can software break hardware?!?

  • Thread starter Thread starter edoardo.costa
  • Start date Start date
E

edoardo.costa

Hi all,
I was a firm believer that SW could not break HW apart from maybe
playing with monitor resolution and such. Now I'm not so sure.

I'd apreciate your advice on this. To cut a long story short, this is
what I did.

I installed windows XP on a disk then used ntfsclone (linux tool) to
clone the disk the same way as ghost does.

The problem I am getting is that my first boot is fine but after I
shutdown it won't ever boot again from that disk.

Here are the facts:
1. When I boot of the disks the BIOS (award latest version) It shows
the disk as:
'Iaxtkr 6H080P0' rather than
'Maxtor 6L080P0'

2. The boot process stops at "Loading DMI Pool.... Successful"

3. After failing, whatever new disk I add (same model) fails with the
same name as above.

4. If I add the disk that failed to a box with the exact same
configs... it boots! Then fails on the next boot as the previous one
did.

5. I can mount the disk under linux and it seems to have no problems
what so ever.

If any of you have any thoughts, advice.... I'd apreciate... I have 4
'bust' disks and 2 'bust' workstations until I can figure out what's
wrong.

6. PS Flashing the BIOS and resetting the motherboard still fails :\

Thanks for all.
-Ed
 
Hi all,
I was a firm believer that SW could not break HW apart from maybe
playing with monitor resolution and such. Now I'm not so sure.

I'd apreciate your advice on this. To cut a long story short, this is
what I did.

I installed windows XP on a disk then used ntfsclone (linux tool) to
clone the disk the same way as ghost does.

The problem I am getting is that my first boot is fine but after I
shutdown it won't ever boot again from that disk.

Here are the facts:
1. When I boot of the disks the BIOS (award latest version) It shows
the disk as:
'Iaxtkr 6H080P0' rather than
'Maxtor 6L080P0'

2. The boot process stops at "Loading DMI Pool.... Successful"

3. After failing, whatever new disk I add (same model) fails with the
same name as above.

4. If I add the disk that failed to a box with the exact same
configs... it boots! Then fails on the next boot as the previous one
did.

5. I can mount the disk under linux and it seems to have no problems
what so ever.

If any of you have any thoughts, advice.... I'd apreciate... I have 4
'bust' disks and 2 'bust' workstations until I can figure out what's
wrong.
Click to expand...
D\load the Maxtor drive test utilities. Put them on a floppy.
Boot floppy. and test drive.
http://www.maxtor.com/portal/site/M...n_us/Support/Software Downloads/Top Downloads

Bottom of the page ==Powermax.
 
Hi all,
I was a firm believer that SW could not break HW apart from maybe
playing with monitor resolution and such. Now I'm not so sure.

I'd apreciate your advice on this. To cut a long story short, this is
what I did.

I installed windows XP on a disk then used ntfsclone (linux tool) to
clone the disk the same way as ghost does.

The problem I am getting is that my first boot is fine but after I
shutdown it won't ever boot again from that disk.

Here are the facts:
1. When I boot of the disks the BIOS (award latest version) It shows
the disk as:
'Iaxtkr 6H080P0' rather than
'Maxtor 6L080P0'

2. The boot process stops at "Loading DMI Pool.... Successful"

3. After failing, whatever new disk I add (same model) fails with the
same name as above.

4. If I add the disk that failed to a box with the exact same
configs... it boots! Then fails on the next boot as the previous one
did.

5. I can mount the disk under linux and it seems to have no problems
what so ever.

If any of you have any thoughts, advice.... I'd apreciate... I have 4
'bust' disks and 2 'bust' workstations until I can figure out what's
wrong.

6. PS Flashing the BIOS and resetting the motherboard still fails :\

Thanks for all.
-Ed
Click to expand...

I'm still trying to wrap my mind around your logic in determining that
the hardware is broken. Try this:

1)Take one "bust" disk and install it in one "bust" workstation. Can you
install linux on this combination? If so, does it survive a reboot? If
so then the disk and the motherboard are clearly not broken in any
physical sense.

2)Take the same combination and do a clean install of XP on it including
format and repartition avoiding your cloning process entirely. Does the
install work? Does it survive a reboot? If so then the disk and
motherboard are doubly not broken.

My first guess is that the cloning process is to blame.
 
I was a firm believer that SW could not break HW apart from maybe
playing with monitor resolution and such. Now I'm not so sure.

I'd apreciate your advice on this. To cut a long story short,
this is what I did.

I installed windows XP on a disk then used ntfsclone (linux tool)
to clone the disk the same way as ghost does.

The problem I am getting is that my first boot is fine but after
I shutdown it won't ever boot again from that disk.

Here are the facts:
1. When I boot of the disks the BIOS (award latest version) It
shows the disk as:
'Iaxtkr 6H080P0' rather than
'Maxtor 6L080P0'
Click to expand...

Obviously you have dropped a 4 weight bit in the copy. This is
probably a memory fault. It is your fault for not having ECC
memory in the first place, and I would consider everything on your
disks to be suspect.

