Hard Drive Question

[Burkeville]

Hello,
I have just started using 120 gig drives and they seem to give me more problems than the 60s or 80s. How full should I let a drive get?? Has anyone else had problems like this?
Thanks

[Bob L]

The 120 gig 7200 drives have been all I have been using pretty much since they first came out. I have'nt experienced any problems.

Exactly what kind of problems are you talking about?

Bob L

[Burkeville]

Hmm, sometimes windows will not see the drive at all or say it was unsafely removed. I have lost 1 120 gig drive recently and got a new one on warranty and now it is playing up too . Although it is pretty full . Only 3 gig free.

Every client always has a safety drive. One for storage and one back up that I drag and drop to at the end of every session. Seems to be the fastest cheapest way . Perry thinks this is not good for 10 years plus storage though. Unless I keep a old machine running for that purpose. I still get the odd quarter track and even f1 tapes in. Thankfully I still have the machines.

kb

[Bob L]

I have noticed that sometimes things can get weird when people are using the ATA-100 port on some motherboards, which probably require special drivers to be installed.

I have seen drive performance and stability go up drastically by re-connecting to the ATA-33 port (if the motherboard has a choice) and removing the special drivers leaving only the basic bus mastering drivers installed.

Many tend to scoff at ideas like this, but I have personally solved many tech issues for many of my users with this suggestion.

Again, this is just a suggestion and may or may not solve what you are experiencing... definitely experiment at your own risk. :)

Other more technical wizard masters of the hardware may be able to shed different light on this matter.

Bob L