Cooked Hard drive

  • Thread starter Thread starter Guest
  • Start date Start date
G

Guest

How resistant are hard drives to heat, I have a 200gig external hard drive
and last night the enclosure cooling fan failed. when I switch the drive on
it is detected by the system but when I try to look into it I get a windows
explorer fault. My question is Have I cooked the drive or is it the USB
interface mounted inside the enclosure. Anyone got an opinion.
 
Jack, is there a way to remove the drive from the enclosure and bypass
the USB interface?
 
Yes Barry it is easy to remove. to test it I can fit it inside the PC but it
seems like a lot of trouble if the drive or type of drive is sensative (a
Maxtor) to heat. I myself think that they should be a bit more robust to
temperature or should have some kind of thermal cut out fitted. it was only
switched on for about an hour and I do not know when inside that hour the fan
failed. So my question is would the drive cooked in this time.
thanks for taking the trouble to reply
 
'Jack' wrote:
| How resistant are hard drives to heat, I have a 200gig external hard drive
| and last night the enclosure cooling fan failed. when I switch the drive
on
| it is detected by the system but when I try to look into it I get a
windows
| explorer fault. My question is Have I cooked the drive or is it the USB
| interface mounted inside the enclosure. Anyone got an opinion.
______

This question is best asked in a hardware newsgroup.

However, it is highly unlikely that the mere failure of the cooling fan
could result in a drive temperature high enough to do any damage. And
certainly not to the USB interface.

You haven't given sufficient details about the problem so you can't expect
much of an answer.
How do you know the fan failed?
Were you using the computer when the problem occurred?
Was the system on standby?
How do you know that nothing else failed (power supply, for example?)
WHAT explorer fault?
...

Phil Weldon



| How resistant are hard drives to heat, I have a 200gig external hard drive
| and last night the enclosure cooling fan failed. when I switch the drive
on
| it is detected by the system but when I try to look into it I get a
windows
| explorer fault. My question is Have I cooked the drive or is it the USB
| interface mounted inside the enclosure. Anyone got an opinion.
| --
| Jack
 
well I know the fan failed because it stopped turning. The power light is
still on
when the failure happened I switched on the drive read some information from
it and then did not require to use it for some time when I returned to the
drive. using My computer and double clicking on the drive icon I got the
message "windows explorer has encountered a problem and is now closing. when
the screen refreshed the drive icon was gone. I rebooted the PC and it is not
sensing the drive
 
I recently had a Maxtor 160GB in an external IcyBox enclosure which failed
at about 2 months old, the IcyBox doesn't have a fan.
If I use it at all now I always power it off when not in use because it does
run fairly warm.
 
'Jack' wrote, in part:
| when the failure happened I switched on the drive read some information
from
| it and then did not require to use it for some time when I returned to the
| drive. using My computer and double clicking on the drive icon I got the
| message "windows explorer has encountered a problem and is now closing.
when
| the screen refreshed the drive icon was gone. I rebooted the PC and it is
not
| sensing the drive
_____

You really should get a replacement from the manufacturer since it is clear
SOMETHING failed. And you are not going to get it working yourself.
That still leaves you with the problem of recovering the data on the drive
(if you don't have a backup.)

Another post in reply to your question suggested removing the drive from the
enclosure. That seems like a good move. Once you have it plugged into an
IDE cable, you can recover the data, as it is more likely that the problem
is a power supply fault rather than a hard drive failure, and failure of the
USB interface could be more likely than failure of the drive. If it IS a
hard drive failure (perhaps even caused by a power supply failure, then
recovery of the data will be between expensive and VERY expensive, depending
on whether only the controller on the hard drive needs replacing, or whether
more heroic measures, requiring a clean room, are necessary.

Bottom line... post your question in a hardware newsgroup or contact the
manufacturer. And while you are at it, work on how you present the problem.
All you KNOW is
the fan doesn't turn
the power supply indicator light is on
immediately after the fan stopped, you successfully read data from the
drive
later your system (BIOS?) could not detect the drive.

An important detail you have NOT included is whether a USB device is now
missing, as a USB connectivity failure would certainly isolate the drive
from the rest of the system.
Another thing to check is whether the drive spins up when power is applied.

Don't make assumptions that it has anything to do with heat. Leave that to
the manufacturer when you ask for a replacement.

Phil Weldon

| well I know the fan failed because it stopped turning. The power light is
| still on
| when the failure happened I switched on the drive read some information
from
| it and then did not require to use it for some time when I returned to the
| drive. using My computer and double clicking on the drive icon I got the
| message "windows explorer has encountered a problem and is now closing.
when
| the screen refreshed the drive icon was gone. I rebooted the PC and it is
not
| sensing the drive
| --
| Jack
 
I have several enclosures that do not have fans so I doubt that the failure
of a fan would cause the hard drive to fail. It may be that some damage
occurred to the enclosures circuit board. Remove the drive and test it
outside of the enclosure.
 
Anything is possible.

You find out if the drive has failed by taking it out of the external case
and connecting it directly to the IDE channel on the M/B.

It can not be stated any cleaner than that!

--
Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User

Quote from George Ankner:
If you knew as much as you think you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!
 
'Jack' wrote:
| well I know the fan failed because it stopped turning. The power light is
| still on
| when the failure happened I switched on the drive read some information
from
| it and then did not require to use it for some time when I returned to the
| drive. using My computer and double clicking on the drive icon I got the
| message "windows explorer has encountered a problem and is now closing.
when
| the screen refreshed the drive icon was gone. I rebooted the PC and it is
not
| sensing the drive
_____

Any resolution on your USB hard drive problem? Please post results as a
help for others with similar questions.

Phil Weldon

| well I know the fan failed because it stopped turning. The power light is
| still on
| when the failure happened I switched on the drive read some information
from
| it and then did not require to use it for some time when I returned to the
| drive. using My computer and double clicking on the drive icon I got the
| message "windows explorer has encountered a problem and is now closing.
when
| the screen refreshed the drive icon was gone. I rebooted the PC and it is
not
| sensing the drive
| --
| Jack
|
| "Phil Weldon" wrote:
|
| > 'Jack' wrote:
| > | How resistant are hard drives to heat, I have a 200gig external hard
drive
| > | and last night the enclosure cooling fan failed. when I switch the
drive
| > on
| > | it is detected by the system but when I try to look into it I get a
| > windows
| > | explorer fault. My question is Have I cooked the drive or is it the
USB
| > | interface mounted inside the enclosure. Anyone got an opinion.
| > ______
| >
| > This question is best asked in a hardware newsgroup.
| >
| > However, it is highly unlikely that the mere failure of the cooling fan
| > could result in a drive temperature high enough to do any damage. And
| > certainly not to the USB interface.
| >
| > You haven't given sufficient details about the problem so you can't
expect
| > much of an answer.
| > How do you know the fan failed?
| > Were you using the computer when the problem occurred?
| > Was the system on standby?
| > How do you know that nothing else failed (power supply, for
example?)
| > WHAT explorer fault?
| > ...
| >
| > Phil Weldon
| >
| >
| >
| > | > | How resistant are hard drives to heat, I have a 200gig external hard
drive
| > | and last night the enclosure cooling fan failed. when I switch the
drive
| > on
| > | it is detected by the system but when I try to look into it I get a
| > windows
| > | explorer fault. My question is Have I cooked the drive or is it the
USB
| > | interface mounted inside the enclosure. Anyone got an opinion.
| > | --
| > | Jack
| >
| >
| >
 
Back
Top