Harddisk clicks -> System freezes/reboots

[Rick Sewill]

On Sun, 2007-01-21 at 14:30 +0100, Ambrogio wrote:
> Il giorno dom, 21/01/2007 alle 14.28 +0100, Sander Hoentjen ha scritto:
> > As others pointed out this is most probably the "click of death". If you
> > don't trust our judgment you can always go to the manufacturers site and
> > download a HDD test tool for that harddrive. This will most probably
> > tell you to let it be friends with Mr Bin, be it after having met Mr
> > Cold Chisel and Mr Lump Hammer or not.
> And what about smart tools?
> 

This happened, more than once, to me.

Each time, it meant the hard drive was bad.

The laptop was under warranty.  

The laptop manufacturer sent a replacement, each time.

Each hard drive seemed to fail every twelve to eighteen months.

I have no explanation why the hard drive kept failing.

The smart tools did report errors, each time.  The laptop manufacturer
trusted his diagnostic tool.  I did not tell the laptop manufacturer
what the smart tools reported.  I assume the laptop manufacturer would
not have trusted Linux.  I do not run Windows and do not know what any
diagnostic tool, under Windows, would have reported.

I was not pleased.  

I do not believe my problem is unique to this particular laptop
manufacturer.  A friend had similar problems with a laptop from a
different manufacturer.  

I do not believe my problem was related to Linux.  The friend who had
similar problems only used Windows.

Before jumping to conclusions, please see if the manufacturer of your
computer included a diagnostic CD.  Hopefully, there is a hard drive
test on the diagnostic CD.  

If the hard drive test on the diagnostic CD reports problems, and the PC
is still under warranty, the PC manufacturer might be obligated to give
you a hard drive replacement.

The PC manufacturer, in my case, always asked that I return ship the
defective hard drive.  I do not know what to suggest for the question of
how to insure critical data not remain on a defective hard drive before
shipping the hard drive back to the manufacturer.

Hopefully, you will have better luck than I, and will not have each hard
drive replacement fail, as the original did, after twelve to eighteen
months of use.

> Bye
>  Ambrogio
> 
-- 
Rick Sewill            tel:+1-218-287-1075 mailto:rsewill at cableone.net
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