Seagate Barracuda 160 GB IDE becomes corrupted. RMA?

On Fri, 17 Feb 2006 06:20:49 +1100, "Rod Speed"
wrote:

an_Musicant wrote
: Rod Speed wrote
: Dan_Musicant wrote
: Folkert Rienstra wrote
:
: That may be a result of lack of 48bit LBA
: support in the bios, just affecting formatting.
:
: Yeah, that must be it. Obviously it miraculously
: formatted itself before he had this crash, or
: maybe the bios downgraded itself afterwards.
:
: I probably formatted it with Partition Magic 7.0. The fact
: that I couldn't format my 40 GB FAT32 partition seems to
: be the result of Windows format not supporting more than
: 32 GB for FAT32. Unfortunately, the Windows didn't make
: that clear and it seems to me very very stupid of MS.
:
: That isnt seen with XP, it doesnt even offer you FAT32 as
: a possibility with partitions bigger than it will format FAT32.
:
: It wouldn't bother me if they'd just gone to the trouble of giving
: me a comprehensible error message such as "FAT32 partitions
: larger than 32 GB are not supported by this format utility."
:
:Sure, MS generally doesnt do it that way with that level of ute.
:
:They basically do it the way XP does it and document it elsewhere.

Doesn't seem fair to the user. I was left guessing what the reason was -
in my case, that I had a hardware problem, whereas they knew it was
because they just didn't support it in the utility.
:
: Anyway, I had no trouble making the drive OK now with Partition
: Magic. A Seagate support guy warned me yesterday to steer
: away from Partition Magic, but it looks like it's either that
: or be satisfied with 32 GB FAT32 partitions, so I did it anyway.
:
: There aint just those two alternatives.
:
: Such as? FAT?
:
:I meant other than those two ways of formatting
:a FAT32 partition that is bigger than 32G

OK, I see.
:
: It's the first such warning I've gotten, and
: I suspect his motives in offering that info.
:
: You shouldnt, it can **** some configs rather comprehensively.
:
: Didn't have trouble before
:
:Plenty of others have.
:
: and have little reason to believe it has been responsible for problems.
:
:We dont know what the problem actually is yet, so
:you dont know if its actually been caused by PM yet.

Right.
:
: I could live with just a 32 GB FAT32 partition, after all it's not all
: that much smaller than 40 GB, which I have set up now, though.
:
:I think its more likely that its a red herring since you say you do
:have TV capture files and those are too bit for FAT32 on the whole.

The TV capture stuff I do is on the NTFS partition, not the FAT32.
:
:And I wouldnt just close my eyes to the problem you
riginally had either, thats guaranteed to bite in the future.

I figure it's apt to, yeah. Thanks.
:
: Thanks all for the help.
:

Dan_Musicant wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Dan_Musicant wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Dan_Musicant wrote
Folkert Rienstra wrote

That may be a result of lack of 48bit LBA
support in the bios, just affecting formatting.

Yeah, that must be it. Obviously it miraculously
formatted itself before he had this crash, or
maybe the bios downgraded itself afterwards.

I probably formatted it with Partition Magic 7.0. The fact
that I couldn't format my 40 GB FAT32 partition seems to
be the result of Windows format not supporting more than
32 GB for FAT32. Unfortunately, the Windows didn't make
that clear and it seems to me very very stupid of MS.

That isnt seen with XP, it doesnt even offer you FAT32 as
a possibility with partitions bigger than it will format FAT32.

It wouldn't bother me if they'd just gone to the trouble of giving
me a comprehensible error message such as "FAT32 partitions
larger than 32 GB are not supported by this format utility."

Sure, MS generally doesnt do it that way with that level of ute.

They basically do it the way XP does it and document it elsewhere.

Doesn't seem fair to the user.

Its arguably the best approach, a question only arises if
you attempt to format a drive bigger than 32G FAT32 and
find you cant even select that option with a partition that big.

I was left guessing what the reason was - in my case,
that I had a hardware problem, whereas they knew it
was because they just didn't support it in the utility.

