On Thu, 5 Jun 2003, Alex Walker wrote:
>
> So what I'm asking is - does anyone know of methods to get data off a dead HD?
There are companies which offer such services but from those I know who've looked they tend to be very expensive.
> I guess first you want to know what I mean by "dead" don't you?
>
> Well, booting in Linux I get:
> ide1: BM-DMA at 0xffa8-0xffaf, BIOS settings: hdc:DMA, hdd:DMA
> hdd: IC35L040AVER07-0, ATA DISK drive
> hdd: 80418240 sectors (41174 MB) w/1916KiB Cache, CHS=79780/16/63, UDMA(100)
>
> So all seems well until:
> hdd: dma_intr: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }
> dma_intr: error=0x40 { UncorrectableError }, LBAsect=45097371, sector=2621448
> end_request: I/O error, cmd 0 dev 16:4b (hdd), sector 2621448
>
Might something you have done (other than breathe) brought this about ?
(Kernel upgrade , change of ide cable ...)
I presume you are using an 80 wire cable.
What have you got on hdc ?
Are you overclocking ?
>From what little I understand this problem can come about for a few of reasons:
Either the disk is dying - but you may be able to salvage some of your data before t dies.
or the DMA controller is having trouble.
Things to try ...
1. Either remove all references to hdd partitions from fstab etc or boot from a rescue floppy/cd. You want disk access under manual control.
2. Use hdparm to pare the disk extras back to slower access modes (eg udma2,mdma2 then no DMA)
(Do read 'man hdparm' first if you haven't. It is like 'dd', a good tool but sit on your hands and re-read what you have typed before you hit return :)
First try to Limit/Turn off dma access
(hdparm -d1 -Xudma2 /dev/hdd | hdparm -d0 /dev/hdd)
You might find the drive in a tizzy after your error message so you
might need either hdparm -w (may not work) or a reset between tests.
3. Repeat (2) but do it to both hdc on hdd. I've seen status=0x51's and other problems when one drive on a channel was in a transfer mode the other didn't understand.
4. Try a new cable.
5. Try it in an older machine (again slower disk access)
7. If it is a ext[2|3] file system 'e2fsck -c -c ...' (and yes you will probably want to specify the -c twice). WARNING - this might loose you data.
6. Pray to $DEITY
> and it just says that lots and refuses to boot. Whilst doing this, the hard
> disk makes strange noises, which I can't really describe, but not like
> initialising or normal reading. (Do I remember correctly that somewhere
> there is a collection of sound files of differently dead hard disks?)
>
Something like:
http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/~hsakr/hdspeakers/hdspeakers.htm
> Booting from a CD has the same effect and Windoze freezes on boot up with it
> in. One thing is that this is just a data disk, so I haven't lost any OS
> stuff... but that's more replacable than the data.
>
> Anyone got any bright ideas as to what I might try?
>
> Hope you all enjoyed The Matrix Reloaded... not that I'm entering into the
> debate on that!
>
Film was a bit dull really. I thought the special effects which gave the first one it's wow factor were done to death and there were too many badly done 'fight by wire' bits. Also Morpheus kept carping on about his bloody prophecy. Overall a good night though.
Have fun,
Duncan
--
Duncan John Fyfe X-ray Astronomy Group,
Dept. of Physics & Astronomy,
Phone +44 116 252 3635 University of Leicester,
E-mail djf@star.le.ac.uk University Road,
Leicester, LE1 7RH, U.K.