Hi all

After my hard drive died yesterday, the journey into work and back today was just too much without at least some music so, when I got home tonight, I decided to stick an old 540mb laptop drive into the player until I get my hands on another drive.

After I'd put the drive in, I fired the player up and all was well. I then put the case back together, and got a drive error. So I stripped it all down again, got it working, reassembled, and same thing. In the end, I found it was nothing to do with the drive cable.

With the case lid off, the player works fine. With the lid on, I get a drive error. Moving the lid over the drive when it's running causes odd noises to come from the drive. Thinking it was something like the fact the case lid has become magnetised somehow, I tried taking the drive out, and doing the same thing with the lid outside of the player. With the drive out, the player works fine, and doesn't do anythng out of the ordinary no matter where you put the case lid. It's only when it's within the case that the problem occurs.

I've now shelved the whole idea, and I'll just have to listen to my car rattle until I can get another drive but....

Could this be anything to do with the previous drive's failure? Are older drives that much different, and hence more prone to interference from something that's not an issue with later drives? Am I safe putting a new drive in? And, having read an old post on the board that suggested magnetism shouldn't be an issue with laptop drives, what's likely to be causing this to happen?

More than a little confused!

Dominic

The top is probably squeezing the drive cable, this happened with my Emepg last year. It turned out to be a faulty drive cable. I could hold the cable up and it would work, but if I put the drive in the Empeg and pressed it down (like the top does) it would quit working.

Have you tested your old drive in a laptop?

It's definitely not the cable. With the player sat on my desk, it'll boot fine with the lid off. Without moving the case, if I then place the lid onto the top of the case and reboot, I get a disc error.

Dominic

if I then place the lid onto the top of the case and reboot, I get a disc error.

And the IDE cables are not being touched, in the slightest, at all, by the lid? Are you sure?

When you're getting intermittent failures like that, sometimes even the slightest nudge of an intermittent connection will make it work again. The slightest movement of any affected component will do it.

Also, check the IDE header for the solder problem. There is a photo of it linked in the other thread you posted on this topic.

Nope - definitely not cable related. The cable's tucked right down near the board, so the case lid can't touch it. The player's laid flat on a solid desktop. It reboots cleanly every time with the lid off, and no adverse boot messages.

If you gently lower the lid onto to top of the case then power cycle, it hangs, the boot message shows an error and the player displays no hard disk found. It's like the lid's somehow radiating something nasty into the drive. I'm just praying now that the same doesn't happen when the new drive I've got on order turns up.

Dominic

That's the strangest thing I've ever heard.

Perhaps it has something to do with magnetism. Lowering the lid changes the magnetic field or something. Very odd.

There was someone else who had the same trouble... Searching...

Is there any sign of damage to the IDE cable along its length? There were instances where the drive tray or the cover wore away the insulation on the drive cable, causing it to short with the cover on. You may also want to look for any grounding issues.

In reply to:

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That's the strangest thing I've ever heard.

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Yep, very strange. I wish I had a decent video camera so I could prove I'm not just going mad

Searching around, there was a thread about speaker proximity and whether magnetisim might mess with the drives. The general consensus then was that magnetism shouldn't really be an issue. If that's the case, I can only assume it's the circuitry for the VFD that's causing it. Sliding the lid back so it's still covering the drive, but about 1.5" away from the display stops it, which seems to back that up. Can't help but wonder if it might explain some of the other mysterious intermittant drive problems other people have experienced?

Dominic

Feel free to pop in and show it to Hugo some time (call first, he may be travelling).

Rob

Cheers Rob. If the new drive shows signs of doing the same thing, I might have to do that at some point.

I'm wondering if this could be the basis of a theory as to why some people experience intermittant boot errors - something on the VFD is generating noise, the problem is worse when it's cold (which seems logical) and some drives (Fujitsus in particular) are more prone to being effected by it than others.

Now all I need to work out is a) how on earth you can actually test whether that's the case, and b) how you overcome the problem!

Dominic

Does it still fail with a sheet of paper between the lid and the rest of the Empeg?

silly idea, but is it possible to coat the inside part of the lid with some sort of material (electrical tape) so that whatever strange force is being emmitted is blocked?

Electrical tape is just plastic so wouldn't block anything unless of course the lid is shorting something out

It still fails with the paper there.

Dominic

Paul,

You might be thinking of me. The sharp solder points on the display board had punctured the IDE cable. When I pushed a certain button, it shorted into the cable and the player would crash. On the other hand, you might not be thinking of me. You seem to have an astonishing memory and ability to find old posts...

Jim

Unfortunately, I don't remember...

This is a pertty odd phenomenon. Does this happen with anything else? Have you tried other objects above the drive? Like another piece of sheet metal, or other metal objects - maybe even a magnet (er, maybe not ) I wonder what would happen with this.