Yes, that's clearly why XP now does it differently.

Anyway, I had no trouble making the drive OK now with Partition
Magic. A Seagate support guy warned me yesterday to steer
away from Partition Magic, but it looks like it's either that
or be satisfied with 32 GB FAT32 partitions, so I did it anyway.

There aint just those two alternatives.

Such as? FAT?

I meant other than those two ways of formatting
a FAT32 partition that is bigger than 32G

OK, I see.

I'd personally use True Image.

It's the first such warning I've gotten, and
I suspect his motives in offering that info.

You shouldnt, it can **** some configs rather comprehensively.

Didn't have trouble before

Plenty of others have.

and have little reason to believe it has been responsible for problems.

We dont know what the problem actually is yet, so
you dont know if its actually been caused by PM yet.

Right.

I could live with just a 32 GB FAT32 partition, after all it's not
all that much smaller than 40 GB, which I have set up now, though.

I think its more likely that its a red herring since you say you do
have TV capture files and those are too big for FAT32 on the whole.

The TV capture stuff I do is on the NTFS partition, not the FAT32.

Sure, it wasnt clear when I wrote that that you only have one
partition formatted FAT32 and thats for the Win98 you use occasionally.

And I wouldnt just close my eyes to the problem you
originally had either, thats guaranteed to bite in the future.

I figure it's apt to, yeah. Thanks.

Specially now that it looks likely that you dont have 48 bit LBA support
ENABLED in 2K and that that is what caused the original problem.

Thanks all for the help.

On Sat, 18 Feb 2006 12:13:30 +1100, "Rod Speed"
wrote:

an_Musicant wrote
: Rod Speed wrote
: Dan_Musicant wrote
: Rod Speed wrote
: Dan_Musicant wrote
: Folkert Rienstra wrote
:
: That may be a result of lack of 48bit LBA
: support in the bios, just affecting formatting.
:
: Yeah, that must be it. Obviously it miraculously
: formatted itself before he had this crash, or
: maybe the bios downgraded itself afterwards.
:
: I probably formatted it with Partition Magic 7.0. The fact
: that I couldn't format my 40 GB FAT32 partition seems to
: be the result of Windows format not supporting more than
: 32 GB for FAT32. Unfortunately, the Windows didn't make
: that clear and it seems to me very very stupid of MS.
:
: That isnt seen with XP, it doesnt even offer you FAT32 as
: a possibility with partitions bigger than it will format FAT32.
:
: It wouldn't bother me if they'd just gone to the trouble of giving
: me a comprehensible error message such as "FAT32 partitions
: larger than 32 GB are not supported by this format utility."
:
: Sure, MS generally doesnt do it that way with that level of ute.
:
: They basically do it the way XP does it and document it elsewhere.
:
: Doesn't seem fair to the user.
:
:Its arguably the best approach, a question only arises if
:you attempt to format a drive bigger than 32G FAT32 and
:find you cant even select that option with a partition that big.

No, I clicked on the partition and Windows said it wasn't formatted and
offered to format it with any file system supported, among them being
FAT32, which was my choice. It went on to do a slow format. Many minutes
later it shoots up a little box saying "The disk in drive H cannot be
formatted." This would suggest there was something wrong with the drive,
not that the utility wasn't up to formatting a partition larger than 32
GB.
:
: I was left guessing what the reason was - in my case,
: that I had a hardware problem, whereas they knew it
: was because they just didn't support it in the utility.
:
:Yes, that's clearly why XP now does it differently.
:
: Anyway, I had no trouble making the drive OK now with Partition
: Magic. A Seagate support guy warned me yesterday to steer
: away from Partition Magic, but it looks like it's either that
: or be satisfied with 32 GB FAT32 partitions, so I did it anyway.
:
: There aint just those two alternatives.
:
: Such as? FAT?
:
: I meant other than those two ways of formatting
: a FAT32 partition that is bigger than 32G
:
: OK, I see.
:
:I'd personally use True Image.
:
: It's the first such warning I've gotten, and
: I suspect his motives in offering that info.
:
: You shouldnt, it can **** some configs rather comprehensively.
:
: Didn't have trouble before
:
: Plenty of others have.
:
: and have little reason to believe it has been responsible for problems.
:
: We dont know what the problem actually is yet, so
: you dont know if its actually been caused by PM yet.
:
: Right.
:
: I could live with just a 32 GB FAT32 partition, after all it's not
: all that much smaller than 40 GB, which I have set up now, though.
:
: I think its more likely that its a red herring since you say you do
: have TV capture files and those are too big for FAT32 on the whole.
:
: The TV capture stuff I do is on the NTFS partition, not the FAT32.
:
:Sure, it wasnt clear when I wrote that that you only have one
artition formatted FAT32 and thats for the Win98 you use occasionally.
:
: And I wouldnt just close my eyes to the problem you
: originally had either, thats guaranteed to bite in the future.
:
: I figure it's apt to, yeah. Thanks.
:
:Specially now that it looks likely that you dont have 48 bit LBA support
:ENABLED in 2K and that that is what caused the original problem.