To start, make a memtest86 floppy ON ANOTHER MACHINE and check your
memory.
 
Here are the facts:
1. When I boot of the disks the BIOS (award latest version) It shows
the disk as:
'Iaxtkr 6H080P0' rather than
'Maxtor 6L080P0'
Click to expand...

- Bad IDE cable
- Bad overclock
- Bad memory
- Bad drive
 
someone said:
D\load the Maxtor drive test utilities. Put them on a floppy.
Boot floppy. and test drive.
http://www.maxtor.com/portal/site/M...n_us/Support/Software Downloads/Top Downloads

Bottom of the page ==Powermax.
Click to expand...

Hi,
Sorry for delay, I need to answer you all now...

It's not a disk problem... the disk boots fine in a similar
workstation... it just fails on the second boot and the Motherboard
can't display the disk name correctly any more but why not try the
maxtor progy...

Thanks
-Ed.
 
John said:
I'm still trying to wrap my mind around your logic in determining that
the hardware is broken. Try this:

1)Take one "bust" disk and install it in one "bust" workstation. Can you
install linux on this combination? If so, does it survive a reboot? If
so then the disk and the motherboard are clearly not broken in any
physical sense.

2)Take the same combination and do a clean install of XP on it including
format and repartition avoiding your cloning process entirely. Does the
install work? Does it survive a reboot? If so then the disk and
motherboard are doubly not broken.

My first guess is that the cloning process is to blame.
Click to expand...

1) Took the bust disk and put it into the bust ws. The result was.
a) Tried it with knoppix 4.0 with no hardware detect, ... but fb got
in the way so I booted of a minimal gentoo cd and the result was:

Major dma seek failures and the incapacity to see the disk.
So I did the same without dma support but still could not see the ide
disk. It detects it as a Iaxtkr rather than a Maxtor and can't
recognise the partition layout.

2) I booted of a Windows XP Pro CD and never got anywhere I get random
errors of files not being able to be copied. I suspected a bad CD so I
swaped it and still the same problems occur so I guess it's when
Wintendo tries to write to the disk.

My guess is also a problem on the MB or the disk but I can't figure it
out. If I put an identical 'virgin' disk into the failed ws, it sees it
perfectly. Now if I put the failed disk into an identical working ws,
it can see it and I can mount the partitions on the disk from linux.

So I guess my cloning tool did do ireversible damage... or do you have
more thoughts? ;)

-Ed
 
CBFalconer said:
Obviously you have dropped a 4 weight bit in the copy. This is
probably a memory fault. It is your fault for not having ECC
memory in the first place, and I would consider everything on your
disks to be suspect.
Click to expand...

Could you explain what you mean by 'dropped a 4 weight bit in the copy'
or point me to some doc?
To start, make a memtest86 floppy ON ANOTHER MACHINE and check your
memory.
Click to expand...

As I had tested the RAM on the same ws, I decided to follow your advice
and add the RAM to my personal ws and ram memtest86+. It passed with no
errors.

As for ECC, I have no say in company budget r orders but I do have a say
at home :)

Bottom line is... two dead workstations and as many disks. Why would a
BIOS show the disk name wrong and refuse to boot while an other will
display it's name properly?

Thoughts?
-Ed
 
Off topic, John...but great pictures at your website! You have quite an
eye for beauty.
 
none said:
Could you explain what you mean by 'dropped a 4 weight bit in the
copy' or point me to some doc?
Click to expand...

Every altered character is different from the correct one only in
the value of the 4 weight bit. Just look up the ascii codes for
those characters, and express them in binary.

--
"If you want to post a followup via groups.google.com, don't use
the broken "Reply" link at the bottom of the article. Click on
"show options" at the top of the article, then click on the
"Reply" at the bottom of the article headers." - Keith Thompson
More details at: <http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/>
Also see <http://www.safalra.com/special/googlegroupsreply/>
 
CBFalconer said:
... snip ...
.... snip ...
Every altered character is different from the correct one only in
the value of the 4 weight bit. Just look up the ascii codes for
those characters, and express them in binary.
Click to expand...

That's righ!
The M in Maxtor is '01001101'
whilst
the I in Iaxtkr is '01001001'

So you are right there but do you have any clue how I can fix the
problem and what device has been affected by this?

I suspect it's the motherboard as the disk seems fine on a 'clean' ws.

As the memmory checks OK, could the disk have caused this problem due to
a bad cloning? It would be nice to be able to get those ws back up and
running ;)

Thanks
-Ed
 
snip...
So I guess my cloning tool did do ireversible damage... or do you have
more thoughts? ;)

-Ed
Click to expand...

Just an offhand idea: you haven't been using the same ribbon cable for
all of this testing have you? The way that you describe the corruption
of the disk contents it could be consistent with a noisy/broken IDE cable.
 
snip...
Just an offhand idea: you haven't been using the same ribbon cable for
all of this testing have you? The way that you describe the corruption
of the disk contents it could be consistent with a noisy/broken IDE cable.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your reply but no, it was a different ribbon. :\

If I do come up with a sollution I'll let you all know.

Thanks again
-Ed.
 
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