really slow hard disk!!

talkshowhost · Mar 10, 2005, 09:43 AM

hi my hard disk has just started to run really slow. to transfer 8GB of data to a different drive it's telling me it will take 70 mins! this is really slow as i can transfer data from other drives so much faster. the drive does not need defragged. my hard disks are as follows a 300GB SATA drive a 120GB maxtor IDE as primary master and 200GB maxtor IDE primary slave. it was running fine a few days ago but have since formatted my computer and now its really slow and causing my whole computer to crawl and i can barely open other programs whilst it doing stuff. is this a sign of a slow death? please help i'd much appreciate it.

mkk · Mar 10, 2005, 09:46 AM

Try running HD Tach 3 and see what figures you get. Post the results and preferably a screenshot of the result page too.
http://www.simplisoftware.com/Public...request=HdTach

talkshowhost · Mar 10, 2005, 11:18 AM

ok i just did the quick bench and again it slowed my computer down here is a screenshot of the result. cheers

http://img14.imgspot.com/u/05/68/10/Untitled1copy.jpg

bug77 · Mar 10, 2005, 11:33 AM

It doesn't seem to be dying, just capped on the max transfer. I would check the IDE drivers (strange on a fresh system) or even the IDE cable.
When you said 'format' you didn't mean 'low-level format' did you? And did you make any other changes to your rig?

mkk · Mar 10, 2005, 11:37 AM

Could be a driver problem as the interface (burst speed) is holding down the drive seriously. Try updating the driver for the interface that the tested drive uses. Or first you could try uninstalling the current driver for that IDE controller and reboot to let Windows redetect it, before trying the latest motherboard drivers. At least if you are using WinXP the standard drivers should do much better than this.

talkshowhost · Mar 10, 2005, 11:43 AM

that sounds like a plan with the drivers. coming to think of it i did install some nvidia IDE drivers i'll check this out and post back. it was a full system format. cheers

davidnsibs · Mar 10, 2005, 11:49 AM

hmm, ive always used nvidias ATA driver and never had a problem on my A7N8X, and I use a 80gb ata133 maxtor hdd, (ive got driver v2.6), however I have heard poeple having trouble with it so using microsofts driver does sound like a good start to find the problem

talkshowhost · Mar 10, 2005, 12:03 PM

ok just uninstalled all the nvidia drivers and then unintstalled both IDE devices in device manager and let them install of the motherboard cd which ive always used and had no problems. test results are the same as before. also tested my maxtor 120GB drive and those speeds are fine which is strange. they are both maxtor ATA 133 only difference is master and slave and i have never had a problem before.cheers

davidnsibs · Mar 10, 2005, 12:33 PM

both in my bios and in my control panel under device manager -> IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers -> Nvidia ATA controller -> Properties i can set the transfer mode e.g. Multi-word dma 1, ultra dma 6 - 133 etc. your hard disk drives should be on either ultra dma 5 or ultra dma 6 (ultra100 or ultra133). can you check that to make sure it is?

EDIT: Just checked my bios and actually i cant set it there, must have been thinking bout something else. but if you go to device manager you should be able to check it htere

talkshowhost · Mar 10, 2005, 12:47 PM

i can see the option in the device manager but it is greyed out and i cannot select anything. i ran another test with just the XP drivers installed and got this result. very odd. can anyone explain this http://img14.imgspot.com/u/05/68/11/new.jpg
and thanks again for all the help.

mkk · Mar 10, 2005, 01:36 PM

By the last graph I would guess that the driver is okay at least, but that there might be a drive or cabling failure going on. Try another cable if you can and run some more tests. If the drive is on the same cable as another unit then also try with this drive alone on a cable.

PangingJr · Mar 10, 2005, 02:13 PM

full system specs, HDD configurations/partition layouts on each drive, please.

talkshowhost · Mar 10, 2005, 03:30 PM

ok i seem to have found the problem. i think it was a power issue as my hard drive was sharing the same power connector as a fan. i have them all plugged directly into the PSU and the tests are all coming out with a good speed. i think i need a more powerful supply anyway and that was next on the list. thanks again for all the help i really appreciate it.

davidnsibs · Mar 10, 2005, 03:58 PM

cool, well done, always nice to have a happy ending!

talkshowhost · Mar 10, 2005, 04:27 PM

yes delighted its finally fixed hopefully the end of a run of problems. thanks again.