Is there any way I can enable it in W2k?
:
: Thanks all for the help.
:

On Fri, 17 Feb 2006 14:41:56 -0500, "Peter"
wrote:

: But it's Win2000 SP4. Wouldn't the drivers support 48-bit LBA?
:
:They do, after a bit of EXTRA work:
:http://support.microsoft.com/?id=305098
:

It says:
- - - -

SYMPTOMS
Windows 2000 Service Pack 2 (SP2) and earlier versions of Windows 2000
do not support 48-bit Logical Block Addressing (LBA) as defined in the
ATA/ATAPI 6.0 specification.

RESOLUTION
To resolve this problem, obtain the latest service pack for Windows
2000.
- - - -

Well, I have SP4, so 48-bit LBA should be in effect, right?

On Sat, 18 Feb 2006 09:43:01 +1100, "Rod Speed"
wrote:

:
an_Musicant wrote
:
: Windows Storage
:
: [ ST3120026A ]
:
: Device Properties:
: Driver Description ST3120026A
: Driver Date 11/14/1999
: Driver Version 5.0.2183.1
: Driver Provider Microsoft
: INF File disk.inf
:
: Disk Device Physical Info:
: Manufacturer Seagate
: Hard Disk Name Barracuda 7200.7 Plus 120026
: Form Factor 3.5"
: Formatted Capacity 120 GB
: Disks 2
: Recording Surfaces 3
: Physical Dimensions 146.56 x 101.85 x 26.1 mm
: Max. Weight 635 g
: Average Rotational Latency 4.16 ms
: Rotational Speed 7200 RPM
: Max. Internal Data Rate 683 Mbit/s
: Average Seek 8.5 ms
: Interface Ultra-ATA/100
: Buffer-to-Host Data Rate 100 MB/s
: Buffer Size 8 MB
: Spin-Up Time 10 sec
:
: Device Manufacturer:
: Company Name Seagate Technology LLC
: Product Information http://www.seagate.com/products
:
: [ ST3160023A ]
:
: Device Properties:
: Driver Description ST3160023A
: Driver Date 11/14/1999
: Driver Version 5.0.2183.1
: Driver Provider Microsoft
: INF File disk.inf
:
: Disk Device Physical Info:
: Manufacturer Seagate
: Hard Disk Name Barracuda 7200.7 Plus 160023
: Form Factor 3.5"
: Formatted Capacity 160 GB
: Disks 2
: Recording Surfaces 4
: Physical Dimensions 146.56 x 101.85 x 26.1 mm
: Max. Weight 635 g
: Average Rotational Latency 4.16 ms
: Rotational Speed 7200 RPM
: Max. Internal Data Rate 683 Mbit/s
: Average Seek 8.5 ms
: Interface Ultra-ATA/100
: Buffer-to-Host Data Rate 100 MB/s
: Buffer Size 8 MB
: Spin-Up Time 10 sec
:
: Device Manufacturer:
: Company Name Seagate Technology LLC
: Product Information http://www.seagate.com/products
:
: [ ST3200822A ]
:
: Device Properties:
: Driver Description ST3200822A
: Driver Date 11/14/1999
: Driver Version 5.0.2183.1
: Driver Provider Microsoft
: INF File disk.inf
:
