multiple crashes of BSvc Processor
I can't believe it takes 4 hours just to write 100mb of random data to an hdd. I've shredded multi-gb areas in far less time on other hardware.

 

[Golden]

Check that disk using the DOS version of SeaTools - run the LONG test:
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/313457-seatools-dos-windows-how-use.html

 

[carwiz]

The blue lines are the highest percent of activity.

 

[SamBrowne]

Well, the problem turns out to be an AF drive reporting a 4k logical sector which win7 doesn't deal with. It needs to be reformatted with a WD tool to show a 512 logical sector and will then operate in 512e mode.

This wipes the data and turns the drive into a single partition. I have a partition I'll need to move first. So I ordered another identical drive as I have nothing else that will hold that partition. I'll reformat the new drive first, then migrate the partition and finally reformat the problem drive.

I'll test an image backup on that to see if the problem is solved.

I do have the 'hotfix' for win7, but I think it just supports 512e mode on AF devices.

I did make a misstatement in my original post: It was 100GB, not MB, that took 4 hours to back up.

After removing the malware, I tried again and after 11 hours the backup failed about 2/3 done.

After that was when I learned about AF drives. Thanks to nick nvidiot on #Windows7 on DALnet irc.

And I'm going to look at that DOS utility mentioned above.

Thanks!
SamBrowne

 

[SamBrowne]

I just checked that utility out; it's for Seagate drives, mostly. I'll pass for now.

I think MS needs to put proper support for AF drives in Win7. Why? Because I see Win7 being just as tenacious as XP - and XP isn't gone yet. Did you know Google is maintaining XP now?

SamBrowne

 

[carwiz]

Windows 7 supports AF drives but HP PCs that don't have Intel Rapid Storage Technology (RST) installed seem to be having a problem. Have you contacted HP Support?

 

[SamBrowne]

It's a second hand box (refurb). No access to HP without $$. My quick research finds it might be technically complicated to install. How can I find out if I already have it?

 

[carwiz]

Look in Programs and Features from the Control Panel. If installed, it will show there.

HP doesn't charge for access to web-based support. That's how I found out about the HP problem. Also note that WD issued a utility to format drives to "factory default" sector format. You need to make sure you download the software that matches your drive and model exactly.

I also see that your PC didn't come with Windows 7 initially and the chipsets will pre-date AFD. It may turn out that the drive controllers in your PC may not support it.

 

[carwiz]

I just learned something new. It appears Windows supports only the 4k/512e format. The Native or "4Kn" is not supported. A logo on the drive label or box should indicate which Advanced Format is used.

 

[SamBrowne]

My pc is an HP DC5750 w/win7 home prem 32 bit, but the cpu is 64 bit. AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4800+ 2.50GHz.

Don't find anything in P&F about the Intel software.

I believe I have downloaded the right WD utility. I'll find out when the new drive arrives - about 5 days yet.

I'm wondering, though, if after the re-format, that I'll be able to partition the disk and retain the 512e status on additional partitions.

And my system has that update for win7. KB 982018

Really appreciate you following up on this!

 

[carwiz]

What new drive? I thought you had the drive in hand? If it's a 4Kn drive, it can't be formatted to 512e. It must have the "AF" logo. These drives can be formatted at 4K or 512e.

Also, your specs say HP 5150. There's a big difference and causes a lot of wasted time when folks use it for reference.

Forgot to mention:
Check with the drive OEM. The utility may not work with USB connected drives. Many have to be connected directly to the host controller (SATA port) for such utilities.

 

[SamBrowne]

carwiz, here's an update:

5/17/15 Results of Windows Backup of C drive files and image 5/16-5/17/15

Took 19 hours.

5/16/15 11:02am - 5:50am ~19hrs - 358.35gb free of 2.73tb(??) bu size = 717.36gb
scale shows space (2.73tb) 3/4 consumed - not!
vol properties shows 721gb used/2.02tb free; resource monitor shows 2,861,427mb total, 2,123,039mb used.


Backup took 19 hours. Volume properties shows 721gb used and 2.02tb free. Backup shows 717.36gb used and 358.35gb free of 2.73tb. MS backup needs math lessons! Apparently converting the drive to work in 512e mode allowed the backup to complete but what a performance hit. MS really needs to address this. MS claims they fully support AF drives in Win 8/10, so the code exists - how about it, Bill?

Also, Realdownloader.exe (a service?) crashed about 4 times during the backup. It crashed many more times during the prior failed backups.

SamBrowne

 

[carwiz]

I would turn off indexing for that drive as well as any other external or backup drive. While it does run in the background, it can take forever on large drives and bloats the indexing tables. This will slow other drives down. You may have to delete and rebuild the index if it's large.

I can't help you with Realdownloader. It's considered an aid for theft and against Forum policy.

 

[SamBrowne]

I don't understand indexing - how does it affect backup performance?

As far as Realdownloader.exe is concerned, it was not in use; RP just loads it at boot I guess. Just mentiuoning a 'side effect' of the backup.

If MS isn't going to address this soon, I'll probably need to buy a smaller, non-AF drive for my backups. I found the HP support forums so I'll be looking to see if I have a chipset issue.

Thanks!