New PC Killed 2 Different External Hard Drives? HELP

lethalwings · 07-24-2008, 02:51 PM

Bought a new computer about 2 months ago and have lost 2 external drives now because of it (guessing).

Computer is HP Pavillion Media Center m8430f PC which is a Intel Core 2 Quad Processor Q6600 running Windows Vista Home Premium (64 Bit).

The first drive (Seagate Freeagent 500 Gig external) ran fine on my old system (Celeron D @ 2.93 Ghz) on Windows XP Professional (formatted using NTFS). It actually worked on the new system for a couple of days as well but started failing when moving files to the internal drive. The error messages said something to the effect that source file no longer existed. This happened intermittently for about an hour at which time, the drive failed and became completely unrecognizeable on any system.

I researched the drive and passed it off as being a manufacturing defect (pissed I'd lost the data mind you) as the user reviews were less than stellar.

I just tried connecting another external drive (Kaser Storage Vault) which had been functioning as PVR storage on a satellite STB as recently as last night. The drive is formatted as Fat 32 if I'm not mistaken. I connected the drive to the Quad Core and it isn't detected. From there I swapped it out to another PC and same thing.

I have tried different USB ports to no avail. I'm not sure what the deal is but the lowest common denominator points to the Quad core so I guess what I'm wondering is if it's the PC or if I have other issues?

Additional note, I do have another 500 Gig external backup drive that's been connected to the PC since day one and have not had an issue with it.

Any help on what it may be or how to fix it would be appreciated.

Cheers
Lethal

~~wiseleo~~ · 07-24-2008, 04:06 PM

You just seem to be unlucky.

Multiple fault possibilities. To minimize them, get the drives out of the enclosures and connect them internally on other systems. If the drives function there, you no longer have a hard drive failure scenario and should look at motherboard, powersupply, and/or controller issues. It's cheaper to break warranty on an enclosure than it is to lose data. The drive inside the enclosure has its own warranty.

The data may still be recoverable if you follow my procedure.

07-24-2008, 02:51 PM	#1 (permalink)
lethalwings Registered User Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 1 OS: xp sp3	New PC Killed 2 Different External Hard Drives? HELP Bought a new computer about 2 months ago and have lost 2 external drives now because of it (guessing). Computer is HP Pavillion Media Center m8430f PC which is a Intel Core 2 Quad Processor Q6600 running Windows Vista Home Premium (64 Bit). The first drive (Seagate Freeagent 500 Gig external) ran fine on my old system (Celeron D @ 2.93 Ghz) on Windows XP Professional (formatted using NTFS). It actually worked on the new system for a couple of days as well but started failing when moving files to the internal drive. The error messages said something to the effect that source file no longer existed. This happened intermittently for about an hour at which time, the drive failed and became completely unrecognizeable on any system. I researched the drive and passed it off as being a manufacturing defect (pissed I'd lost the data mind you) as the user reviews were less than stellar. I just tried connecting another external drive (Kaser Storage Vault) which had been functioning as PVR storage on a satellite STB as recently as last night. The drive is formatted as Fat 32 if I'm not mistaken. I connected the drive to the Quad Core and it isn't detected. From there I swapped it out to another PC and same thing. I have tried different USB ports to no avail. I'm not sure what the deal is but the lowest common denominator points to the Quad core so I guess what I'm wondering is if it's the PC or if I have other issues? Additional note, I do have another 500 Gig external backup drive that's been connected to the PC since day one and have not had an issue with it. Any help on what it may be or how to fix it would be appreciated. Cheers Lethal

07-24-2008, 04:06 PM	#2 (permalink)
~~wiseleo~~ Troubled Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: San Francisco Bay Area Posts: 461 OS: Win 2003 SP2 My System	Re: New PC Killed 2 Different External Hard Drives? HELP You just seem to be unlucky. Multiple fault possibilities. To minimize them, get the drives out of the enclosures and connect them internally on other systems. If the drives function there, you no longer have a hard drive failure scenario and should look at motherboard, powersupply, and/or controller issues. It's cheaper to break warranty on an enclosure than it is to lose data. The drive inside the enclosure has its own warranty. The data may still be recoverable if you follow my procedure.