readdm@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (David M. Read) (03/18/91)
I suddenly picked up a weird gremlin today: I keep getting these "Sector not found" errors...sometimes a "retry" makes it go away, sometimes it doesn't. What is the source of this error, and how do I make it go away? The drive is a Seagate ST-277R, less than a year old. The Controller is a Western Digital RLL hard/floppy unit... Thanks for any ideas! -- Dave Read | readdm@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu | ...in large, friendly UT-Austin Nuclear Physics | read@physics.utexas.edu | letters, were the words Graduate Student (Slave) | read@lampf.lanl.gov | DON'T PANIC ! "What for you bury me in the cold, cold ground ?" - The Tasmanian Devil
rkl@cbnewsh.att.com (kevin.laux) (03/18/91)
In article <45723@ut-emx.uucp>, readdm@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (David M. Read) writes: > I suddenly picked up a weird gremlin today: I keep getting these > "Sector not found" errors...sometimes a "retry" makes it go away, > sometimes it doesn't. > > What is the source of this error, and how do I make it go away? > The drive is a Seagate ST-277R, less than a year old. The Controller > is a Western Digital RLL hard/floppy unit... > First, back up the entire hard disk. You should do a low level format and then DOS's format. The problem is that the heads drift a bit over time and use. When you read/write files from the disk, they are located by read the sector id's. The sector id's never get re-written after the formatting is done. It is entirely possible to write a new file, then try to read it and get the Sector Not Found error message. Also, if you change the orientation of the drive (to/from horizontal/vertical), you should reformat the disk in its new orientation. To maintain your hard disk and refresh your sector id's, get a hard disk maintenance program such as Spinrite or Disk Technician and run it on a regular basis. -- ________________________________________________________________________________ R. Kevin Laux Email: rkl1@hound.att.com AT&T Bell Labs Voice: (908) 949-1160 Holmdel, NJ 07733 Fax: (908) 949-0959
mpd@anomaly.SBS.COM (Michael P. Deignan) (03/19/91)
readdm@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (David M. Read) writes: >What is the source of this error A bad disk. >, and how do I make it go away? Get a new hard disk (not a Seagate...) MD -- -- Michael P. Deignan / -- Domain: mpd@anomaly.sbs.com / "The Mother Of All Battles" -- UUCP: ...!uunet!rayssd!anomaly!mpd / apparently had an abortion... -- Telebit: +1 401 455 0347 /