[ale] two sata drives fail at the same time?

[Michael H. Warfield]

On Sun, 2009-12-06 at 15:49 -0500, Geoffrey wrote: 
> Calvin Harrigan wrote:
> > Geoffrey wrote:
> >> So, what are the chances that two different sata drives, same 
> >> manufacturer (wd), that were purchased at different times, would fail at 
> >> exactly the same time?
> >>
> >> Is it possible for a drive failure to cause another to fail?  I'm 
> >> grasping, but I just can see this happening.
> >>
> >> They were connected to an interface card, so I removed it and connected 
> >> them to the onboard interface, no go.  both drives appear to exhibit low 
> >> clicking sounds.
> >>
> >> This pretty much sucks.
> >>
> >> This system sits behind a decent ups/surge protector, no problems with 
> >> any other hardware and no recent electrical issues known.
> >>
> >>
> >>   
> > Bad power supply/bad 12v rail/bad connection?  Using any molex
> > splitters/converters?

> I would think that the drives would simply not be visible then? 
> Apparently, it sees the drive(s) when it tries to boot, since it won't 
> boot, not even into bios.

No, actually, that's not true.  If the 5V rail were bad, then the
electronics would not have power and that would be true.  If the 5V rail
is good but the 12V rail is bad, you lose motors and actuators but the
PCB is still active and powered and trying to spin it up (and failing).
I've seen this before and, yeah, the 12V rail is your prime suspect.  It
might not even be totally dead, just far enough out of tolerance.

Mike
-- 
Michael H. Warfield (AI4NB) | (770) 985-6132 |  mhw at WittsEnd.com
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