: Disk Device Physical Info:
: Manufacturer Seagate
: Hard Disk Name Barracuda 7200.7 Plus 200822
: Form Factor 3.5"
: Formatted Capacity 200 GB
: Disks 2
: Recording Surfaces 4
: Physical Dimensions 146.56 x 101.85 x 26.1 mm
: Max. Weight 635 g
: Average Rotational Latency 4.16 ms
: Rotational Speed 7200 RPM
: Max. Internal Data Rate 683 Mbit/s
: Average Seek 8.5 ms
: Interface Ultra-ATA/100
: Buffer-to-Host Data Rate 100 MB/s
: Buffer Size 8 MB
: Spin-Up Time 10 sec
:
: Device Manufacturer:
: Company Name Seagate Technology LLC
: Product Information http://www.seagate.com/products
:
: Logical Drives
:
: Drive Drive Type File System Total Size Used Space Free Space %
: Free
: Volume Serial
: A: Removable Disk
: C: (BOOTWIN98SE) Local Disk FAT32 2998 MB 1439 MB 1558 MB 52
: %
: C031-ABA7
: D: (Boot1Win2000) Local Disk NTFS 6000 MB 4593 MB 1407 MB 23
: %
: 409B-839C
: E: (Boot2Win2000) Local Disk NTFS 6000 MB 2761 MB 3239 MB 54
: %
: 7CBD-7CDC
: F: (BootDataNTFS) Local Disk NTFS 99464 MB 58990 MB 40474 MB
: 41 %
: F459-C03C
: G: (---200_NTFS) Local Disk NTFS 190771 MB 164077 MB 26694
: MB 14 %
: FC20-6685
: H: Local Disk
: I: (160_NTFS) Local Disk NTFS 109999 MB 69460 KB 109931 MB
: 100 %
: 3CC9-08ED
: J: Optical Drive
:
: Physical Drives
:
: [ Drive #1 - ST3120026A (111 GB) ]
:
: Partition Partition Type Drive Start Offset Partition Length
: #1 (Active) FAT32 C: (BOOTWIN98SE) 0 MB 3004 MB
: #2 NTFS D: (Boot1Win2000) 3004 MB 6000 MB
: #3 NTFS E: (Boot2Win2000) 9005 MB 6000 MB
: #4 NTFS F: (BootDataNTFS) 15006 MB 99464 MB
:
: [ Drive #2 - ST3160023A (127 GB) ]
:
: Partition Partition Type Drive Start Offset Partition Length
: #1 NTFS I: (160_NTFS) 7 MB 109999 MB
: #2 FAT32/NTFS H: 110007 MB 42617 MB
:
: [ Drive #3 - ST3200822A (127 GB) ]
:
: Partition Partition Type Drive Start Offset Partition Length
: #1 NTFS G: (---200_NTFS) 7 MB 190771 MB
:
:Those 127 GB drive sizes are a worry, looks like
:you havent actually got 48 bit LBA enabled in 2K.
:
:That would explain the initial loss of a drive, you wrapped
:around once you wrote past the 127G limit and stomped
n the partition table at the front of the physical drive.
:
:You appear to run the drives pretty empty, which would
:explain why you have only just seen the problem now.
:

Hmm. What's causing that 127 GB drive size? How can I enable 48 bit LBA
support in Win2000? I have SP4 installed, and I thought it is supposed
to be in effect, automatically. ???

