Hard Drive failure...is this fatal? at DVinfo.net

Neil Rostance · April 19th, 2009, 09:57 AM

Hi Everyone,

Hope this is a suitable sub-forum for an external hard drive question!

I have 2 x LaCie d2 500GB eSATA-II 3Gbits External Hard Drive's connected to a Mac Pro. They have had flawless performance for over a year. Until yesterday....

I have these drives set to go to sleep when not in use. Every now and again they power up and spin up. One of the drives kicked-in and I could hear the disc spinning. I could then hear a very faint grinding. Very faint....but definitely a grind.

I turned the disc on and off again. It loaded fine.

Today i load my computer up and the hard drive attemps to spin. It doesn't grind, but it doesn't get past a low speed attempt to boot up. It repeats this until i shut it off again.

Is this a terrible sign? There are about 40gb worth of project not backed up and i'm beginning to get the fear.

Thanks for any advice.

Cheers,
Neil

Neil Rostance · April 19th, 2009, 10:21 AM

Panic over!

I'll post my fix just for anybody else's reference. It turns out the power supply to the drive is faulty...not sending enough juice to spin the disc fast enough. Swapped power supply over and it works fine!

LaCie - External Hard Drives, DVD±RW Drives, Monitors

Mitchell Lewis · April 19th, 2009, 11:34 AM

This has been a very common problem for us and our LaCie drives. We've had at least 4 power supplies replaced by LaCie (free of charge). It's sure scary when it happens, but then relief when everything is good again.

Dean Sensui · April 19th, 2009, 04:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neil Rostance

There are about 40gb worth of project not backed up and i'm beginning to get the fear.

Now that it's working again, make your backups immediately and dread nought.

April 19th, 2009, 09:57 AM	#1
Neil Rostance Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Lace Market, Nottingham, UK Posts: 194	Hard Drive failure...is this fatal? Hi Everyone, Hope this is a suitable sub-forum for an external hard drive question! I have 2 x LaCie d2 500GB eSATA-II 3Gbits External Hard Drive's connected to a Mac Pro. They have had flawless performance for over a year. Until yesterday.... I have these drives set to go to sleep when not in use. Every now and again they power up and spin up. One of the drives kicked-in and I could hear the disc spinning. I could then hear a very faint grinding. Very faint....but definitely a grind. I turned the disc on and off again. It loaded fine. Today i load my computer up and the hard drive attemps to spin. It doesn't grind, but it doesn't get past a low speed attempt to boot up. It repeats this until i shut it off again. Is this a terrible sign? There are about 40gb worth of project not backed up and i'm beginning to get the fear. Thanks for any advice. Cheers, Neil

April 19th, 2009, 10:21 AM	#2
Neil Rostance Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Lace Market, Nottingham, UK Posts: 194	panic over! Panic over! I'll post my fix just for anybody else's reference. It turns out the power supply to the drive is faulty...not sending enough juice to spin the disc fast enough. Swapped power supply over and it works fine! LaCie - External Hard Drives, DVD±RW Drives, Monitors

April 19th, 2009, 11:34 AM	#3
Mitchell Lewis Trustee Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Kennewick, WA Posts: 1,124	This has been a very common problem for us and our LaCie drives. We've had at least 4 power supplies replaced by LaCie (free of charge). It's sure scary when it happens, but then relief when everything is good again. __________________ Sony EX3, Canon 5D MkII, Chrosziel Matte Box, Sachtler tripod, Steadicam Flyer, Mac Pro, Apple/Adobe software - 20 years as a local videographer/editor