Hard Drive problem

gmc_3

I bought a hard drive 2nd hand, I've plugged it into my pc and tried to format it but get the error 'Data error (cyclic redundancy check)'.

Can anyone help, I don't know whats on the drive and don't really care just want a clean format.

Thanks

G

T4i

Is the HDD brand new? It will need a partition before formatting.

T4i

Faulty IDE cable.

gmc_3

The ide cable is fine. I formatted a mates hd last week using the same cable.

The drive is 2nd hand.

G

kingpuck

hey,

if you can get into dos try using the chkdsk /f command. I have used this to fix the same problem on a few hard drives before.

Once this has been done then format as usual, I would recommend doing a full format though rather than a quick one.

Another thing you might be interested in, I use Knoppix a lot for situations like this. It is a live linux distibution than runs off a cd, very very handy. You should give it a try if you haven't heard of it before.

gmc_3

Hi, don't know if i ran the chkdsk right. Tried from the command prompt and was told that it would check on startup, so I restarted. Found no probs but not convinced it checked the right drive. I laso get this message when the pc is booting up

'Pri Slave Hard Disk: S.M.A.R.T. Status Bad, Backup and replace'

Thanks

G

T4i

If you bought that drive of someone throw it hard at there nose. Its dying.

If its a secondary drive try this;

chkdsk d: /f

gmc_3

I presume 'd:' is the name of the drive. my pc is picking it up as f: so swap d for f?

G

T4i

yeh sorry....thats the 1

gmc_3

Ok... got the message

'unable to determine volume version and state. CHKDSK aborted'

should i be taking aim?

G

Nex0

What make is the drive? As some manufactures have diagnostics tools on there websites