On Fri, 17 Feb 2006 21:07:53 +0000, Mike Tomlinson
wrote:

:In article , Dan_Musicant
writes
:
:I have another HD in the box that's 200 GB and it has one logical drive
:only, and is formatted NTFS. That's obviously not the problem. Also, the
:drive was working fine for 1.5 years and I made no changes.
:
:Read what Eric wrote. The drive doesn't get trashed _until_ data has
:been written past the 137GB boundary, so the drive can appear to be
:working well for quite some time, until you fill the disk up enough.
:
: The logical
:drives simply disappeared from it, evidently data corruption.
:
:Which is exactly what writing past 137GB does. The write "wraps around"
:to cylinder 0. What's on cylinder 0? The boot sector and partition
:tables - bye bye logical drives.
:
:See http://www.48bitlba.com/

Thanks. I'm checking out the site.

One thing I didn't mention and it could well have a bearing he

2-3 days before the corruption occurred I removed my Promise Ultra100
TX2 PCI IDE Controller card from the system in order to free up a PCI
slot. I had been running over 4 IDE devices, so I removed all but 4,
including the 3 IDE HD's and my DVD burner. The problem drive may well
have been on the card and not the MB IDE channels. It's currently
primary slave.
:
:Roddles is talking absolute crap as usual.

Dan_Musicant wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Dan_Musicant wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Dan_Musicant wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Dan_Musicant wrote
Folkert Rienstra wrote

That may be a result of lack of 48bit LBA
support in the bios, just affecting formatting.

Yeah, that must be it. Obviously it miraculously
formatted itself before he had this crash, or
maybe the bios downgraded itself afterwards.

I probably formatted it with Partition Magic 7.0. The fact
that I couldn't format my 40 GB FAT32 partition seems to
be the result of Windows format not supporting more than
32 GB for FAT32. Unfortunately, the Windows didn't make
that clear and it seems to me very very stupid of MS.

That isnt seen with XP, it doesnt even offer you FAT32 as
a possibility with partitions bigger than it will format FAT32.

It wouldn't bother me if they'd just gone to the trouble of giving
me a comprehensible error message such as "FAT32 partitions
larger than 32 GB are not supported by this format utility."

Sure, MS generally doesnt do it that way with that level of ute.

They basically do it the way XP does it and document it elsewhere.

Doesn't seem fair to the user.

Its arguably the best approach, a question only arises if
you attempt to format a drive bigger than 32G FAT32 and
find you cant even select that option with a partition that big.

No,

Fraid so.

I clicked on the partition and Windows said it wasn't formatted
and offered to format it with any file system supported, among
them being FAT32, which was my choice.

I was talking about how XP does it, not 2K. Clearly they have
seen the light and improved on the poor way 2K does it.

It went on to do a slow format. Many minutes later it shoots
up a little box saying "The disk in drive H cannot be formatted."
This would suggest there was something wrong with the drive, not
that the utility wasn't up to formatting a partition larger than 32 GB.

See above.

I was left guessing what the reason was - in my case,
that I had a hardware problem, whereas they knew it
was because they just didn't support it in the utility.

Yes, that's clearly why XP now does it differently.

Anyway, I had no trouble making the drive OK now with Partition
Magic. A Seagate support guy warned me yesterday to steer
away from Partition Magic, but it looks like it's either that
or be satisfied with 32 GB FAT32 partitions, so I did it anyway.

There aint just those two alternatives.

Such as? FAT?

I meant other than those two ways of formatting
a FAT32 partition that is bigger than 32G

OK, I see.

I'd personally use True Image.

It's the first such warning I've gotten, and
I suspect his motives in offering that info.

You shouldnt, it can **** some configs rather comprehensively.

Didn't have trouble before

Plenty of others have.

and have little reason to believe it has been responsible for
problems.

We dont know what the problem actually is yet, so
you dont know if its actually been caused by PM yet.

Right.

I could live with just a 32 GB FAT32 partition, after all it's not
all that much smaller than 40 GB, which I have set up now, though.

I think its more likely that its a red herring since you say you do
have TV capture files and those are too big for FAT32 on the whole.

The TV capture stuff I do is on the NTFS partition, not the FAT32.

Sure, it wasnt clear when I wrote that that you only have one
partition formatted FAT32 and thats for the Win98 you use
occasionally.

And I wouldnt just close my eyes to the problem you
originally had either, thats guaranteed to bite in the future.

I figure it's apt to, yeah. Thanks.

