yip@wsl.dec.com (Michael Yip (Lt Cmdr - Chief Test Pilot)) (02/08/91)
A friend of mine called me up a couple of days ago with some problems on her XT compatible. She is an accountant and knows very little about computer. She was running some kind of database and the machine hung. The intersting thing was that she couldn't reboot again from her hard drive immediately, but if she left it overnight or for a period of time, she had no problem with it, and could reboot again from the hard drive. This happened, according to her, a few times already. She had no problem if she was to reboot it from drive A and the hard disk was then accessible. I have not had time to go visit her and looked at the machine yet but does this all make sense that if you leave the machine off for a while, it would reboot? Does it sound like the fan is not working properly cooling off the boards inside the box? I suppose an un-related problem is why the database crashed (no idea which one she was using at the time, as I said, I have not had time to find out from her yet) but this sounds like a DIFFERENT problem and has to be looked at. Can someoen enlighten me especially on the first part of the problem why the machine wouldn't boot up immediately after the crash and would work later? Thanks. ====================================================================== Michael E. Yip Digital Equipment Corporation Internet: yip@wsl.enet.dec.com Western Software Laboratory UUCP: ...decwrl!wsl.enet.dec.com!yip ======================================================================
smsmith@hpuxa.ircc.ohio-state.edu (Stephen M. Smith) (02/08/91)
yip@wsl.dec.com (Michael Yip (Lt Cmdr - Chief Test Pilot)) writes: >A friend of mine called me up a couple of days ago with some >problems on her XT compatible... >She was running some kind of database and the machine hung. >The intersting thing was that she couldn't reboot again from >her hard drive immediately, but if she left it overnight or >for a period of time, she had no problem with it, and could >reboot again from the hard drive. This happened, according >to her, a few times already. She had no problem if she was >to reboot it from drive A and the hard disk was then accessible. > >I have not had time to go visit her and looked at the machine >yet but does this all make sense that if you leave the machine >off for a while, it would reboot? Does it sound like the fan is >not working properly cooling off the boards inside the box? >====================================================================== >Michael E. Yip >Digital Equipment Corporation Internet: yip@wsl.enet.dec.com >Western Software Laboratory UUCP: ...decwrl!wsl.enet.dec.com!yip >====================================================================== I doubt very much that the boards are overheating, although it wouldn't hurt to reseat them in case the heat expands a slot and causes a bad connection between a card and the motherboard. My suspicion is that it has been a LONG time since she did any disk optimizing, and over time the heads in the disk have drifted so that when the disk has run for a while the slight expansion in the disk causes the heads to misalign with the sectors. Have her back up the files onto floppies with copy or xcopy, then low level format the disk and reinstall the operating system, then put the files back on. By using the "copy" or "xcopy" command, the files will then be written back on the disk in contiguous sectors and therefore her hard drive will be automatically optimized. S. "Stevie" Smith \ + / <smsmith@hpuxa. \+++++/ " #*&<-[89s]*(k#$@-_=//a2$]'+=.(2_&*%>,,@ ircc.ohio-state. \ + / {7%*@,..":27g)-=,#*:.#,/6&1*.4-,l@#9:-) " edu> \ + / BTW, WYSInaWYG \ + / --witty.saying.ARC
zlraa@marlin.jcu.edu.au (Ross Alford) (02/09/91)
In article <1991Feb8.043253.22719@magnus.ircc.ohio-state.edu> smsmith@hpuxa.ircc.ohio-state.edu (Stephen M. Smith) writes: >yip@wsl.dec.com (Michael Yip (Lt Cmdr - Chief Test Pilot)) writes: >>A friend of mine called me up a couple of days ago with some >>problems on her XT compatible... ... (basically, her hard disk periodically refuses to boot)... >... My suspicion is >that it has been a LONG time since she did any disk optimizing, and >over time the heads in the disk have drifted so that when the disk >has run for a while the slight expansion in the disk causes the heads >to misalign with the sectors. > >Have her back up the files onto floppies with copy or xcopy, then >low level format the disk and reinstall the operating system, then >put the files back on. By using the "copy" or "xcopy" command, the >files will then be written back on the disk in contiguous sectors >and therefore her hard drive will be automatically optimized. > A couple of comments: First, I've had this problem myself. After about 2 years, the heads on a some hard drives seem to slowly lose their mechanical alignment, so the disk has trouble finding sectors, particularly when booting. Backing up (twice is a good idea if you've got the patience) and doing a low-level reformat, so the tracks and various marks are in the positions the heads expect to find them in their current mechanical alignment, does seem to cure this sort of problem. Second, for goodness' sake don't bother using copy or xcopy to do your backup. I don't know of *any* DOS backup utility, either the MSDOS standard or any of the various independently supplied ones (e.g. Mace, Fastback, PC-Tools, ...) that actually does an image backup when backing up to a floppy. They *all* read and write a file at a time. It doesn't look that way on the backup disks because they stick the information from each file to the tail end of the information of the preceding file, and use their own internal indexing to keep track of where one ends and the next begins. Doing a backup and restore with any of these programs will lead to all files being contiguous on the hard disk, and will be a lot less trouble than using copy or xcopy. Ross Alford zlraa@marlin.jcu.edu.au -- //DUXYZY01 JOB DU.D00.AA1234,ALFORD // EXEC PGM=IEBCOPY //OUT DD DSN=DU.E26.AC4672.Z11.ALFORD.OLDLIB, // DISP=(NEW,CATLG),SPACE=(TRK,(10,,10),RLSE),UNIT=DISK,VOL=SER=DUK333 ... ACK!
akcs.bill@point.UUCP (Bill Wolff) (02/12/91)
Why not use COPY and XCOPY for backups? The problem seems to me to be a power supply problem. Although a problem from a hard drive is also likely I suppose. But I never had a drive problem in the last 10 years. <BW>
glmwc@marlin.jcu.edu.au (Matt Crowd) (02/13/91)
In article <27b7287b-245f.2comp.ibmpc-1@point.UUCP> akcs.bill@point.UUCP (Bill Wolff) writes: >Why not use COPY and XCOPY for backups? What happens when you want to back up files that are larger than the drive you are backing up to...... matt crowd.