Pavilion a1210.uk freezes following new HDD installation

[tipshorn-al]

Hi,

I wonder if anyone has seen this problem before. I changed out the hard disk for a SATA 500Gb alternative (Samsung). The PC worked fine to start with but began to occasionally freeze. The frequency increased to the point whereby the o/s wouldn't load at all (I could get into the BIOS however). The  visible symptom of the freeze being the disk light stayed on constantly at the freeze point.

I tried changing to the second SATA channel. The PC became stable again. Only a few weeks later for the problem to restart to the point where it froze  as above. I then via a converter attached the disk to the PATA channel. Again, worked to start with but ultimately froze again.

I had kept the old hard disk and after returning to that the PC is stable again. Meanwhile the Samsung is attached as a slave and is fully accessible.

Not sure what is going on here. Any ideas from anyone?

Thanks.

[8lives]

What is the Samsung model #?

[tipshorn-al]

Hi,

HDD is Samsung HD502HI

Cheers.

[8lives]

Since your motherboard on supports 1.5bps, did you apply the Samsung patch file to lower the bps of the HD02HI to 1.5?

[tipshorn-al]

HI,

Yes I did try that, but I can't remember if I put it back to 3.0. I'll check by running the utility again. Thanks.

Al

[8lives]

What BIOS release are you running?

Are you still using the original power supply?

[tipshorn-al]

Hi,

I tried running the utility that boots up in dos to change the transfer rate but it kept failing. Downloaded it again, but same problem (failed copying the .exe utility from d drive to l drive it said). I'm sure that it is in 1.5Gb/sec mode however when I got the HDD.

also

Bios version is 3.37 (worth noting that the motherboard is a replacement but an exact same model of the original. The original got ruined when taking off the heat sink when replacing the processor. The processor got stuck to the heat sink unfortunately).

Yup, still using the original power supply.

Thanks for posting.

Al

[8lives]

Hi, the Samsung should be the only one connected to the motherboard.

Did you try the ES-Tool from Samsung?

[tipshorn-al]

Hi,

I got the Samsung tools to run by disconnecting a second DVD RW that I had added. I ran both tools, the ESTool gave a clean bill of health (didn't run the full surface scan because of how long it would take). I also set again the option for 1.5Gb/sec transfer rate.

After doing the above and re-booting the PC froze - with the HDD light staying permanenlty on. Re-booted a second time and now OK again (for the moment).

I get the feeling this is something to do with the motherboard as the HDD is fine. I recall previously that on occasion the PC wouldn't recognise the HDD at all and therefore couldn't boot past the BIOS.

Cheers, Al

[8lives]

Hi, I would also look at updating the power supply.