Specially now that it looks likely that you dont have 48 bit LBA support
ENABLED in 2K and that that is what caused the original problem.

Is there any way I can enable it in W2k?

Yep. http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;305098

Thanks all for the help.

Dan_Musicant wrote:
On Fri, 17 Feb 2006 14:41:56 -0500, "Peter"
wrote:

But it's Win2000 SP4. Wouldn't the drivers support 48-bit LBA?

They do, after a bit of EXTRA work:
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=305098


It says:
- - - -

SYMPTOMS
Windows 2000 Service Pack 2 (SP2) and earlier versions of Windows 2000
do not support 48-bit Logical Block Addressing (LBA) as defined in the
ATA/ATAPI 6.0 specification.

RESOLUTION
To resolve this problem, obtain the latest service pack for Windows 2000.
- - - -

It says quite a bit more than just that.

Well, I have SP4, so 48-bit LBA should be in effect, right?

Nope, not until you do the rest of what it says needs to be done.

"Dan_Musicant" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 17 Feb 2006 14:41:56 -0500, "Peter"
wrote:

: But it's Win2000 SP4. Wouldn't the drivers support 48-bit LBA?
:
:They do, after a bit of EXTRA work:
:http://support.microsoft.com/?id=305098
:

It says:
- - - -

SYMPTOMS
Windows 2000 Service Pack 2 (SP2) and earlier versions of Windows 2000
do not support 48-bit Logical Block Addressing (LBA) as defined in the
ATA/ATAPI 6.0 specification.

RESOLUTION
To resolve this problem, obtain the latest service pack for Windows
2000.
- - - -

Well, I have SP4, so 48-bit LBA should be in effect, right?

Probably wrong.

Document, that I referred to, still says:
*********
STATUS
Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products
that are listed at the beginning of this article. This problem was first
corrected in Windows 2000 Service Pack 3.Important Although support for
48-bit LBA is included in Windows 2000 Service Pack 3 (SP3) and later, it is
still necessary to create the registry change that is described in the
"Resolution" section of this article.
*********

So you still need to set appropriate registry values.

Dan_Musicant wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Dan_Musicant wrote

Windows Storage

[ ST3120026A ]

Device Properties:
Driver Description ST3120026A
Driver Date 11/14/1999
Driver Version 5.0.2183.1
Driver Provider Microsoft
INF File disk.inf

Disk Device Physical Info:
Manufacturer Seagate
Hard Disk Name Barracuda 7200.7 Plus 120026
Form Factor 3.5"
Formatted Capacity 120 GB
Disks 2
Recording Surfaces 3
Physical Dimensions 146.56 x 101.85 x 26.1 mm
Max. Weight 635 g
Average Rotational Latency 4.16 ms
Rotational Speed 7200 RPM
Max. Internal Data Rate 683 Mbit/s
Average Seek 8.5 ms
Interface Ultra-ATA/100
Buffer-to-Host Data Rate 100 MB/s
Buffer Size 8 MB
Spin-Up Time 10 sec

Device Manufacturer:
Company Name Seagate Technology LLC
Product Information http://www.seagate.com/products

[ ST3160023A ]

Device Properties:
Driver Description ST3160023A
Driver Date 11/14/1999
Driver Version 5.0.2183.1
Driver Provider Microsoft
INF File disk.inf

Disk Device Physical Info:
Manufacturer Seagate
Hard Disk Name Barracuda 7200.7 Plus 160023
Form Factor 3.5"
Formatted Capacity 160 GB
Disks 2
Recording Surfaces 4
Physical Dimensions 146.56 x 101.85 x 26.1 mm
Max. Weight 635 g
Average Rotational Latency 4.16 ms
Rotational Speed 7200 RPM
Max. Internal Data Rate 683 Mbit/s
Average Seek 8.5 ms
Interface Ultra-ATA/100
Buffer-to-Host Data Rate 100 MB/s
Buffer Size 8 MB
Spin-Up Time 10 sec

Device Manufacturer:
Company Name Seagate Technology LLC
Product Information http://www.seagate.com/products

