maximum read errors & logging thrashing the floppy

[jjbbrewer]

Hi

I started a partition table rebuild on a 320Gb disk a few hours back and it stopped at about 98% finished with a "maximum read errors" message.  After trying the default menu item ("ignore sector & continue" I think) it found another.  After doing that about 3 times, I selected the last option ("ignore all bad sectors and continue".. or somethink like that). 

The good news is that it's continuing, but the bad news is that it seems to be logging about every 1000 sectors and thrashing the floppy drive.  From what I calculate, it'll be doing this for about 20 hours & I'm concerned it'll kill the floppy.  Is there something I can do to keep this from happening?  (It's running right now).

Thanks,
  Jim

[Joep]

Hello,

That many read-errors is not a good sign at all (*), and corrupt partition tables may be the least of your worries at this point then.

(*) - If you have enabled the UDMA driver when you started DiskPatch, try WITHOUT the UDMA driver. If no read errors are reported during the scan then the disk is probably ok.

I suggest you address the most urgent problem first; the read errors.

First check the disk health: http://www.diydatarecovery.nl/dp_manual/guide_smartcheck.htm
If you want, we can analyse the disk health report for you. Depending on results, it may be wise to clone the disk prior to making repairs

To answer your oginal question: To prevent DiskPatch logging read errors you need to start DiskPatch with the /FIL command line argument ((DP /FIL). in the pop-up, select disable logging.

[jjbbrewer]

Hi Joep - thanks for the response!  I'll try without UDMA and see what happens. 

Another point - the floppy thrashing stopped when the log file got too big for the disk and DP stopped.   Back at the main menu, I tried to read the log with the reader and it died - maybe because the log was truncated?  If you want to look, the log file is http://users.frii.com/jjb/DP.LOG - does that help at all?

Thanks again ..

[Joep]

Hello,

Yes, the MBR does not appear to be correct. Hs fixboot been run by any chance (from recovery console)?

About the read errors / UDMA: These appear to be real read errors and not the bogus ones we see in relation with the UDMA driver. So, we need to establish the disk health. I suggest you first create a disk health report (in DiskPatch startup menu select Options > create disk health report ... In the root of the DiskPatch diskette there should be a file called REPORT.TXT now. NOTE: You may need to delete that earlier logfile to make some room.

If I'd had to advise without the disk helath report: There appears to be a serious problem with the hard disk and I advise to clone it ASAP.

Then, after we have cloned it we can try and see if we can repaair the partition tables.

[jjbbrewer]

Yes, the MBR does not appear to be correct. Hs fixboot been run by any chance (from recovery console)?

No.  The disk was originally on an XP system with the large partition patch to the registry.  I accidentally connected to a system that didn't have the patch & the OS asked if I wanted to make a new partition on it .. :-/  oops.  But I didn't have XP clean the disk. 

About the read errors / UDMA: These appear to be real read errors and not the bogus ones we see in relation with the UDMA driver. So, we need to establish the disk health. I suggest you first create a disk health report (in DiskPatch startup menu select Options > create disk health report ... In the root of the DiskPatch diskette there should be a file called REPORT.TXT now. NOTE: You may need to delete that earlier logfile to make some room.

Sounds good.  I'll do that.

If I'd had to advise without the disk helath report: There appears to be a serious problem with the hard disk and I advise to clone it ASAP.
Then, after we have cloned it we can try and see if we can repaair the partition tables.

Thanks for the advice.  I just ordered another disk so I can create a clone.  It'll take about 3 days to come, so I'll check the disk health, create a clone, and get back to you.   Thanks for the suggestions!