[ ST3200822A ]

Device Properties:
Driver Description ST3200822A
Driver Date 11/14/1999
Driver Version 5.0.2183.1
Driver Provider Microsoft
INF File disk.inf

Disk Device Physical Info:
Manufacturer Seagate
Hard Disk Name Barracuda 7200.7 Plus 200822
Form Factor 3.5"
Formatted Capacity 200 GB
Disks 2
Recording Surfaces 4
Physical Dimensions 146.56 x 101.85 x 26.1 mm
Max. Weight 635 g
Average Rotational Latency 4.16 ms
Rotational Speed 7200 RPM
Max. Internal Data Rate 683 Mbit/s
Average Seek 8.5 ms
Interface Ultra-ATA/100
Buffer-to-Host Data Rate 100 MB/s
Buffer Size 8 MB
Spin-Up Time 10 sec

Device Manufacturer:
Company Name Seagate Technology LLC
Product Information http://www.seagate.com/products

Logical Drives

Drive Drive Type File System Total Size Used Space Free
Space % Free
Volume Serial
A: Removable Disk
C: (BOOTWIN98SE) Local Disk FAT32 2998 MB 1439 MB 1558 MB
52 %
C031-ABA7
D: (Boot1Win2000) Local Disk NTFS 6000 MB 4593 MB 1407 MB
23 %
409B-839C
E: (Boot2Win2000) Local Disk NTFS 6000 MB 2761 MB 3239 MB
54 %
7CBD-7CDC
F: (BootDataNTFS) Local Disk NTFS 99464 MB 58990 MB 40474
MB 41 %
F459-C03C
G: (---200_NTFS) Local Disk NTFS 190771 MB 164077 MB
26694
MB 14 %
FC20-6685
H: Local Disk
I: (160_NTFS) Local Disk NTFS 109999 MB 69460 KB 109931 MB
100 %
3CC9-08ED
J: Optical Drive

Physical Drives

[ Drive #1 - ST3120026A (111 GB) ]

Partition Partition Type Drive Start Offset Partition
Length #1 (Active) FAT32 C: (BOOTWIN98SE) 0 MB 3004 MB
#2 NTFS D: (Boot1Win2000) 3004 MB 6000 MB
#3 NTFS E: (Boot2Win2000) 9005 MB 6000 MB
#4 NTFS F: (BootDataNTFS) 15006 MB 99464 MB

[ Drive #2 - ST3160023A (127 GB) ]

Partition Partition Type Drive Start Offset Partition
Length #1 NTFS I: (160_NTFS) 7 MB 109999 MB
#2 FAT32/NTFS H: 110007 MB 42617 MB

[ Drive #3 - ST3200822A (127 GB) ]

Partition Partition Type Drive Start Offset Partition
Length #1 NTFS G: (---200_NTFS) 7 MB 190771 MB

Those 127 GB drive sizes are a worry, looks like
you havent actually got 48 bit LBA enabled in 2K.

That would explain the initial loss of a drive, you wrapped
around once you wrote past the 127G limit and stomped
on the partition table at the front of the physical drive.

You appear to run the drives pretty empty, which would
explain why you have only just seen the problem now.

Hmm. What's causing that 127 GB drive size?

You havent ENABLED 48 bit LBS support in the registry.

How can I enable 48 bit LBA support in Win2000?

http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;305098

You must enable the support in the Windows registry by adding or
changing the EnableBigLba registry value to 1 in the following registry
subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\atapi\Parameters
To enable 48-bit LBA large-disk support in the registry: 1. Start Registry
Editor (Regedt32.exe).
2. Locate and then click the following key in the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\Atapi\Parameters
3. On the Edit menu, click Add Value, and then add the following
registry value:
Value name: EnableBigLba
Data type: REG_DWORD
Value data: 0x1
4. Quit Registry Editor.


I have SP4 installed, and I thought it is
supposed to be in effect, automatically. ???

Nope, that KB article clearly says that you need to
have the EnableBigLBA registry value set to 1 as well.